Ninja Night

Our attempt at Easter pictures. Oops.

The days leading up to Easter were and are quite a blur. I think I pretty much lived on the phone for the two weeks prior trying to get Elsie’s passport. I applied for it two weeks after she was born (the day I got the birth certificate) and it still had not come. Our flight to New Zealand was leaving Monday night out of LAX, and on Saturday, I got the final word that it was nowhere to be found. The ladies at the call center couldn’t even tell me if it had been made yet. Let me just say that I learned a few valuable lessons for all you readers:

1. Get your passport and your kids’ passports a.s.a.p. I don’t care if you have a trip scheduled or not. The current wait time is three months for a passport. You never know what could happen in three months. You win the Finnish lottery three months from now, but how the heck are you going to fly there and retrieve it?

2. If you ever have any issues with the federal government, CALL YOUR SENATOR (or your senator’s office at least). Little did I know that the senators are there to “assist everyday citizens through their dealings with the federal government”. Ms. Fowler never told me about that in those “three branches of government” lessons.

3. You probably have heard that the passport wait times are so long because they made the new rule that you cannot fly back to the USA from Mexico or Canada without a passport. Well, my advice is do not even drive or sail to Canada or Mexico without a passport anymore. What if you go there and get Montecuzoma’s revenge? Yep, you’re not getting on that plane sister…. You are driving your big-D self back. And guess what, starting next year, you cannot even drive or sail back without one. Please go back and read #1.

4. If you have to call the passport agency, call me for tips. I know which “hold music” matches up to which call center, for example. I also know all of the US territories. Do you? Do you know we own and control the Northern Mariana Islands?

On top of the passport issue, we had major job issues to work out, like invoicing and taxes and all the logistics for the nearly three weeks we’d be gone. Jonah miraculously got his four-way inspection passed, only four months after they broke ground! (This is a huge house with a basement and pretty much the lot had to be built up with a bazillion tons of dirt, so four months is a miracle). He is really amazing to me, how dedicated he is and how diplomatic he is with all the crazy people he has to organize. I’m so grateful he goes to work these long hours so I can stay home with the kids, too. What a hero, what a guy.

Also want to send a shout out to my mom who covered for us while we were gone. How many people can have their mom take care of business while they are away? Tyler, you can’t answer that one. Wow, we are SO lucky.

So, Jonah and I decided to have a nice relaxing Easter and focus on what was most important. The kids got shovels and hula hoops from the Easter bunny, and then we went to church and tried to help them be excited about the miracle of the Resurrection. Easter is really a beautiful time of year to really free your mind and rest in the hope. The kids were really peaceful that day, which is the best indication to us that they sensed what we were trying to celebrate. We had a nice early dinner at my mom’s house and then headed to Las Vegas that evening. At 6am Monday morning, we took a flight from LV to LAX to begin the passport saga.

So, we had to rent a car at LAX, pack our huge bags in it, and then drive to the Wilshire Blvd Federal Building in West Hollywood. Luckily, I had made an appointment two weeks prior to this, because when I called Saturday night to change our appointment time, the next available appointment was April 22^nd. Anyway, we got there at 9:30 am and finally got in to turn in our new application for Elsie at 11am. We were at least glad that the grounds of the federal building were green and beautiful and that the kids made friends and played outside all morning. They told us to come back at 2pm to pick up the printed passport. So, I called my really good friend Kyle to come meet us at In-n-Out for lunch. He practices Chinese Medicine in Santa Monica (originalbreath.com). He is just the greatest person and I haven’t seen him in a few years, so it made our whole passport saga worth it. We had a great time chatting and I wish we could have taken him with us to New Zealand.

Anyway, we made it back to the Federal Building where we had to wait in a huge 200 person line to pick up the passport. If you got to the front of the line and your passport wasn’t ready yet, then you went to the back of the line. At least five people missed their international flights while waiting in the line. I talked to one guy who had missed three flights to Africa while waiting for his passport, at a cost of $8000. Anyway, I took a break from the line to go get a water bottle from the car, and while Jonah was in line holding Elsie, Aniston fell off a bench and knocked herself unconscious!!! I guess Jonah handed Elsie to a lady in line and ran over and tried to bring Aniston to. He called me on my cell phone and I ran back from the parking lot. Luckily, she didn’t even have a concussion as far as we can tell. She remembered everything about the whole incident. She had a big goose egg, but that was it. She’s always been a fainter.

So, I FINALLY got the passport at 5:30 pm. Miraculous. I let out a big cheer in the waiting room they had moved me to after they disbanded the line outside. The funniest thing is that when we got back to St. George two and a half weeks later, Elsie had a passport waiting for her in the mailbox.

We had told the kids we’d go to the beach, so we went for a short trip to Santa Monica pier before heading back to LAX. Aniston was SO mad she didn’t get to ride any roller coasters, but we really didn’t think it was a good idea considering her possible concussion. We did ride the Ferris wheel though, as you can see in the pictures. We made it back to LAX without a hitch and had some pricey airport pizza before getting on the plane.

As good of a family picture as you are going to get on an Easter Sunday when we're in the midst of packing. I'm surprised I even brushed my hair that day. I don't think Cam brushed his!

Santa Monica Pier Ferris Wheel.