Yosh is SUCHHHHHHH an incredible little boy. Thursday we picked him up from school. We told him before we were going on a big byebye after school. He wasn't so impressed. He was in the OT room when I arrived and he saw a ball so he decided to play with that before we left.
So, we are on our way to the airport, where we arrive way too early.
We pulled into the off airport parking lot ($9/day instead of $30), where he helped move the luggage from our car to the shuttle van. We then continue through to the airport shlepping some rather heavy bags. (nebulizer and formula and barley pillows oh my). We, stupidly, only brought two checked bags and we had to do some shuffling to get them down to 49.5 pounds each. Finally get them checked and we move onto security. Always the highlight of any trip, but Yosh got to keep his shoes on through security- go figure, my son is not a terrorist.
Now we get to spend two hours in the airport before a three hour flight, which was of course delayed. Yosh got to spend time meeting new friends and checking out the sights.
By the time we landed in Miami, where it was a suffocating 75 degrees (yes I like winter, sue me!), any other 10 year old would have been in full meltdown mode. We had some biting (he bites his arm very hard when he gets frustrated)and some whining, but he was a trooper especially considering it was now an hour after bed time.
Now lets talk airports. You have to understand I have lived all of my life in New York and New Jersey, where we have three of the worst airports in the world. Each one individually wouldn't be so bad if their on time records could be improved- not going to happen with intersecting flight plans. On a scale of 1 to 10 with 1 being perfect and 10 being atrocious, I would rate the three NY/NJ airports an average of 7. Having said that... Miami International Airport gets a 20. It is beyond horrifying. Terminal D which is entirely American Airlines, is over a mile long- not in a horseshoe or circle just long it keeps on going like the energizer bunny.
Of course, to get anywhere you have to walk or take the magic carpets to a central dumping ground. The car rental center IS NOT in the airport. Every airport I know all of the car rental agencies have kiosks in each terminal. Not so in Miami. After finally in the central hub you then have to take a monorail to get to the car rental center. WHY? Yosh remained wonderful. He took his time getting through the airport and complained but in the end listened so wonderfully to abba and mommy. Ok enough about the stupid airport, for now.
We finally arrive in the Team's hotel and try to get settled in. We did not bring Yosh's yogurt with us and only brought enough babyfood to last the day. So out shopping I go. The first store, amazingly enough does not have soy based yogurt (Yosh is allergic to dairy). So of to a second store I go where I can get 16 containers of Yosh yogurt, not nearly enough to really get us through the weekend. The second store has no babyfood but we have enough at the hotel for one more meal and I will go back out before Shachris to get more. After eating Yosh went, pretty much straight to sleep.
Yosh woke up before I could get to the store so breakfast is delayed. What does he do? Shrugs it off and wants to get out of the room to meet people. His fan club of course grew by leaps and bounds. Some lucky people already new Yosh and some met him for the first time and fell instantly in love. Who can blame them? Finally we eat and daven- or in my case shop, daven and eat- and off to the expo we go. Now mind you the Shabbaton was INCREDIBLE, except for one thing transportation. Yosh and his abba do not like sitting around and waiting so when we had to sit on the bus before we were finally off we were not happy. What did Yosh do about it? For the most part made new friends. Sure there was some bitng but he got over it pretty quickly. Once we were FINALLY at the expo- a 35 minute trip that turned into an hour- Yosh goes exploring while I get my bib- I love saying that makes me sound like a messy eater. One bib and a pair of Orange Laces (http://www.orangelaces.com/) I am ready to head back. At 1:13 one of the Yachad people comes to me and says we want to head back a few minutes early- not in a few minutes but a few minutes early- mind you we were scheduled to leave at 1:15 so I don't see how telling people, especially Jews, at 1:13 that we are leaving a few minutes early is really going to happen. Well 30 minutes later we were still there. Lunch is sceduled for 2:00. But this is about Yosh NOT Yachad's transportation.
So after having a delayed breakfast and basically doing nothing but sitting on a bus and walking around a runner's expo Yosh is ready to move on with his day. After lunch it is more hanging out and getting ready for Shabbos, Yosh's favorite day of the week. Friday Night davening was incredible. The singing and dancing during Kabbolos Shabbos had Yosh in Heaven. He sang and danced and loved every second of it. Off to dinner where Yosh got to lead the line of singers and dancers during zemiros. He had an ecstatic look on his face. Thanx to the roaming minstrels of Yachad. After an incredible meal Yosh is ready for bed after suh a looonnngggg day away from home.
