Minnesota Bound

We took the whole family out for dinner for what I think might be the first time. It was a McDonald's in Butler, Missouri. It was a nice McDonald's with friendly people. The kids were great.

Here we are unloading cargo in Des Moines.

Happy New Year from Chichicastenango

Here's What Flew By -- La Ceiba to San Pedro Sula

Antigua Bound

Here is where we are headed today.

Antigua, Guatemala.

We're traveling by bus and hope to update the blog throughout the day. We have mobile wireless, so we should be able to do it. It's 0538 right now. We should be in Antigua by nine p.m.. We're riding a Hedman Alas bus, which is the best way to go here in Honduras.

Wish us luck. Traveling by bus for over twelve hours with an 11 month old might not be the smartest thing we've ever done.

From your grandson

Dear Papa,
I'm sorry that you've been feeling so yucky, but I'm so excited to see you tomorrow. I hope it will make you feel better!
Love, Zeke




Ezekiel and I (Karine) are taking a little trip to the U.S. this week to visit my parents. My dad has had a couple surgeries in the past week and things are looking much better for him now. He should have a rotator cuff in working order pretty soon! In the meantime, Zeke and I are looking forward to a little quality time with Papa and Nana. Tom is going to stay home and take care of everything on the homefront for the week.

Lost and Found

Karine and I have different philosophies when it comes to luggage. Or to stuff in general. She likes more, I like less. I would love to travel with nothing. Luggage is the single worst thing about going anywhere. Here is what we had with us when we flew out of Omaha: 1) Karine, 2) Tom, 3) Giant Suitcase #1, 4) Baby Duffel, 5) The Chicco Cortina Travel System (CCTS), 6) Karine's Purse, 7) The Black Pack.

The Baby Duffel is not a little tiny duffel bag. It is a giant duffel filled with baby gear: pacifiers, receiving blankets, onesies, a Polish Pottery piggy-bank, a swaddler, baby lotions, baby creams, baby bottles, and a bear that makes noise when you press his body parts. The Black Pack is a black Jansport backpack that I have had since high school. It contains vital documents, our laptop, and our cameras. This trip is also contained our ultrasounds and a magazine about German Shepherds.

We lost the CCTS somewhere in Minneapolis. Karine spoke with a nice woman in Omaha about checking it all the way through to Chicago. Here is where our problems start. When we got to Chicago the CCTS was AWOL. This is not good. Karine loves this thing. She researched strollers for weeks. She could be a consultant in the stroller industry. She was upset.

We spoke with John down in the luggage department at Chigaco O'Hare. I call him the luggage guy. He probably has a title of some kind, luggage associate, something like that. He was pretty busy when we talked to him. He was in the middle of a dog swap. A dog swap is when you go to pick up your dog and they give you someone else's dog and say, "Here's your dog!" Then you find out that your dog is in Norfolk, VA. John was untangling one of the those when I asked him about our stroller.

We told him what happened and he typed some stuff in the computer. He took down our number at the hotel and told us that he would send the CCTS if it came in before midnight. But he didn't didn't talk to anyone on the phone. That made me feel uneasy. You think he could just call someone at Northwest Airlines in Minneapolis and ask.

We took a bus over to Midway. We were the only people on the bus. It was a big bus. We arrived at Midway with our remaining luggage just as Rolland Burris was giving a press conference upon returning from Washington. He is a US Senator, sort of.

Burris seems like a nice guy, but he was appointed by this idiot.



We walked past the press conference and went to speak with Leatrice in the luggage department. She made us feel better about everything. She got on the phone and talked to some people. She was really nice the whole time she was helping us. But the CCTS was no where to be found. It had not been located or sent anywhere. So we went to the Holiday Inn.

***Karine just informed me that she told this entire story.***

Today we discovered that everything that was lost had been found. It was waiting for us in San Pedro Sula. The luggage people at Northwest and Delta Airlines found our stuff and figured out how to get it to us. They did a good job. Our stuff was sent to La Ceiba this afternoon. The CCTS is at home now. It is in great shape.

Karine is happy. Ruby is happy. And I am happy.

Our bags had all kinds of crazy tags all over them. This one is our favorite. We hope this unknown luggage person went to that party. And we hope everyone had an awesome time.

Home Sweet Home

We made it! And I didn't even go into labor on the plane or anything!

Tom and I are home in our 80 degree house and so happy to be here. We did arrive with a few less things than we left with. Okay, we arrived empty handed. When we left Omaha yesterday morning, we had a stroller/carseat (my beautiful new Chicco) and two suitcases, and a backpack. We're home safely with our backpack. The rest- well that's a long story...

