Our Christmas continued at the airport...
Max's present from Brittany was pretty fitting for the day. He loved the digital camera he got from Aunt Aja and brought it with him.
We had a delicious Christmas breakfast/lunch at La Madeleine. Love Field Airport is so nice since the remodel!
When you have a fancy Christmas dress, you wear it even if you are only rocking it in the airport and in the skies!
She was so excited to be on the plane.
Checking out the clouds...
Maxwell was a super traveler
I even got her to fall asleep!!!! Score!
We had a layover in Phoenix and when we got to our gate they were asking for volunteers to give up their seats. So, we did! They would still get us out to SLC that day but it would be 4 hours later and we would get 1500.00 in travel vouchers for our trouble. SCORE!!!! What a deal.
My Grandma Carlson lives in the Phoenix area so I quickly called her and asked if she had plans or if we could come visit. She was just staying home so it was perfect for us to go visit. At that point, we had to hustle to make it happen. I figured that by the time we got a rental car (with car seats since we had checked our car seats) and drove out to Grandma's we would only be able to stay 45 - 60 minutes before we would have to head back to the airport, return the car, go through security again and get back to our gate to board our plane.
There wasn't much room for error so we quickly got moving. While we were on the shuttle to the rental car facility, I had my laptop out making the reservation.
The kids hanging out while we got the car. They were good little troopers.
We needed to eat dinner and I didn't want Grandma to have to worry about trying to feed us so we called and told her we would pick up some food on the way to her house. Easier said than done on Christmas Day. We looked and we looked and the only thing we found open that would work was Jack in the Box. (It was funny that's what we got because when I talked to Brittany earlier, she shared that they had done Jack in the Box for dinner because it was just them and she didn't feel like making a big, special meal.)
It was so fun to pull up to Grandma's house and see her come out to greet us. This was the first time she got to meet Emmalyn and I think it's the first time she got to meet Maxwell too.
We ate our Jack in the Box dinner (mine was gross...good thing I loved my lunch!). But I was really, really grateful we were getting to see Grandma. For multiple reasons. 1 - It made me sad that she was home all alone on Christmas. Such a departure from the busy holidays with her from my youth. I was happy that we hopefully filled her evening with some cheer. 2 - Even though it was only Jack in the Box, I was glad to be able to bring her some dinner so she didn't just have her regular dinner on Christmas. 3 - I love her and it's been far too long since I have been able to spend time with her. 4 - It touched my soul to be able to see her engage with my kids.
It felt like a Christmas miracle to be able to spend an hour with her.
She pulled out this hot wheels track that I remember playing with at her house when I was a kid. Both the kids LOVED it.
She got right down on the floor and showed them how to play with it
video - playing cars with grandma Carlson
Emmalyn kept reaching out to her to get her attention by hitting Grandma in the chest (whoops - sorry Grandma).
Group picture!
I sure love my Grandma (who is now visibly shorter than me!)
4 Generations minus 1 (miss you Mom!!!)
Back at the airport she was still a happy camper which is good considering she has spent most of the day on a plane or in a car
Planes...buses...and automobiles
So we had RUSHED back to the airport only to then have our flight delayed another like hour and a half. :( Such a bummer because I would have loved to have spent more time at Grandma's rather than hang out at an airport trying to entertain kids who were now past their bedtime and still far from going to sleep in a bed.
Trying to keep her entertained
we went through all of our bag of things to play with
luckily getting off and on and off and on and off and on a chair is super fun
Finally on our last leg! Look how exhausted that little face is
We landed at SLC about 5 hours after when we would have originally landed but it was worth it!
We had an issue getting the luggage loaded into the car that was smaller than we were expecting (so frustrating!). The kids and I hung out in the front seat trying to stay warm while the freezing car struggled to heat up while Peter was a trooper and was standing out in the cold trying to fit out suitcases/bags/stroller into a space made for one of those. He eventually succeeded and we got to Aunt Tammy's around midnight. (They were out of town and not getting home until the next day so I was glad they weren't home and disturbed by our late arrival.)
Whew --- what a long day but it was all worth it for that one hour with Grandma - Best Christmas Present ever! Merry Christmas!!!!
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