Shabbos morning and Yosh is ready for davening grabbing everyone's talis. With another wonderful davening Yosh starts davening on his own- some people shushed him but that did not stop him in the slightest. Yosh loves laining and hanging out at the bima. He sat so quietly and nicely for the inspirational divreai Torah, where I, and every other Yachad runner, was pronounced incredible by Rabbi Black of NYU. Musaf and Yosh gets to sing and dance more.
Shabbos afternoon and its nap time. Just more proof that Yosh is tired as he rarely naps any more. Then we are off to the beach where we discover Yosh is not such a fan, go figure just like mom and abba. Shalosh Seudos Yachad style follows and Yosh loves every second of it. He goes into the center to help the singing along much to the delight of everyone there. He sits and politely listens to the dvrei chizuk and Torah then sings and dances some more- no shushing this time. Maariv followed by a Yachad Havdallah and off to bed for Yosh. Or not. As he napped Shabbos afternoon he is not so interested in sleeping at night. Much to the chagrin of someone who has to be up at 3:00 in the morning. He was still up when abba came back from the pasta party.
Finally we get a little bit of sleep and abba is off at 3:30 in the morning to eat breakfast. A missed wakeup call and mommy and Yosh are up a little late, 7:00 in the morning, but still manage breakfast and catching the supporter bus to Miami. Mommy brings him to the the finish line but it is very loud so off to Charity Village they go. A couple of hours later abba finally arrives and boy does Yosh look tired. But instead of whining and having a temper tantrum he just mopes about checking out all the people. Finally, over an hour after abba arrives we are told there is a bus waiting- don't get me started on the transportation mess again. Suffice it to say we arrive back at the hotel 20 minutes after the time lunch is called for and Yosh has had an incredibly long morning.
Instead of having a fit Yosh takes it in stride acting out in small but manageable ways. But now he has been up for 7 hours and is out of sorts by not being home and his usual routine disturbed. Most other 10 year olds by now would have been miserable and made sure that everyone around them was equally miserable. To make matters better all we really have time to do now is sit around the hotel waiting for the time to go to the airport. Guess what long story short our 9:15p flight was delayed 45 minutes. Well after Yosh's bed time. We finally get on board the overbooked plane and with a little bit of finagling we all get to sit next to each other. I was originally ticketed to sit in the middle seat in the row behind Yosh and Kerri while they had the window and middle seat. Anyone know of anyone who would switch an aisle seat for a middle seat? No? Neither did I until last night. I went to the gate and asked the attendant if we could speak to whomever was sitting in 23D to talk about switching seats. She seemed as dubious as I on the chances, especially since the person with that seat was a member of the priority club, but she gamely did so. This lovely young lady named Nicole, came up rather confused until I told her the situation. She gladly exchanged seats even though she mumbled about hating middle seats. I offered her $20 which she refused but I insisted. With a little arm pulling she took the twenty. In the end she got a much better seat as the attendant was able to give her seat 12d- an aisle seat 21 rows closer to the exit. She started heading onto the plane and came back insisting we take the money back. What a wonderful young woman.
Yosh by now is beyond tired as it is 2 hours past bedtime of an incredibly boring day. As we get on the plane he makes yet another friend and he tells her sleep night. As we pass each row of the plane he tells everyone time for sleep night. Well guess what, he didn't sleep until, wait for it... the captain gets on the pa and announces we will be landing in 5 minutes. This promptly heads into meltdown mode for Yosh and 20 seconds later he crashes in my arm and falls heavily asleep. He woke up just as we got to the gate. Now imagine a 10 year old child at 1:00 in the morning who had fallen asleep for five minutes getting up and going through the airport. Yosh did it in style, saying hi to the baby he saw and everyone else in the now closed terminal. Were no problems on the plane? Let's put it this way Nicole is lucky not to have been 21 rows farther up but to have missed the biting scratching and hitting that ensued. He felt so bad about that, but then he always does.
Now to step back a few hours... As we were waiting in the airport for our delayed plane we told Yosh, on Monday we would buy him any ball he wants because he was so incredibly good during this very long weekend away from home. He is thrilled and talks about good and ball.
We get our bags and take the shuttle back to the car. Yosh is in good mood as we get in the car and finally drive back home. On the drive home (and on the plane when he was having his several meltdowns) we kept reminding him that he will be getting a new ball when mommy takes him shopping tomorrow after music therapy with Greg. He kept singing and saying school, Greg, ball with a huge smile on his face as we drove and I even got a fistbump at 2 o'clock in the morning. Baruch HaShem he did not sleep in the car on the way home, however when we put him in bed he got VERY upset. Finally, after about 20 seconds, mommy and abba relinquished and let him lie down in mommy's bed. 10 seconds after mommy snuggled with him he was out like a light.
This morning he was still tired but is now in school a happy camper.