We had such an easy time in Omaha when the nice lady at Northwest told me that I could "valet check" or gate check my stroller/carseat combo. I thought this would be a good idea because it wouldn't be handled as roughly as other luggage. We wheeled it to our departure gate and were prepared to meet it in our destination city, Chicago. The nice lady said she'd check it through to there since we wouldn't actually need it during our 1 hour layover in Minneapolis. Upon arrival in Minneapolis, we were treated to a ride on the Special People Cart. Since I'm preggo, a nice gentleman set us up with a sweet ride to our next gate.

We arrived in Chicago O'Hare with our 2 suitcases and the backpack, however the stroller/carseat was nowhere to be found! Since it had been gate checked it didn't have the tracking tags on it- just a tag on each that listed its destination. The guy in the lost luggage office at O'Hare was pretty busy and not really a lot of help to us. He was in the middle of dealing with a dog mixup. Apparantly, two dogs with two different destinations (ORD and ORF) were switched and ended up in the wrong cities with the wrong families! This situation made my missing stroller/carseat seem a lot less troubling.

We then had to take a shuttle from O'Hare to Midway airport so we'd be ready for our early morning flight today. We talked with a kind woman in the Midway lost baggage and she helped straighten a few things out and gave us some resources. After arriving at our hotel, Tom proceeded to file the appropriate claims and call all the right people - what a great husband! By 11:45pm, we had received the status that our stroller/carseat was probably gone for good. Nobody had seen it anywhere, and that they'd probably be buying and sending us a brand new one. In the time it takes for the claim to be processed and shipping to occur, they gave us $100 credit to buy a new stroller. The woman on the phone encouraged us to take a midnight taxi to Walmart, buy a stroller, and present the receipt for reimbursement at our 5am check in. I went shopping on Amazon instead. This is what Northwest airlines is buying us for our stroller/carseat troubles:

We woke up at 4am and went to the Midway airport, checked our 2 remaining suitcases and got on our plane. There was a very tight connection in Atlanta (only about 20 minutes because our plane was running late). While we made it to the connecting gate just in time, our luggage did not. Upon arrival in San Pedro Sula, we were down to just our backpack. The people at Delta have located our 2 suitcases and they'll be arriving into La Ceiba tomorrow night. No real biggie, but OF COURSE we'd lose our other 2 bags too!

While the trip home was stressful at times, Tom and I both did a really great job of not getting too worked up. Travel itself is exhausting enough, and I now understand why women in their 8th month of pregnancy don't often travel. The baby is still happily hanging out inside me, and I'm hoping he'll be comfy there for a few more weeks. We're going to fetch our dog in a few minutes and then we'll be so happy to sleep in our own bed tonight. Home Sweet Home!

The Chicco Cortina Travel System

This dream has become a reality for Karine. She actually started weeping when I assembled it in my mother's living room. Tears of pure joy. Now we just have to get it back to Honduras.

Driving North on Hwy 10

Here's Tom lip pointing at a passing train while we are driving on the highway. This is his idea of a really good time. Shortly after this picture was taken Tom's older sister Anne saw the mustache for the first time. She told him that it was gross. Fifteen minutes later it was gone.

1,844 Miles Later....

We find ourselves in beautiful Omaha, Nebraska. I am like the number one supporter of Omaha, worldwide.

Chicago

Here we are in Illinois, where the governor is a laughably corrupt scumbag with ridiculously poofy hair. And his name is Blag-blah-jo-vich. Or something like that. When we arrived we found everything surprisingly yellow.

La Ceiba to San Pedro: Photos of Excitment

On the tarmac at La Ceiba. Prettiest little airstrip in the world.

Our plane had a working ashtray. I took a picture of it.

Just in case you were curious. The departures area at the San Pedro Sula airport.

We always fly into and out of San Pedro Sula. Our first trip into Honduras we flew into Tegucigalpa. That's a really nice airport to fly into. If you like feeling like you are going to die.

Leg 1: La Ceiba to San Pedro Sula

After a delightful breakfast of baleadas and Coke at the La Ceiba airport, we are on our way. We've successfully landed in San Pedro Sula with all of our luggage still with us. We're looking forward to our flight with Delta and a late afternoon meal in Atlanta. We took the picture above while waiting for our luggage in reclamo de equipaje. "Equipaje" is one of my favorite Spanish words. (Ache-ee-pah-hay!) It just sounds fun in my mouth.

Adios Honduras- Hasta Pronto, Estados Unidos!

Airports

We'll be enjoying airports in the following cities over the next forty-eight hours: La Ceiba, San Pedro Sula, Atlanta, Chicago, Minneapolis, Omaha. If we see anything magically awesome or otherwise noteworthy we'll post it. We will not be travelling on Spirit Airlines.

Karine has volunteered to start crying at all of the ticket counters. She thinks it might score us a first class upgrade. We'll see how that goes.

Cayos Cochinos and other stuff

Yesterday, we took our second annual trip to the Cayos Cochinos. (Follow link for pics from last year's trip) This group of small white sand islands are located just 4o minutes by boat and a 25 minute car ride from our house. Yesterday, a group of 8 teachers headed out for a day of snorkeling along the pristine reefs, swimming, eating, and fun. We had a blast!

