California or Bust! Day 1

At 3:30 A.M. on a chilly Wednesday morning 9 weary travelers emerged from a chi-town hotel. The final destination- California! We had already put 3 hours of driving behind us and we still had 6 hours of flying and another 4 hours of driving ahead of us. We loaded our gazillion bags, strollers, car seats, diaper bags and kids in to the hotel shuttle. We made our way to the airport and tried to figure the best way to get through the airport with all our stuff. Thankfully the guys are excellent pack mules and strollers can carry kids and bags! Sean and Stefanie were lucky enough to be in charge of the wedding dresses and Sean’s suit (they truly were my life savers!). The staff at North West Airlines was very helpful with getting our strollers and car seats sent from Chicago straight through to LAX. We made it through security fairly easily; apparently not too many people are up at 5 o’clock in the morning. Since everything went smoothly we were able to get some food and relax before boarding.


The flight from Chicago to Minneapolis was not full so we were able to sit where we want. We all strapped in and started to get nervous. This was the first flight for Stefanie, Adam (age 8 ½), Killian (1 ½) and Sammy (6 mon.). They all did wonderfully! Killian went to sleep as soon as we took off. Her eyes got a bit big as we started down the runway, but the fatigue and engine noise put her right to sleep. During our short time in the sky the flight attendants were asking us about the bags and who was getting married. My sister and her husband Dave told them it was Sean and I gettin’ hitched. A few minutes later they came back with a complimentary bottle of wine for us and best wishes. Killian slept the entire flight and woke up happily as we landed.



We unloaded the first plane and made our way to the next terminal, had a break for potty/diaper changing and loaded on the next plane. Again, Killian slept most of the time. She was up entertaining everyone around her for about 20 minutes. She made a quick trip to the back of the plane for a diaper change and to talk to Stefanie. The flight attendants said she was the “Best Baby Ever”. Okay that may have not been their exact words, but something to that effect. We landed at LAX, got our luggage and headed to the car rental place. As our party was getting on the shuttle, we heard a very loud whistle. My sister and I instinctively turned to look for our dad. And to our surprise there he was! They still had to get their luggage so they took the next shuttle. Once we all made it to Enterprise we got to sit for awhile. Dad and Sean were in charge of getting the rental vans. This took quite some time. Sean thoroughly inspected everything about the vans. Finally, we got two acceptable vans after Sean rejected a previous one for noisy breaks. Off we go, again!


The car ride to SLO County was gorgeous. We got to see palm trees, mountains, ocean, crazy motorcycle drivers, and giant California mansions!

A shot of the mountains while we were driving.

We stopped at an In and Out for burgers- delicious! Sean made sure to send Ian a message to rub it in that we were eating there. I think Ian was more excited to know his Baby, Killian, was on her way to see him!

Killian's excitement to be driving again!

Sean was the tour guide for our van. My dad was too busy in his van yelling about Sean’s driving skills. Apparently changing lanes A LOT and speeding up on a freeway entrance is a California thing. Poor Sean got picked on for his tour leader skills. Every gated property on the road he thought Never Land Ranch was on he pointed to and said there it is, oh wait maybe not. Stefanie, Sean and I just laughed at him. The other point of interest- Lake Cachuma was coming up. He kept informing us to look over this turn….and nothing! Finally we got to see it, we informed him that time that we saw it and he said, “Yeah that’s it!” The rest of the ride was pretty quiet; people were falling asleep or just relaxing. As we came into Sean’s old stomping grounds the point of interests came back. We learned that his friend’s dad owned this land and cattle, this place was where he did something, this is where he went to school, his church, this is where he drove dangerously and so on. You could definitely see the excitement in Sean’s eyes.

The view from our house.

A deer munching on the property.

A lizard by the pool. The boys had fun trying to catch one.

We made our way to the rental house (Gorgeous!) unpacked, took Sean and Stefanie to their hotel and headed over to the ranch. Unfortunately our timing was just off and Sean’s mom and sisters had just left. So we got to see his dad, brothers and grandma. Killian was a bit tired so we couldn’t stay long. We grabbed the pack and plays and back to the house we went. We slowly finished unpacking, ate some diner and crashed!