Great Grandmas Galore!

For the last week of August, Robin took his first plane ride to Buffalo, to visit his Great Nana.

But that's not all! The weekend before we left, we went to Colorado Springs to stay the night with Dean's grandma, so Robin saw his Great Grandma Virginia right before Great Nana. Such bounty! Dean's parents and sister came up to Colorado Springs as well, so we all went out to dinner together. We stayed at Virginia's apartment and Del, Cyndy, and Kathy stayed in a hotel room across the hall--Virginia lives in a building that is half apartments and half hotel, so they were able to get the room right across from her. The next day, we swam in the pool and then had Virginia's famous shrimp salad and pear pie for lunch. Dean and I ran off to explore the Garden of the Gods for a few hours after that while the doting grand-and-great-grandparents babysat.

Robin did really well on the plane to Buffalo. He shrieked a few times, but mostly they were happy shrieks with only a few cries. It was really great that we had Grandma Sue and Poppa Jim with us, so Robin had four laps to travel between. And on the first leg of our journey there, the seat next to us was free so we were able to bring his carseat onboard and strap him into the seat. For the second leg, the seat was sold but I think we scared away the man who had it (maybe it was me saying I would nurse him once we were airborne) so we had the space next to us empty again. They'd already checked our carseat at the gate though, so we weren't able to strap him in that time.

Sleep while we were gone was interesting. Robin was, of course, overtired from the trip (the only naps we managed to get him to take on the plane were when he fell asleep while nursing) and then he cried for a long time when we put him to bed because he was in a strange place. That happened for the next two nights (and days, with naps) as well, but each time the crying was shorter. For the second half of the week, he went down to sleep pretty well, although we still didn't have much of a schedule. He slept in a second-hand pack-n-play (playpen) that one of my mom's aunts found at a consignment store in Buffalo. There is nowhere in the greater Buffalo area that rents children's gear and it would've cost us $50 ($25 each way, for the second bag) for us to take our own. So it was cheaper to buy one there than ship ours. Crazy! We were going to consign it back and recoup some of the money, but we decided instead to store it at Nana's house for the next time. This way we'll save ourselves the hassle next time, and once we're done having kids in cribs we'll consign it back.

The trip home was a little bit more interesting. We were behind schedule so rushing a lot, and Robin had a full night's sleep behind him (as opposed to having been awakened 3 hours early, like the first trip) so he was not quite tired enough to sleep on the plane. He was, however, quite cranky by the end. We kept him from screeching by feeding him lots of Cheerios, one after the other. He didn't sleep in the car ride home, either, so after five minutes of nursing back at the house, he was out like a light. I did get him up to eat more solids and nurse once more before his more normal bedtime, just to try to get back on schedule.

So Robin has now been on four airplane rides. He's quite the little flyer!

I'll post more about the trip soon, but just wanted to get this up online. And now I'm going to bed, because just like my son, I'm quite exhausted from traveling. Good night.