Welcome to Canada

The plane rides....hmmmm.

I am really struggling to explain what the last 24 hours have been like. I think mostly because since we landed my head feels all light and yet my body feels really heavy and although Josh won't admit it, I'm pretty sure that Canada has a strange up and down motion like you are on a ship in choppy waters. He says it's all in my head but I'm not so sure.

It is making typing an interesting experience though, my arms sort of sway a little and keep hitting the wrong buttons. LOL.

The first plane, 14 hours and 20 minutes to LA wasn't too bad actually. The girls behaved themselves really well. They loved being able to watch as much TV as they liked (who'd have thought!) and Elizabeth stuck to her routine and even slept in the tiny bassinet on the plane, although she had to sleep all curled up as she was a little too big for it.

The only bad thing about the plane for me was that Elizabeth basically sat on my lap and climbed all over me when she wasn't sleeping. So eating and drinking were a nightmare. I got off that plane looking like I had been wrestling in tomato sauce, snot and juice. 

We landed at about 6:30am LA time, which was actually Midnight our time. So moving through customs, getting our bags and everything was quite the blur. Hannah and Laura were absolute troopers though. We did wonder if security might be a little tighter due to the Boston bombings but we didn't notice it being too intense. 

After this things got a little more hairy.

The next and final plane was only 3 hours but seeing as it was now 2:30 in the morning the girls finally decided to lose the plot and proceeded to alternate between sobbing uncontrollably and sleeping with drool coming out the sides of their mouths. Their legs kept cramping up (as were ours since we had to try and sit as still as possible while the three of them laid all over us in various positions) which made things a bit more frustrating. But it was all over in a flash compared to the other flight. Waking them up was difficult and a little heartbreaking :(

Then on to customs and immigration. This was a pretty surreal experience.  The immigration officer while seeming friendly at first didn't take long to put on his professional demeanor. After explaining why we were there, his questioning soon began to make us think that he wasn't going to let us in. He explained that he didn't believe that we really needed 6 months to learn about Crows (Abv. Crowsnest Lake Bible Camp) and that he was worried that we were going to take work away from other Canadians. 

Eeeekkk! Please don't put us back on the plane! 

But after much explanation and convincing from Alex he did let us in. This took about an hour. We had arrived with only one person ahead of us in the line but as we left there were around 20 people behind us and we were praising God that we weren't in that line!!!

Then on to collecting our baggage. 

Which we couldn't find. 

Thankfully we did find most of it off to the side. Because we had taken so long the plane company that we had just been on had collected it for us. But we were missing our car seats which meant we had to fill in a tonne of paperwork to figure out where they were and how to get them to us. Hopefully they should rock up at Crows within the week or so. This all took another hour or so.

By this time it was 2:30 in the afternoon Canada time (Josh and Glynis had been patiently waiting for us) and about 9:30 in the morning Australian. But as none of had had more then 3 hours sleep we were walking zombies. We decided to push through and try to make it to a normal bedtime. Easier said then done when we had a few car rides yet. Even I nodded off while trying my utmost to stay awake. 

We had a fantastic supper (which is Tea in Canadian) at Glynis' family home meeting most of her family (they have 7 kids!). I'd love to name them all but I only remember about half their names in my jet lagged haze. But it was so great to have a home cooked meal with real ingredients and no more take away. The girls also hit their second wind and enjoyed the toys they could find and had an even better time when an impromptu snow fight erupted. 

We headed back to Josh's a little after that much to Hannah and Laura's disappointment as they wanted to keep playing. It was about 9pm. 

Here's a strange one for you, it's light here until about 9:30 in the evenings in winter and about 11pm in Summer! And the sunrise is still at about 5:30 in winter and about 4:30am in Summer.  They have no need for daylight savings here.CRAZY!

We all hit the sack with plenty of enthusiasm and slept until 11:30am today, even then I think the girls would have kept sleeping but we decided to get them up. Which is when Josh kicked in to awesome hosting mode and proceeded to make us chocolate chip and banana pancakes with (you guessed it) maple syrup. Hannah was very impressed :) except she was a little put out that there were no real chips. LOL.

Elizabeth is still really struggling and I think she may also be teething a little so she has going back after to bed and the girls and Alex have gone out to hit the shops. We discovered that we had forgotten winter hats and seeing as there is snow it's all the girls want to do, so buying a hat became an essential.

We are planning on heading to Crows tomorrow sometime, can't wait!

 

This is us outside Josh's house yesterday before heading out to Glynis' for tea. Excuse the half asleep expressions. :)