Two parts "Sloop John B".
I do not recommend traveling with Maggie. She's a rotten traveler. It could be the four teeth coming in at once, it could just be that Molly is an infinitely better child in almost every way (and to think, I had come to consider her the problem child!).
I wish we'd brought a computer along so I could have documented this as it all unfolded; now I've got to kind of remember it as I go on and hope I hit all the hot spots. Here goes nothing.
Because our trip had three legs (San Francisco/Minnesota/Colorado/back to San Francisco), we had to get paper tickets. Multiple airlines, a million plane changes. And after we originally booked it, one of the airlines cancelled their service from Minnesota to Denver and we had to work out an alternative, which meant an actual trip to the airport. Remember a few years ago when we were all still kind of freaked out by e-tickets? That "Oh jeez, what if I get there with my little printout and they don't really have any record of my reservation, and I'm screwed" feeling? Well, now that is how paper tickets make one feel. Go figure.
San Francisco graced us with so much fog and rain on the day of departure that all flights out were delayed by hours--this meant that we would be missing our connection in Phoenix for Minneapolis. So Grammy got a Christmas Miracle: we spent the night with her and she got to snuggle the babies. Then we got up at the asscrack of dawn and flew to Minneapolis, and I would just like to say that they upgraded us to First Class and it was possibly the finest three hours I have ever spent on an airplane in my entire life, and I am now going to be devoting my spare time to figuring out exactly who I need to sleep with in order to fly by no other means, ever. First class absolutely rules. The crew treated Molly and Maggie like princesses--first class kids who cry are apparently much more adorable than coach kids who sit quietly and don't bother anyone. My lunch was delicious, and the booze never stopped flowing. I must have been a terrible person in my past life, having had to fly coach all these years. I'm going to try harder to be a better person in hopes that karma will grant me upgrades on a regular basis.
Christmas in Minnesota was lovely. Santa brought excellent presents, there was wine and cheese aplenty, and the post-holiday sales were divine. We had a few extra days after the rest of the family left MN to play and relax and spend one-on-one time with Dug's parents. Molly has her Mimi completely whipped, and it's pretty entertaining to watch. Dug's mom, as the oldest child, is used to being the boss of everyone, and to see her bend to Molly's will is about as funny as it gets, although I don't really know how to describe it to people who don't know Dug's mom...it's a little like the Karen/Rosario dynamic on "Will and Grace", I guess.
The trip from Minneapolis to Denver didn't quite go off without a hitch, I'm afraid. They bumped us to a different flight and one of our bags didn't make the trip with us, and it happened to be the one with all of the girls' clothes in it. We had their snow clothes and a few random things that had gotten into other duffels, but none of their long underwear or socks. We were about a minute and a half from hitting up the thrift stores when the bag showed up.
Denver's a neat kid town, from what I could see. The girls had a blast at the REI Flagship, which has a playground, and Molly came very close to trying out the climbing wall there before chickening out. We had both dinner and breakfast at Jack-n-Grill, a great New Mexican restaurant. And we stayed in the lovely home of friends Mike and Maura, whose hospitality was greatly appreciated during our "layover" in Denver before the rest of the family arrived and we could head up into the mountains. They're terrific people, so if you are at all handbag-inclined check out Maura's handiwork at Red Camper.
We had New Year's Eve in Denver at Dug's cousin-by-marriage Jen's house, with the whole assortment of cousins, siblings, aunts, girlfriends and boyfriends and spouses, before heading up on New Year's Day to our crazy-cool rental house.
We all got our asses kicked by the altitude--Dug was really sick while we were in Denver, so it's probably a good thing that we stayed there for two nights before heading even further up. Even so, the high country is no joke: even drinking tons of water--SmartWater, no less--I woke up every morning so dehydrated that I was actually in pain. It got better by the end of the week, but MAN. Ouch.
We did all our skiing at Copper Mountain and since I have no basis of comparison, you can take my enthusiastic recommendation of the place with a grain of salt. Molly did two days of ski school, which is possibly the cutest thing you'll ever see in your life. I took one half-day private lesson and then winged it (wung it?) for the rest of the week. Generally I feel pretty good about my progress, although I'm still totally skiing in pizza form, rather than french fries (I certainly hope these terms are universal to skiing, otherwise I feel like a dork using them). I'm looking forward to doing it again, which is about the highest level of approval I am capable of bestowing on a physical activity.
The town we stayed in was also home to an outlet mall. That might have contributed to the excellent time that I had. We slept poorly though, between the dehydration and the very obnoxious nightwaking of Maggie (Every. Single. Night.).
The trip home could have been worse, I suppose. We were scheduled to stop over in Phoenix again (not overnight though) but managed to get on a direct flight instead, and it would have been okay if Maggie hadn't blown a gasket early on and spent most of the time headbutting me in the lip (which already had a blister from where I burned it on a fondue fork, thank you very much).
But in the end we got home in one piece, or four individual pieces anyway, and everybody slept through the night and the girls even slept late, which is especially awesome considering the time zone changes. The girls are clearly delighted to be home, especially Maggie, who must just be more of a creature of routine than Molly ever has been.
And I've forgotten all the funny things that happened.
Oh, Molly accidentally peed on her cousin Nick while he was giving her a piggyback ride. That was pretty funny.