A LONG goodbye

May 21, 2010

The day we left Australia was a gray and gloomy rainy day. I must admit it mirrored my feeling that day!!! Leaving was SO hard! I'm not sure when I will see my family again and that was extremely trying for me. Yes, Australia is just a plane ride away. But it is a LONG and EXPENSIVE plane ride away! I envy those who's family members live in the states - not too close mind you, but in the states. You don't know how lucky you are!

At the Brisbane airport after they have gone through security and customs you can see your family members through a glass wall on the second floor. So my Mom waited to see us one last time. We waved goodbye and blew kisses as we headed down the terminal to catch our plane. Ryan changed Ezra's diaper and we took turns using the restrooms ourselves. As I was waiting I heard some say "Are you on the flight to LA?" "The plane is broken and they are sending one from Sydney, we have a five hour delay!" WHAT!!!!! Wait this isn't so bad because my Mom is still here because she has to wait for my Dad to get off work and pick her up, we can hang out with her a little longer! WRONG!!!! Once you go through customs you can't go back out. I found my Mom, got her attention and told her, well mimed to her what was going on. I had Ezra's airplane blanket and I pointed to the plane then acted out broken (I'm sure the fact that my plane was broken completely freaked my Mom out) as I also mouthed the words. I'm sure it was quite comical to those around us! The viewing window is on the story above the terminal so I'm looking up and she's looking down. Finally we got wise and pulled out paper! My mom had brought stuff to work on while she was waiting and it just so happened that she had these big notepads. I on the other hand had a pen but no paper. So I resorted to Subway napkins!

here are some of our notes....

"At least we are not dead" This came from me trying to look at the bright side of a five hour layover. I was glad they found the problem with the plane BEFORE we got on it! "Sydney" I was telling her they were sending a plane from Sydney. We could mouth some things but others we could get so that's were are lovely note cards came into play. "Something to blog about" This was me once again looking on the bright side of life, saying that this would be a funny story to blog. "I love you & Goodbye" No explanation needed!

Top left: is when Dad got to the airport. Top middle: is Mom being cute. Top right: is Ezra eating homemade cheese crackers my Mom made and cheese she sent for him. Bottom left: one of the signs. Bottom middle: Mom & Dad. Bottom right: Mom sharpening her pencil.

Being able to see my parents but not really able to talk or be close to them was horrible! They were so close but so far away. It made for a LONG sad goodbye.

Because of the delay the airline gave us vouchers to eat at the food court. For some reason they gave us four $16 vouchers. So we had $64 to eat. The catch is you don't get change for the voucher so you have to figure out the best way to spend the "money". Our first stop The Red Rooster. The crazy thing is we had been wanting to try this place out but had never gotten around to it until we got to the airport.......right before we went through customs. So we payed for it ten minutes before we got some for free. One of the things we got was chips and gravy. Ezra liked the gravy so much that he dipped everything in it.......including his fists!

Our second "meal"
These ice cream bars looked really good but like I said before we had to use one whole voucher at a time or loose it. So we got two ice cream bars and some drinks for later.

I do not have a photo of our third meal is not but we got some subway to take on the plane. Yes, we used our voucher to the fullest!!!

After a LONG delay of miming and eating it was finally time to say......

to Australia!

Now for the plane ride home......
We did not want to have the same experience we had one the way over so we resorted to give Ezra something to help him sleep. Several people in Australia recommended the same product so we thought we would try it. We gave Ezra some the night before to make sure he wouldn't have any problems and he was fine. We had only tried a half dose. On the plane we gave a whole dose........BIG MISTAKE! Ezra was nice and drowsy but he had nightmares and would wake up every twenty minutes fussing and or shaking.....poor guy!!!

So after a long flight we made it to LA. Then we had to drive the rest of the way home. There was problems getting a connecting flight to Vegas so it just ended up working better to rent a car and drive the rest of the way. All of this would have gone A LOT better if ONE: We got sleep on the plane and TWO: if we would have arrived in LA at our original time. Because of the five hour difference in time we then hit LA TRAFFIC! Our car trip was long and Ryan was doing it on NO sleep. Over THIRTY HOURS of no sleep!!!

Thankfully we made it home safely worn and weary but with AMAZING memories that we will NEVER forget!!!