Christmas Vacation; part 1

We survived our first flight ever as a family, with a 2 week old baby and a 2 year old (we must have been crazy!).  It didn't all go as planned; earlier on the day we were supposed to fly out I got a text from the airline saying the flight was going to be delayed a hour and a half.  So instead of leaving San Antonio at 5:55, it wouldn't leave till 7ish. I checked our connecting flight to make sure we'd make it, and it looked like we'd just barley make it.  However, since we were flying Southwest and didn't have assigned seats I was worried that we wouldn't be able to find seats together.  So I got on line and found that there was a flight that left at 6:30 and got into SLC half an hour earlier than the planned flight.  I called the airline and they switched us to that flight.  The first leg of our flight home was the longest, 2 1/2 hrs.  The older kids did really well, Hunter started to get whiny a little before the flight landed, and Andrew slept the most of the time in Trent's arms.  When we got to our new gate in Denver we found that our flight going out had been delayed an hour, to allow those whose flights had been delayed in other places make the last flight into SLC for the night.  That ment that instead of getting in at 10:30pm we weren't going to get in until 11:30 SLC time, we are an hour behind in TX, so to us that was 12:30.  Hunter didn't have a nap that day, and we were all TIRED.  Hanna fell asleep on Trent before the flight even took off.  We got lucky and there was one empty seat so we took the car seat on for Andrew and he did really well, slept most of the time.  Carter fell asleep about 5 mins into the flight on me.  Hunter however didn't fall asleep till about 30mins before we landed.  He was soooo tired, but he doesn't usually fall asleep anywhere.  Trying to get 3 sleeping kids, 5 bags, and a car seat off the plane was a bit of a challenge, but we figured it out. As soon as we told Hunter that Grandma was waiting for him he woke right up and walked all the way from the gate to the baggage claim area.  We didn't actually get to my parents house till after 1am.  We got Hunter and Hanna up to bed and looked around....Where was Carter?  Had we left him in the car?  He made it in the door and passed out on the couch.  My brother-in-law carried him up stairs and put him in bed.  I'm pretty sure he still had his coat and shoes on. 

We had so much fun visiting with friends and family!  The kids played in the snow the very first morning we were there.  Hunter, I'm sure, didn't remember snow from last year and went outside first thing in the morning with no shoes or coat on.  We left 70 degree weather in San Antonio to freezing cold in Utah. 

In true Hunter fashion he found many things to get into.  The first order of business, make sure there were no wrapped presents under the tree.  He took care of that right away.

Andrew got all dressed up for church:

Andrew met many cousins, aunts, uncles, and grandparents that were all excited to see him and kiss him:

Miss Brooky LOVED baby Andrew and wanted to hold him every chance she could. Her little smile when she holds him melts my heart, makes me just a little sad she won't get to see him more often.  Everyone got a chance to hold a screaming Andrew.

We giggled with papa and spent lots of time playing with cousins!

One day we drove up to the Logan area to Trent's sisters house and then went out to Hardware Ranch to see the elk.  It was FREEZING!  But fun to see the elk.