It had been way too long since we visited our Texas family, so when we heard that BYU was playing the University of Texas in Austin, we decided it was a great time for a trip. My father-in-law Frank surprised me with tickets so it was a done deal.
As usual, the flights proved interesting. Such is the way of flying stand by. We had hoped to fly out of Columbia because the airport is only about 20 minutes from our house and Baylie wouldn't have had to miss any school. Unfortunately, those flights ended up overbooked. However, we're lucky to live within an hour and a half of three additional airports - Charleston, Charlotte and Greenville-Spartanburg. Our backup plan was Charlotte. The night before deparure those flights ended up overbooked as well. So, at 3:00 Friday morning, we found ourselves headed to Greenville.
I should note that the day before, I realized that a coupon I had for a free photo book from Picaboo was going to expire the next day. It was a $45 value and I still hadn't done birthday books for Jalen or Baylie. That resulted in me staying up all night to create the album.
We wanted to fly to Houston because it's an easier connection, but we ended up flying through Chicago. We love the Chicago O'Hare airport. It has a kid's museum that's like a mini airport and the kids are free to run and make noise. We always have our kids travel in jammies when it's really early or late.
We were able to make it all the way to Austin without getting bumped. David's dad, Grandpa Batch, picked us up at the airport and we spent the day with him and his wife, Granny Dameki. David's sister Rebecca also came over with her two kids, Jazmine and Ezekiel. The kids had a lot of fun reconnecting.
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| Getting a workout. |
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| Crazy boys. |
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| Trying to do push ups like Uncle Patrick. |
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| David doing the 1-minute push up. It's hard to do! |
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| You okay, Dad? |
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| More push ups. |
Baylie fell asleep on the couch. I slept on the other one so she wouldn't be afraid when she woke up. Jalen decided to join us as well. I couch hopped all night and Jalen followed me. I was pretty tired come morning.
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| With Grandpa. |
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| And another angle since Grandpa insisted we get a good picture of his truck. |
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| Jalen, Ezekiel and Carter. |
The next day we went to David's mom's house, Granny Janis. We met up with Uncle Isaac's kids, Carter and Skylar and Aunt Casey's kids, Alex and Gracie.
Baylie and her Granny Janis have a common afinity for puzzles.
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| David and his big brother Isaac. |
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| Isaac and Carter. |
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| Isaac and his kids - Carter and Skylar. |
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| Isaac photobombs the girls - Baylie, Skylar, Gracie and Jazmine. |
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| The siblings - Isaac, Casey, Reecca (with Ezekiel) and David. |
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| PawPaw Frank and Granny Janis. |
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| Granny Dameki and Grandpa Batch. |
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Grandkids with Grandpa and Granny Dameki
Baylie, Jazmine, Grandpa, Granny, Jalen, Ezekiel, Gracie, Carter, Alex, Skylar. |
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Grandkids with PawPaw and Granny Janis
Baylie, Jazmine, Granny, PawPaw, Jalen, Ezekiel, Gracie, Carter, Alex, Skylar. |
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| The Dudes. |
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| Flexing. |
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| The Ladies. |
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| Flexing? |
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| The whole fan damily. |
Baylie has a song she made up about buttercups, so she was really excited to see that her Granny had buttercups. She had to take a picture of them.
Frank and I left the bedlam behind and headed to the game. I miss going to BYU football games and was so excited to get to see one.
The University of Texas stadium has a capacity of 100,119, making it the eighth largest stadium in the United States and the thirteenth largest stadium in the world.
I didn't think it was as big as the South Carolina stadium, but it turns out it's bigger (SC stadium holds just over 80K, not including standing room only seats and BYU stadium holds just over 63K).
The BYU fans couldn't handle the heat. We all hung out under the stadium until game time.
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| Coach Dave Rose was wandering around before the game. |
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| Jimmer Fredette doing a pre-game interview. |
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| Pregame. |
The BYU fans were well represented. I couldn't help but wonder if other visiting teams had such large crowds.
After the game, the team came over to thank the fans. They really had great fan support throughout. Of course it's easy to cheer for a team that thumps their opponent 41-7.
Since there was no band, the fans took it upon themselves to sing the Cougar Fight Song after each score. That was a lot of singing!
Our flight home was not as smooth as our flight to Texas. We left for the airport at 4:00 a.m. on Sunday only to be bumped off three flights in a row to Houston. We then decided to try for Chicago again and we did make it to Chicago, where we got bumped again.
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| Jalen fell asleep while we were eating lunch. |
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| David was very excited to get himself a Schlotsky's original sandwich. |
Eventually, David and Baylie were able to catch a flight to Columbia. That was good because Monday was picture day and we didn't want Baylie to miss any more school. It was bad because our car was in Greenville. They had to take a cab home. (It was so late that we didn't want to bother anyone for a ride.) I stayed behind in Chicago because it's easier for me to arrange for new flights since I'm the one with airline experience. That meant David had to teach my seminary class.
I decided to stay until the following day and try for Greenville first thing in the morning. That way we could pick up the car. I have spent the night in airports before, but I'm much older now and I had Jalen with me. It was a stupid choice to stay in the hotel this time. We should have stayed in a hotel, even though it would have cost us money we don't have.
Poor Jalen! I didn't have warm clothes or pajamas for him. The airport was freezing cold. He was such a trooper and didn't even complain.
Sometime in the night, someone on the airport cleaning staff brought us each a blanket. What a relief! It was really cold by then.
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| Jalen is under this blanket, snuggled up with me. |
At about 3:00 a.m. we went for a potty break. It was so strange to see this huge airport that is normally so busy practically empty.
The following morning Jalen and I got on a flight at 6:40. Unfortunately, it had a mechanical problem. After sitting on board for over an hour, we ended up changing planes and finally departed at about 11:00. Obviously I hadn't slept well in the airport, so that meant I had gone three nights in a row without a good night's sleep. I was beyond exhausted.
Jalen was amazing. He cried a little when his daddy and Baylie left, but after that he never cried or complained. He was just happy and such a great companion. When we got to Greenville, I realized he must be starving. He had a little bit of banana bread left over from the day before, but nothing else. But he never complained or asked for anything.
When we finally got to Greenville, I was relieved to find our car was still there and nothing had been taken from it since we had forgotten to lock it up. When we had arrived at the airport, the parking ticket machine was broken so they had to hand write our ticket. When we got ready to leave, we couldn't get out of the parking lot. Fortunately, it didn't take long for someone to come help us and let us out.
We got back to Columbia just in time to pick Baylie up from school at 2:30. By the time we got home around 3:00, I was barely fuctioning. I went and laid down and slept until 6:00 p.m. when Baylie woke me up. The following morning after seminary, I slept for another four hours.
All in all it was a great trip. We need to visit Texas more often. Our kids love being around their cousins, aunts, uncles and grandparents.
P.S. Have I mentioned lately that I am in desperate need of a new camera?!
