The Show Me State

Vacation!  Lori and Cooper jetted off into the wild blue yonder yesterday morning!  Off to Missouri to spend time with family while I am headed to Philly for a national conference this week.  Lori split up her parental leave time, and it works out perfectly to take these last two weeks of the leave with her family in The Show Me State.  

Let's not talk about how hard Day One was for me......

We both pride ourselves on being low-key parents, but traveling with a kid is such a project!  Handled the clothes just fine.  Bottles and such were not a problem.  And you know me, Ziploc bags were utilized!  We had to make sure we were thinking of everything and every possible health and temperature situation.  Taken care of beautifully.  Lori and Cooper managed to fit both of their things into one big suitcase.  Perfect.  

We bought a big duffel-like bag so we could check the carseat since it is needed, and the crap we managed to shove in there!  We had lots of room since we brought the infant seat instead of his new huge up-to-60-pounds monstrosity that is in our car now.  We also crammed his Bumbo seat, jumpy door frame thing (bec it is hysterical to watch him in it), infant life vest, swimming diapers, monitors, bottle bag, and a few diapers/formula to keep him well cared for before heading to the grocery store.  The best part?  We got to the airport to check-in, and carseat bags are "freebies" and don't count as checked baggage.  If they only knew! 

Oh, and Cooper's first flight?  FIRST CLASS.  

I was able to get a gate pass to go through security and hang with them until they boarded.  Hey, we saw Rod Stewart in the Admiral's Club!  Cooper got to eat "brunch" of rice and lentil baby food, look at the planes and activity at the window, flirt with several travelers, and then this poor exhausted child fell asleep in my arms until they called their flight.  

The weary traveler.  Doesn't he look big?
So we walked down to the gate, and we said our goodbyes.  I won't see Lori and Cooper until I fly out on the 7th to spend the second week all together.  And this sounded like a good plan up until that moment!  Lori had some juggling to do to get a sleeping child out of the stroller, carrying a huge backpack, holding the diaper bag, and folding up the stroller to be gate-checked.  Hopefully their first class status entitled her to a little assistance in her endeavors!

I think he was looking for me! LoL

Lori was stressing (lori? stressing?) about flying with Cooper on his maiden voyage all by herself.  Understandable.  You never know how babies are going to react to the experience.  But happy to report that Cooper had no issue whatsoever.  He slept on/off and played with the couple of toys we packed in the diaper bag.  Perfect.  Even the guy sitting next to Lori, who was presumably less-than-thrilled seeing an infant, said that he would share first class with Cooper any time!  

Got picked up by Mike with no problem in St. Louis, and Cooper spent the rest of the day being played with by his adoring fans.  So happy that they are able to spend some quality time with family these two weeks.  I believe the plan is to stay in St. Louis until Sunday, and then head to Jeff City with Robyn, Matt, and the boys until traveling to Arkansas with Lori's parents on Wednesday.  I fly in to Little Rock on the 7th.  Definitely no rest for the weary!