First in Flight

Our weekend started off a little crazy (read scary) and I'm just thankful that we were still able to make our trip to California to see Matt's family as planned. Thursday we worked in a little rice cereal into Noah's bottle late in the evening, though he hadn't had it in a while since we had been trying so many new solid foods. He loves it in the bottle but not a fan when its fed to him, he would much rather eat his sweet potatoes (camote).

He started getting a little fussy around normal time to eat and he only ate about half his sweet potatoes. So we held him for a little while after he was cleaned up. Around 8:30, Noah threw up. Not just any throw up...I'm talking exorcist style vomiting minus the head spinning. Poor Matt and poor little No No. They were both covered and my little nino looked so scared. :( We got him settled down, cleaned and changed. He started giggling and didn't have a temp so we felt a little better, we just figured the rice cereal didn't sit well and this was a side of his reflux we have yet to see (*insert deer in the head lights look*). Noah then proceeded to throw up two more times and then passed out. Matt and I were very anxious about what was going on with our little boy and figured we'd call the emergency line for the DR to just be on the safe side even though he didn't have a temp. We figured if the No No woke up in the middle of the night and got sick again we'd post pone our trip :( But we would play it by ear in the morning.

Fast Forward to 5am Friday morning, Mama and Daddy are both restless and nervous about the little one and our impeding trip. I go to check on Noah before I jump into the shower and that little ham is wide awake chewing on his sleep sac! Hilarious! When I tell him good morning/buenos dias (the kid loves loves loves Spanish!) he just smiles and giggles at me. Needless to say he was FINE! :) Yay! Game on! :) The morning was a whirl wind but we managed to accomplish all of the below in under an hour and get on the road to the airport:

• Pump
• Finish packing
• Feed a baby
• Dress a baby
• Shower and dress two adults
• Pack the car

Lessons Learned from the airport:

• Noah in a front carrier only works if he is asleep. Half way through our walk to the United check in he started waking up which resulted in him almost wiggling himself out from his flailing arms and legs...it would have been utterly hilarious any other time but 6:30 in the am with little sleep wasn't that funny :p
• Attempting to bring all our luggage from Daily Parking Lot 2 to the United check in with an 18lb baby is utterly INSANE! We must must must use a luggage cart next time. Thankfully we saw the error of our ways and remedied this at LAX and our return trip to IAD.
• Declaring baby milk will still result them in putting it in some funny scanner which takes a little more time through security.
• iPads and Kindles should be taken out of bags and put in the bin separately even though they don't tell you to, this will prevent an extra run through to recheck.
• If you bring a mini cooler for breast milk in your back pack, make sure you declare it. Since the ice pack is technically a frozen liquid. If it is not frozen all the way through they will make you throw it away since they cannot check it...good advice.
  
• People will try to touch your baby...everyone either loves your baby or is trying to use the force in the hopes of making your baby mute for the duration of the flight. The later is normally accompanied with a death stare.
• Checking all bags and only bringing 3 carry ons (diaps bag, backpack of goodies for Mama and Daddy and the pump bag) is the way to go! :) Easy breezy beautiful!
• Traveling with a young one does have its advantages. Everyone at security is so nice and considerate (poor TSA folks really get a bad wrap), we ever got to line jump at LAX because of Noah :)
• Waiting to get on the plane last and get off last really makes boarding/baggage claim a breeze! :)

Noah was such a trooper! :) We were/are so proud of how well he did at the airport and on both flights! :) We ended up trading off carrying Noah in the airport which resulted in both Matt and I having extremely sore arms that made us feel like we went through a very intense bicep workout at the gym :P Noah was curious about everything and flirted/made friends with tons of people...such a little ham! Here is the little ham at our gate excited for his first plane ride:
Noah was a little star for the first flight to LAX. He took his bottle for take off and giggled at landing. He slept for most of the flight. Thank God he takes after Matt and is a good little flier...unlike his Mama! We only had one minor hiccup on both flights...Noah spit up a little and it landed perfectly into Mama's crotch. Gotta love baby vomit in your crotch that makes you look like you've peed your pants :)

Pumping on the plane was a success :) I pumped twice going and twice coming back with no issues/incidents other than weird looks when I was in there for over 15 mins and the occasional knock/attempt to open the door when it clearly says OCCUPIED! I would take pumping in the airplane bathroom over the airport bathroom. I did have to do that once at LAX. Hilarious! They had auto-flush toilets and no lid, so in order for me to sit and pump versus standing the whole time, I had to drop trough and take a sit. I was worried if I didn't drop the pants, it would be my luck the toilet would be flushed and then I would have a real mess on my hands er butt :P

We enjoyed ourselves in California visiting friends and family but are so happy to be home! Noah was very excited when we landed last night :)
I'll be back later with an update on our whole weekend and my first Bat Mitzvah! :)