One highlight for me was that Josue, our guide for the day, asked me how many months I had. This may not seem significant to many people, but for me it meant that I actually looked pregnant and not just fat to someone who didn't know! Here's a picture of Tom and me with Josue and our friend Jason.


While we waited for our lunch of freshly caught red snapper to be prepared in the local Garifuna village of Chachauate, we were entertained by a few of the island kids. There is no tv, electricity, or arcade to keep people entertained out there. Instead, the locals make their own entertainment in the form of kids! One little boy, Pedro, was hanging out with Tom and was loving the Gatorade I shared with him in his cup.


We are so excited for all the celebrations coming up this week. I've got 2 student birthdays in my class on Monday, so we're enjoying cake on Monday and cupcakes on Tuesday afternoon. On Wednesday, the kids are very much looking forward to one of their favorite Honduran holidays- Children's Day. This is a day where the whole country celebrates youth and spends time appreciating children. The PTA has organized a 30 minute, mini-train tour around the city for each grade and a big party at the end of the day. Tom is hoping to accompany all the grades on the train ride since he loves trains so much.

Then on Thursday, we celebrate my 30th birthday. I think I'll make monster cookies and bring them to school for the kids (we're going to have sweets every day this week!) For my birthday, we'll celebrate with an ultrasound and dinner. I'm hoping that the baby will show itself to be a boy or girl as a gift to me on Thursday- we'll keep our fingers crossed!

Finally, on Friday, we will celebrate Independence Day at school. Honduras actually celebrates its independence on the 15th of September, but we've got a 5 day weekend due to the holiday, so we'll celebrate on Friday in school. I'm sure there will be more treats.

In baby news... I felt the baby move for the first time this week! Now that I know what it feels like, I've noticed it every evening. In fact, the little guy/girl is squirming around as I type this blog. It's exciting!

Also, we'd like to thank our readers for their dog advice. After much deliberation and thought, I think we're going to hold off on a second dog for awhile. Ruby might just have to settle for us for now, and then once the baby is born, there will be someone here all day, every day to keep her company.

Home Sweet Home!

After 3 days of trying to get here, we're finally home! Our house and dog look great and we're excited to wear the clothes we haven't seen all summer. We're going to try to find some food here soon, and then settle in. Glad to be back!

Atlanta

Delta, Delta, Delta, Can I help ya, help ya, help ya?

This woman works for Delta Airlines. She helped us get our bags checked for our flight to Honduras. While we were speaking with her we felt as if she actually cared about us. Thank you woman at the Delta ticket counter!

Worst. Airline. Ever.

We're still in Chicago. Our flight from Chicago to Ft. Lauderdale was canceled. The delightfully helpful ticketing agent pictured here told us we could rebook our tickets free of charge on the next available flight. On Friday. We said no thanks. We are done with you Spirit Airlines. We booked a flight on Delta. God has blessed us with one more day in Chicago and we're not going to waste it. We're going to the Polish Museum of America tomorrow.

Pointing Woman: Can I please get on the plane? I have a ticket.
Ticketing Agent: Bite me.
Pointing Woman: Please. I am a human being.
Ticketing Agent: A what?
Pointing Woman: Can I use my ticket for anything besides a flight on Friday?
Ticketing Agent: Eat it.....Next!

We found this review of the Spirit Air experience posted online:

"The Bottom Line: Under no conceivable circumstances would I ever fly on this airline again. I was treated with incompetence and contempt for the duration of my delay-riddled 24 hour spirit experience."

Follow the link for the whole sad story.

Everything in Chicago, Part 2

Tom and I have found Chicago to be a wonderful city! We started our day with a visit to the tallest building in the United States, the Sears Tower.

The view from the bottom....

103 Floors later

This is Tom, lip pointing towards our next destination...


Me getting on the El, the smoothest form of public transportation we've been on all year!


Here we are! We bought some tickets on the street for a shady seat (the kind without direct sun, not the sketchy kind of seats) in historic Wrigley Field.


Jeff Tweedy of the band Wilco, was in town for Lollapalooza. He threw out the first pitch.


Here's what baseball looks like when it's not covered in a dirty dome!

After the game, we stopped in at a pet store to buy this rope bone for Ruby. We're so excited to see her!

After a day of more sightseeing and baseball, we were exhausted. We ordered some yummy Chicago pizza and watched Ironman in our hotel room. It was a great visit, and we'll definitely come back! (Especially if Spirit Air and American Airlines keep up the incredibly low flights between San Pedro Sula and Chicago). Now we're going to pack up our summer suitcases for the last time and go to the airport. Our next post on Karine and Tom in Honduras will actually be from Honduras. Woo-hoo!