Seattle!

Henry's in bed, Karl's out to dinner with his parents, and the blackberry is oddly silent, so I finally have a few minutes to write about our trip to Seattle last weekend.   It's hard to believe a year has already gone by since our last trip out west -- I was barely 5 months pregnant and discovered, on our late-night flight, that our proto-Henry really did move around a lot at night.

We were rather nervous about the trip because the flight is so long and a three-hour time change seemed like an ideal way to throw Henry's schedule into a tailspin.  All in all, it went much better than we expected, but it was still a far (tiring) cry from our leisurely pre-baby travels.

On the flight out, we thought we had coordinated it perfectly by booking a 5:00 flight so that Henry would get an afternoon nap, be awake for half the flight, then fall asleep at his normal bedtime.  No dice.  No dice at all.  He was so wound up and overstimulated that he didn't sleep at all, which meant that by the time we landed in Seattle, he'd been awake for 10 hours.  There wasn't much actual crying on the flight but it took constant holding and entertaining to keep him from being "that baby" on the plane. 

Also, planes are not really designed for people with giant babies.  For one thing, it's pretty difficult to tip your kid sideways to nurse without half of his body hanging out into the aisle.  Also, the bathroom situation.  By the time the fasten-seatbelt light went off, Henry's diaper was really wet, so I gather up the child and the diapering gear and head to the lavatory.  NO CHANGING TABLE.*  What?!?!  I ask the flight attendant if there was one in the first class bathroom.  Nope.  She said to "get creative."  I kid you not.  My options are to change him on my seat or to put him on the floor somewhere.  Okay, so by "creative," you mean "unsanitary."  I decide to lay him on my seat.  Fine, no problem, I can change a wet diaper in five seconds flat without any serious risk of fluid leakage or exposing more private bits than TSA sees on an hourly basis.  Of course, an hour later, Henry was sitting on my lap and got that look in his eye.  That look.  The one where he stares off into space, his eyes water a little bit, and his stomach muscles flex and....fffffft.  I'm good, but I'm not good enough to solve that problem gracefully on an airplane seat.  So I go back to the bathroom to "get creative."  There are no flat surfaces whatsoever other than the floor, which is of course so tiny that I couldn't even put Henry down there and still bend over to reach him.  I end up closing the toilet lid, sitting on it, putting my feet up against the closed door, and stretching Henry along my legs.  I'm still impressed with myself for that one.

Anyway, we made it, and we had a great time.  We should really stop going to Seattle in the summer because it is so spectacularly beautiful that we are tempted to forget the ten months of rain and move right back there.  The mountain even came out in honor of our trip.

The boys.

Rare mom-baby photos.

We did a lot of hanging around the house, which always makes for a relaxing vacation.

 

The water feature on the new patio was a huge hit.

So were the rocks surrounding the water feature.

 In an awesome "small world" moment, we hung out with Robyn and her husband Joe.  Robyn used to work with my dad in St. Louis.  When she moved to Seattle, Dad told her to get in touch with me but never did.  Then she and Joe randomly met Eric and Julia at a party or something, and now they're all BFFs.  We even borrowed their stroller for the weekend.

I spent an afternoon with my Judge and Alice, which was fantastic.  They love to see their Team Tallman "grandkids."  Sadly, I forgot my camera.  But I did get this awesome photo series when the boys and I went to brunch with my co-clerk Steven and his girlfriend Jess. 

 

Can you believe this guy spends all day
putting criminals in federal prison?

We had a big group brunch with the Reitz clan.  Bob and Joan were in town for their annual visit too.  They hadn't seen Henry since Christmas, when he was a floppy little nugget.  It was great to see everyone in one place.

Sharing toys with big cousin Leo.

Hanging with Aunt Linda.

Crawling practice with Uncle Paul.

Bob and Joan with their great-grandboys.

Grandkids and great-grandkids.

Requisite Garfield Commune on-the-front-steps picture
(now featuring new pledge members).

Next year we will plan to stay longer.  Partially because two full days of travel for three days on the ground is rough, and partially because we have so many good friends and family there that it takes more than three days to properly see everyone and still have time to drink enough Pimm's cup on the patio.

*This was a Boeing 757.  The Airbus plane we flew home had changing tables.  My professional and familial loyalties are to Boeing, but come on.