First days in Colorado

We stayed in the hotel in Japan for ten days.  The boys wanted to stay for FSY so we stayed in Japan an extra week so they could go.  We had one room for a few days and then when they finished FSY we got another room for them while we waited for the rotator to fly us out. The rotator leaves from the base and it was a full plane.  We sat around for a long time because they made everyone come about four hours early, even though most of us had checked in the night before.  I have no idea why we all had to wait there so long.  The flight was pretty uneventful honestly.  The kids did well.  Felicity and Piper slept on my hip for a few hours and it was so painful!  I tried sleeping but didn't sleep much at all on the plane.  When we got to America we had a long layover in Seattle.  We were so exhausted since most of us hadn't slept much so we went and found the USO.  I was so grateful that it was open and wasn't full.  We checked in our bags, went to the bathroom, got some food--they had hotdogs, water, soda, donuts--and then we all found a lazy boy to spread out on and everyone fell asleep for about an hour and a half.  Then we went and found our gate for the next flight.  We had another layover in Denver that was about four hours.  Originally we tried to only book flights to Denver and then we were going to get a rental and drive from Denver to Colorado Springs but the Air Force refused to allow that.  They said we could do that ourselves if we wanted to pay for those tickets.  We went back and forth about what would make the trip the easiest for everyone and in the end we decided just to wait the four hours.  We got dinner and walked around until our flight.  The flight from Denver to Colorado Springs was only 45 minutes of flying time and is historically a really bumpy and yucky flight.  My kids get motion sickness fairly easily and on our flight home last summer for the reunion where we flew from LA to Vegas had all of them barfing or clutching the barf bags.  I was sure this was going to be a repeat of that but our prayers were answered and the kids did very well on the flight from Denver to Colorado Springs.  The plane did end up sitting on the runway for about an hour before take-off, which was lame.  We weren't exactly sure what were were going to do when we got to Colorado Springs.  We thought we were going to have to put me and a bunch of the kids in a taxi while Mike drove all the luggage to the hotel, or,  me stay with the luggage at the airport while he took every to the hotel and then came back to fetch me.  It turns out that they gave us a bigger vehicle and Mike used his awesome packing skills to pack every single piece of luggage (over 12 pieces) and all seven of us into the SUV.  We arrived at the hotel at around 1:00 AM.  We stayed in the hotel for 11 days.  I as so ready to be done with hotel living by the time we moved out of there!

The majority of our time during those 11 days were trying to unpack, paint walls, go for hikes, keep kids entertained, pulling weeds, etc.  

The boys both had trips to Florida to hang out with cousins and Grandma and Grandpa.  The Richards have a tradition where all the cousins who turn 16 that year get to go spend a week playing in Florida with Grandma and Grandpa.  Isaac's group missed their year because we were in Japan, Nick was in Korea, and Grandma and Grandpa were on a mission.  That meant that Grandma and Grandpa had to pack in two rounds of grandkids in this summer on separate weeks to catch all the kids who had just graduated or would be graduating.  Besides the trips to Florida, Piper went to girls' camp a second time, this time with the new ward here in the Springs.  She was very brave to go not knowing anyone.  I think she had a really good time and it was a completely different camping experience than the one in Japan.

Other than that, we got the kids ready for school, celebrated our first holiday back in America (the 4th of July!), tried to get over jet lag, and just tried to adjust back to life in America in general.

We still have a lot of projects to do and a lot of decorating but we are slowly getting settled.