We said our farewells to family and our three kitty cats, Merlin, Beefuzz, and Tigerlily. Then around 11:00am CST on Wednesday, January 16th, my sister-in-law Laura dropped us off at the St. Louis, MO International Airport.

Once inside the airport we cleared security rather quickly and headed to our gate. That is when the “fun” began. 30 minutes before boarding an announcement came through that our flight was cancelled due to a cracked windshield. The next flight to Detroit would be in 7 hours! This would not bode well for us, since our international flight was leaving Detroit for Paris in 6 hours! We waited in line, but eventually were able to be rerouted to Minneapolis, then onto Amsterdam, and finally Edinburgh arriving only 6 hours later than originally scheduled. While in line to be rerouted, a sweet little elderly German woman asked if anyone spoke German. I stepped forward and offered to help Ms. Ursula. She was very appreciative! Another German gentleman named Aachen came forward a few minutes later to help out too!

At 5:35pm CST we were in the air. Faywen was a bit nervous seeing as how it was her first time in a plane…Seamus too! The flight went smoothly and we landed in Minneapolis, MN. After a 2 hour layover and a yummy airport snack we boarded a KLM plane to Amsterdam departing at 9:35pm CST. The crew were very kind and even gave Seamus and Faywen “kid pouches” full of games and toys. The beautiful B787 is one of the newest “Dreamliner” planes made by Boeing. The flight wasn’t full and the boys had an extra seat to sprawl out in and sleep. Faywen sat between Robert and I. We all enjoyed the personal screens in the seat back in front of us. Each had it’s own earplug jack, games, movies, and TV shoes to choose from. You could even track the planes progress over the ocean! The breakfast was delicious too!

As we descended Faywen got a wee bit air sick and threw up just minutes before we landed, but she did so on the blanket in her lap. The crew helped clean up and after we landed she felt better. Seamus, Liam, and Faywen were the only kids, besides one baby, who were on the flight. The crew asked if the kids would like to meet the pilots and see the cockpit after we landed. Of course they jumped at the opportunity and Captain Hans and Captian Fritz were enthralled with our children’s knowledge of flight and the questions they asked. The kids were in the cockpit for over 10 minutes with the pilots. We officially landed in Europe at 11:51am CET.

We spent three hours at Schiphol Airport in Amsterdam. It is one of my favorite airports. It was nice being back there after several years. We explored the airport and made our way to our final gate and flight. We boarded our flight to Edinburgh. Liam and I sat next to a lovely lady named Melanie from Stirling. We arrived at our final destination at 4:20pm GMT. The kids once again got to briefly meet the pilots! We cleared customs rather easily and then boarded an Airlink bus. It was fun viewing the city from the second story of the bus! We got off at the Princes Street stop, walked two blocks, and then checked in at the Premier Inn.

We have two rooms, one for us and one for the kids across the hallway. The kids’ room has a stunning view of Edinburgh Castle. It was beautifully lit against the darkening sky. After a quick trip down the street to Boots, a local “Walgreens”, to purchase our hygiene products we headed out to dinner. Ironically we ended up at Burger King. We never eat fast food at home, but Robert and I know that Burger King is VERY popular in Britain and we thought to ourselves “hey at least once we should eat there!” Everyone crashed after taking nice warm baths and slept soundly!