A Trip Out West

(Grand Teton Range and the Snake River below it.)

On July 4th, Lily, Ethan and I boarded a plane for Idaho to visit Lily's Grandpa Dan and Grandma Charlotte. We had a good time seeing Ethan's parents and Lily got to meet several of her aunts--Jane, Marlys and Lavonna--and uncles--Dick, John, Roy and Rodney, in addition to seeing her Uncle Luke, who was also there. Everyone was in Idaho Falls to celebrate Dan's recent retirement from the USGS.

On Tuesday, Ethan and I drove Luke to the airport in Jackson, WY, which is 2 hours from Idaho Falls. Lily stayed behind with Grandma and Grandpa, who had a great time taking care of her, while Ethan and I went on a 10-mile rafting trip on the Snake River in Jackson. It was gorgeous and relaxing.

We also visited the Idaho Falls Zoo, where Lily was really, really interested in the swinging apes in the primate house. Monkey see, monkey do!

On every leg of our airplane trip to and from Idaho, Lily was a gem--especially on the return. We flew to Denver from Idaho Falls and got on our last plane to head from Denver to DC. After we pulled away from the gate, passengers (including us!) heard a loud thumping noise, which eventually, after much investigation by the crew, sent our plane back to the gate.

We were all allowed to disembark while the mechanics tried to figure out the problem and ended up spending a long 8 hours in the Denver airport. It was quite an adventure--Lily spit up all over herself, so she ended up with a brand new t-shirt from the airport gift shop (Future Ski Bunny!); we ran out of diapers, but luckily you can buy almost anything in the airport; and our stroller was gate-checked and they wouldn't get it off the plane for us, so we had to carry all of our stuff and Lily back and forth through the airport.

They finally found a new plane for us and we took off over 5 hours late. As consolation, United offered all of the passengers free cocktails. Lily's mom and dad could use one after our long day and let's just say that airplane "mini bottles" are the perfect size for baby hands! We screwed the lid back on the empty bottle, cleaned it off and handed it to a travel-tired Lily.

She was such a trooper and only cried the last 15 minutes of our flight...then passed out on Ethan's shoulder from exhaustion!