Tristan Barber is FIVE: Travel nightmare

How to even begin what it took for us to get to New York...

Things started out well at DFW airport. We were on time and I found out I now get to check my bags - for FREE!

Upon boarding, we had a mechanical issue... DELAY! NOOOOOO! Oh well, thankfully I packed a lunch for us so we were good to go!

Upon arriving at ORD, we received bad news. We missed our flight and we had ONE option. Fly to Boston and then onto SYR or, possibly not get home until Sat or Sunday. Airports were a mess due to weather. There were 52 people standing in line waiting for OUR seats... I made the decision to go. I couldn't get a boarding pass or assigned seats. We boarded late (again) because our Pilot was pulled for another flight. Apparently another flight was more important!!?!?!

Best thing I could think to do... popcorn and nuts from Nuts On Clark!

We finally took off but I had a bad feeling they couldn't make that time up in the air. We were probably going to be stuck. In Boston. Thankfully T napped, I swear it saved me.

We landed in Boston at around 8:45pm. We hadn't eaten since 11:30am and everything in the airport was closed. This was trouble. I just had no idea how MUCH trouble. The AA Rep told me our bags were sent to USAirways because they would be servicing our flight the next day to Philly ... then NY.

So we headed over... not ONE complaint from Tristan. I knew he was tired and hungry and he just patiently tagged along to both baggage claims and then to the shuttle.

Yup, I have the BEST kid on the planet!

Finally we arrived at our hotel that my friends SO GRACIOUSLY used miles to book for us. I was so embarrassed to take but Les said you do so much for other people, let someone help YOU!

So, I did. And it was a HUGE blessing.

We arrived and headed to the only restaurant open at 10pm... and tried to order food. They were SOOO rude and ignored us for about 10 minutes - even had a guy and his son try and get us waited on ... they ignored him too. Pitiful.

Hey - we've had a rough day, we're hungry!!

Our food arrived and suddenly T was sick. Bad tummy ache. We packed up our food and back to the room we went.

I barely ate my dinner, he ate two bites of his burger and then I spent the next hour up rubbing his tummy until he passed out. At midnight.. I couldn't even enjoy my glass of red... I just put it aside and passed out.

The next morning I woke up to this:

AND there was a Red Sox game, the 4th of July parade and they were sending off "Old Iron Sides" so I knew I had to get out of there!

7am, I woke up T and explained I knew he was tired but if we wanted any chance of getting to Grandma's by the party, we needed to book.

We went to both baggage claims and no one could help us. Luggage was nowhere to be found. They wouldn't even let me file a report because at that point no one "owned" responsibility for my bags.

*ANGRY* but time to go...

T and I took the shuttle to the rental car place and got our car. Then we hit the road.

We drove 4 hours... (zero complaining from my child that day either) and finally stopped for lunch.