The Brothers Bennett: First plane ride

We took the Ronan on his very first plane ride this past weekend and he was awesome! He spent the first 10 minutes bouncing and laughing in the extra seat between us (luckily we scored the bulkhead row in the very front!). The second 10 minutes were spent patting and licking the window. The last 40 minutes were spent nursing and sleeping in Mama's lap. And then we deplaned in impossibly warm and sunny LA.

I have to say that renting a car with a carseat already installed is the way to go. Our maroon Chevy Impala may not have been the most stylish thing on the road (ha!), but it sure beat having to lug our Britax Marathon on the plane and spend who knows how long installing it after the flight. In just half an hour we had arrived at Grandpa Jack's in Monterey Park for the start of a fun-filled weekend.

Let's see... In a nutshell, here's what we did: We spent Friday night catching up with Grandpere Jacques and Uncle Brook (C's brother) over BBQ and wine. On Saturday we had brunch with our friends Jason and Lisa in their adorable seaside town (Manhattan Beach) -- they're due any day now! Ronan's great-grandma, and our best man, John Will, came over on Saturday afternoon, and then the whole group of us went out to dinner at this delicious Thai place called Saladang in Pasadena. On Saturday night, Brook and Patty came over and Ronan played some piano with his grandpa. He was so wound up and over-tired that night that he woke up crying at 2 am and refused to go back to sleep. We put him in between us in bed and he played and poked us for about 45 min. before crashing out. He's just like a puppy! On Sunday morning, we checked out Brook's new apartment in Montebello before driving back to Burbank to catch our flight home. There was no food anywhere near the Burbank airport so we had to resort to "chicken selects" from McDonald's.... blah. Ronan was awake and babbling the entire flight home, but he didn't cry! After all the action in LA, we were glad to get home to our quiet little SF abode. Ronan went back to his 11-hour/night sleep routine without a hitch, though it'll take some more time to repair his nap schedule... And it'll take most of the week for Mom and Dad to catch up on our sleep too!

All in all, a very fun weekend with our loved ones!! Can't wait to go back. :-)