The Schweighardts Take Wien

The last two days have been crazy...crazy awesome.  And I can say that because I've now had more than 1 hour of sleep and didn't have to haul all our worldly possessions up two flights of stairs.

We left the Tri-Cities Wednesday morning at 9am, took a puddle jumper to Seattle and had a bit of a lunch break and an opportunity for the girls to run rampant before boarding our plane for the ten hour flight to Frankfurt.  At this point, we were all a bit giddy; we were on a fantastic adventure, we were feeling good and couldn't believe our unbelievable good fortune in scoring four business class seats.  Now, I understand that there's a difference between business class and first class, but I could care less, because I got to LAY DOWN on an airplane. I had more than enough room for my luggage and my mile-long legs.  Bailey could easily fit in my seat with me while sleeping and our flight attendants were amazing.  They also somehow managed to make all the food taste good and presented it well.  I felt like I was allowed to sleep in a full service restaurant. So, yes, I am probably spoiled for life.

Bailey only got about an hour of sleep on our international flight and Audrey racked out for nearly the last two hours of our flight.  John and I were both pretty much running on empty, but there's absolutely no complaining after that experience.  We were on to Frankfurt!  We really had no idea what to expect from our airport experience.  We knew we would have to go through passport control and security yet again, but we were totally unprepared for just how absolutely crazy busy the Frankfurt airport is.  Thankfully, fortune smiled on us yet again.  Because we had a stroller, we were directed to a family screening process involving about ten persons, who all loved and doted on our dazed girls while John and I tried to pull all our liquids and electronics back out of our disheveled bags.  It was a pretty hilarious experience for the girls--here we are at what should've been 11pm to their little bodies, entering a sea of babbling strangers who are rooting through our luggage, asking Mom to take her boots off, all while crooning, laughing and asking a million questions.  It was the jolliest bunch of airport personnel I ever did meet.  Even though it was an incredible ordeal, they somehow had us coming out of it feeling like we had the royal treatment. 

Our flight from Frankfurt to Vienna was only supposed to last an hour and twenty minutes, but we ended up waiting at the gate for an additional hour for an oxygen canister...don't ask me details.  At that point, Bailey was screaming from sleep deprivation and I was trying to keep my eyes open.  Thankfully, the flight attendants on this flight (also business class!) were fantastic as well.  They saved the day with a seat belt attachment that allowed me to buckle Bailey to my seat and let her sleep on my chest instead of having to move her once we eventually took off.  We were served yet another amazing meal on that flight and I actually got to relax a bit since both Audrey and Bailey were sleeping like angels.

Now, the catch with traveling with a seemingly angelic sleeping child is that when you arrive at your final destination and have an UNGODLY amount of luggage to see to, they never wake up refreshed and ready to greet any new situation.  We somehow made it to baggage claim with the two crabby monsters, I figured out the baggage cart system...and I tell you, those things appear soooo much smaller when you have a Mount Everest of luggage to put on two of them...two carts for thirteen bags and two car seats.  We drew quite a few gawking stares while we arranged everything and hauled it all to the arrivals gate in search of our driver.  Luckily (again) our driver was fantastic, if not flabbergasted by the amount of stuff we had--he even helped John lug it all to the curb across from our apartment building once we arrived.  Then, in a Herculean feat, John carried all thirteen bags and two car seats across the road, into the building and either up the lift or the two flights of stairs.  I was supervising kids...it's a very important job.  And, yes, I know what you're thinking.  I did my part; I rolled the bags from the lift (two yards) to our apartment door.

Understandably, John immediately passed out once his job was done.

I, in a crazy rush of adrenaline, proceeded to unpack all thirteen bags and started making our little temporary apartment a home.  The girls were excited to see the toys I had brought for them and played contentedly for several hours while I organized.  It was fantastic.  Our landlady left some toys and coloring supplies for the girls to play with and Audrey has pretty much been stationed at our dining room table coloring ever since. 

Since we initially thought we would be arriving on a holiday weekend, I had packed plenty of nonperishable food, so we hunkered down in the apartment for the evening and hit the sack early.

Really, I cannot imagine our trip going any better.  There were bumps and set backs, spills and crying...pain and bruising, but that was all expected.  The most important detail is that the Big Guy Upstairs was obviously with us through it all.  I'm going to go ahead and give any kind of kudos for success to Him, since I really don't think I've got much to do with it.  For the past year He has been demanding that we just sit back and surrender EVERYTHING to Him and this is one example of how He saw us through an event better than we could've ever managed for ourselves.  His plans are perfect; someday I may be able to convince my ever-loving soul of that.  Until then, I suspect He will just keep sending me challenges to get the point across.