Home Again

After a great 9 day trip to Minnesota we are HOME AGAIN!! There is nothing like being away from home for that long and coming back. Dorothy is right to say "There is no place like home". Don't get me wrong we had a blast. We got to meet our brand new nephew and get to know our little niece. Karsten also had alot of fun. He loved playing with his cousin and he slept better while we were away than he does in his own bed sometimes. We got to meet people that we had heard of and seen pictures. We also got to catch up with my Brother and Sister-In-Law that we really haven't gotten to spend much time with the last few years. I also have to mention what great hosts my Brother and Sister-in-law are. We really enjoyed getting to stay with them and they went out of their way to make us feel totally at home. All in all, it was a great trip.

The last day was probably the longest day. We got to the airport at about 9:30 in the morning for an 11:00 flight. I pushed Karsten in the stroller just to keep both of us sane while we were waiting. As we come back to our terminal when it should be about time to start boarding we notice that our plane is not in it's spot. Time goes by and the little screen still says our flight is On Time but there is no plane. About 15-20 minutes before our plane was supposed to leave the gate attendant announces that our plane has brake issues and had been fixed but they have to perform a 25 minute test then taxi over to our gate. (My question was, "Does a plane really need brakes?? They don't work in the air right? When we land they could just use a net and catch us.... I was pretty desperate at this point) Anyway I guess they thought that brakes were pretty important and it should only put us behind 45 minutes in the long run. We have a 2 1/2 hour layover at DFW so this still works. I even would be able to feed Karsten lunch before we get on the plane.

Peter goes for a walk to waste some time and look at a little airplane toy we were thinking of buying Karsten. (We decided against it, it was a little over priced at $8.) While he was gone I was feeding and entertaining Karsten, the gate attendant has an announcement. She starts with"OK, folks I've got some really bad news. This flight has been cancelled. You may get in line and rebook or I have a little stack of phone numbers you could call and rebook over the phone." I jump up to get in line with Karsten in his stroller and remember that I can't leave our luggage. I call Peter, tell him what is going on ask him to get back. He comes back and I immediately get in line. While in a huge line that is not moving at all I ask myself "Why don't I call the number??" I have this fear of talking on the phone to make appointments, order pizza and basically anything else that has to do with making decisions on the phone. This is quite funny since I used to work in a call center at a bank's customer service department. So I go grab a little paper with the number on it and make the call. Right away someone answers, there was no wait time. The lady on the other end of the line was super nice. She very quickly secured the last two seats on the next flight out at 1:00. She also had to change our connecting flight to Abilene. With everything considered it only put us in an hour and a half later than our original flight. The very nice lady on the phone also said that they seats would be two different middle seats. Any one with a child that is 15months old and very busy knows this is a difficult situation. After talking with the gate attendant we were able to get two seats together. They were the ones right behind first class and there was a wall in front of us instead of no leg room and seats. It was so nice. We ended up having a really nice flight. We also landed sooner than expected and were able to catch our original flight to Abilene.

That one was delayed about 30 minutes from being overweight. This is a long time considering that the flight it self only last about 35 minutes. We were able to keep Karten kinda entertained and unable to shake the seat in front of him. By this time Karsten had only slept 30 minutes the whole day so he was absolutely wired. We survived anyway. I guess the moral of the story is that a plane does need brakes and even though your flight gets cancelled the Lord can still orchestrate you to get home somewhere near your original time. Thank you Jesus!! I don't say that lightly. Friday was a long tiring day and I can't imagine how we made it through except by the grace of God!!!!