Do You Know the Way to Green Bay?

It took 12 hours but thanks to the generousity of my sister and brother-in-law, Owen and I traveled to Green Bay last weekend to help celebrate Mackenzie's first birthday!

Our journey started when we left our house at 7am, continued through a two hour delay in Baltimore and a missed connection; four hours waiting in Detroit for the next flight; walking every inch of the airport as they changed our gate three times; and sitting on the plane, at the gate, for over an hour while our crew tried to locate a ground crew to back us up! Our pilot was so furious that he personally handed out comment cards and urged us all to complain to Northwest, then had the flight attendent give us all drinks on the house once we finally got in the air - after another 20 minute delay for de-icing (KMC - I had a vodka and cranberry in honor of you all).

Throughout it all Owen was an absolute trooper. He made friends with many of our fellow travelers and a lot of people made a point of telling me what a good boy he was. I had been a bit nervous about traveling by myself with him, but he made it (relatively) easy. Still, I was very happy to finally touch down in Green Bay, enjoy a late dinner with Kris, Jeff, my mom and dad and the kids, and relax.

Mackenzie is an absolute sweetheart and made me proud by digging - face first - into her smash cake! Big sister Samantha was a huge help opening presents, and Owen enjoyed all the new toys and playing with his cousins. I'm so glad we could be there.

And, yes, the trip home was shorter - we only had to change airlines because our flight out of Green Bay was delayed and we'd miss our connection in Detroit; our new flight was also delayed; we sat on the runway for 30 minutes waiting for FAA clearance to take off; circled Milwaukee because of high winds in Chicago; then sat through another hour delay before finally taking off for Baltimore. We are staying close to home this weekend!