airport and planes

 Flying is super cool and all, but it kind of loses it's potential after you've spent all day and all night with kids cramped in a plane. We were at the airport by 5 AM (3:45 wake up call!!) Then we had a 2 1/2 hour flight to Chicago and then a 3 hour layover- enough for lunch and a few back massages from the little kiosk in the airport (Adam and my Mom- lucky ducks).

P.S. Chicago O'hare has automatic seat covers on their toilets... just wave your hand over the back and a new one slips on. So weird and cool.

 waiting in Chicago

 sleeping Baby Will

 It's hard for me to imagine what it's like for a 6'4" Adam to sit on a plane for so long. Here he is stretching out before the big 9 hour flight. 

I sat with Ollie and Linc in front of my Mom, E and Adam. Linds, Will and Jackie behind them.

 These guys were troopers. 9 hours with a baby on her lap!

 Linc and Ollie did great too! Linc didn't love his seatbelt, but other than that stayed calm and busy. Elliott was the one we were worried about since he had since proclaimed he wasn't coming with us because he was scared of the plane. I sort of bribed him to come anyway. He was so worried when we started to take off, but a minute later I told him he did it! And we were up in the air and to look out the windows. He was instantly relieved and fine.

 Thank goodness for the movie player we bought last second at the Chicago airport! We were planning on bringing ours, but the night before (1:00 AM) when we checked it we realized it would only work when plugged in! We weren't sure if they would have individual tv's for each seat which would have been fine for the boys, so we bought it. They didn't...and it saved our lives. 

 Little Will crawling the isles.

sleeping Linc

Leena, Ollie, Ari, Marketta, Adam, Jaakko, Jackie, Seppo, Linds, Eero, Linc & Will

We finally arrived in Finland at 9 AM, which was midnight Utah time. We had 10 people arriving, since my bro Ari met us there (he flew in 2 days before.)

My Uncles Seppo and Eero, Aunt Marketta and cousin Jaakko were there to meet us! We had so much luggage that they all had to come with 4 separate cars to haul us to Vaalimaa- 2 1/2 hours away. 

Finland, here we come!