Chicago, Part 3

Okay, so now that I’ve drawn this out forever…

Monday–We get up and Mom, Cooper, and I go over to my aunt’s house to spend a little more time with her, my cousin, and the kids (and for me to shout exiting orders to that baby in the belly…STILL in there, as of this post). We just sat and chatted while Mom and I laughed at the kids bickering (they were tired), and then all four of us adults just sat around on the floor with Cooper while the two older kids napped.

After a few hours, we drove back to Mom’s and waited for my brothers, Jeremy and Doug, to stop by to see Cooper one last time (or for the first time, in Doug’s case) before we left. Mom was good and took pictures…I was bad and forgot. If she ever emails them to me, I’ll be sure to post. My brothers left and I put Cooper down, then watched a little TV with Mom. Cooper wanted to make sure his grandparents didn’t forget him and got up at 4-something screaming for a bottle, again.

Tuesday–We’re up and at ’em early, getting ourselves out the door to catch our plane back to DC. We give my Mom a million hugs in the freezing, windy, 35-degree weather, check the bags, and run into the building. We get through security even easier than a few days before (Midway had more lanes open than Dulles did), and walk around in the over-priced shops before going to our gate…where we seem to be missing a plane. We stroll around some more, then I finally give up and just sit and sit and sit. Plane finally shows up (and um, they refuse to tell us where it’s been, all late, running with that rowdy crowd), folks get off and we hustle on there.

Once we’re at cruising altitude, we’re told we will more than make up our 40-minute delay because we have a very helpful 145mph tailwind that will shoot us into DC right on time. So we land a couple minutes early and then wait AN HOUR for our bags. You’d swear that the bags were on a different plane that didn’t have the benefit of the tailwind. Unfortunately, this is always the case with Dulles. So consider yourself warned if you fly into there…they take forever to get bags out…although that is my only gripe about that airport…everything else is really good and efficient.

Justin greets us at baggage, and when we finally get the bags, we haul ourselves out to the car, pick up Gavin (who barely acknowledged me, but was happy to see Justin and Cooper), then run to The Best Target in the World so that I can get a new hairdryer:

Ladies, this would be the Conair Infiniti Cord-Keeper Tourmaline Ceramic Ionic Hair Styler. I used to have an ionic dryer and this one completely blows it away…my hair’s dry in about 1/2 the time it was with the old dryer…and this one’s lighter, quieter, and it’s got a fun little button to zip up the cord! I am usually a very ~~cheap~~ thrifty shopper, but I thought I’d splurge a little and snapped this puppy up for about $35. I’m glad I did…it was worth the money.

So we’re finally home and we fell right into our usual routine again. We put the kids to bed and HALLELUJAH! that child chirped a bit in his sleep a few times, but he SLEPT THROUGH THE NIGHT. And has done so every night since!!!! WEEEEEEEEEE!