Flying High

Labor Day weekend was spent in Cleveland this year. Daddy found out that there was an air show out there and he thought it would be a good idea to take "the boys" out to see the planes. I think Daddy was just as excited to go out there as we were.

Aunt Veronica was nice enough to find a place for us to stay. We had a great apartment to stay in and had plenty of room for everyone that went. We left early in the evening on Friday. Granny, Andy, Tony and Mindy left about an hour after us. We stopped at about 4 rest stops to eat and use the restroom but we finally arrived in Cleveland around 11:30 PM.

We took our first load of luggage up to the apartment (on the 9th floor of the building). Mommy started to get Nathan and I settled for bed while Daddy and Aunt Veronica went back to the car to get more of our stuff. She wasn't having much luck with getting us to sleep, when she heard sirens going off in the hallway. She looked out in the hallway and there were a few other people out there wondering what was going on. We had to evacuate the building. Fire alarms were sounding everywhere. So, Mommy carried Nathan and held my hand until we got to the stairwell. Once in the stairwell, I wasn't moving fast enough and there were a ton of people. Mommy decided it would be safer for her to play Super Woman and carry both Nathan and I down 9 flights of stairs. We spent quite a while outside and had to wait for the fire engines and police men to leave but it was safe to go back inside.

The next morning, we walked to Burke Lakefront Airport. This was where we would get to see the big, fast, loud planes that Daddy had promised.
We couldn't believe how big these planes were and some of them were open so that we could take a peek inside.
Uncle Tony caught me as I was trying to take off in this one.
Then, Nathan and I hopped in this mini-jet and tried to take it for a ride.

For some reason, they weren't letting me near the big blue ones. Those are the ones that I really wanted to fly.
It was a little warm on Saturday and we were taking advantage of the shade. I was checking out the landing gear on this plane and discovered that the wheel was bigger than me.
We were getting hungry. So, we spread our blanket out underneath the wing of this really big plane and made some ham sandwiches.
After that, I had a mission with the moon. I had to get into my astronaut suit and go on the mission to the moon.
Look what I found on the moon. A pretty butterfly. Actually, he was on the pavement around one of the planes. Mommy thought that he might have been hurt because he wasn't flying away. She she put her hand down next to him and he crawled right on to her hand. She lifted him up so that I could see him better and he flew right away. Thank goodness he was ok.

It was getting later in the day and it was all most time for the Blue Angels to take to the sky. So, we found a nice patch of grass and spread our blanket out again. Aunt Veronica was happy to spend some time with us.
Nathan and I wore our ear protection pretty much all day. The ear plugs were a little big for our ears but they did the trick. There were even parts of the show that Nathan slept through so he mustn't have been disturbed too badly.
The Army dropped people out of the sky. They came down waving flags and some of them had been leaving smoke trails.
It was getting late in the afternoon and I hadn't had my nap. I was really being a pretty good sport about it too. Uncle Tony carried me around on his shoulders and I was using his head as a pillow. Even though we applied sunblock many times through the day, the sun was intense and we must have missed some spots because I was getting red marks under my eyes.
Finally, the Blue Angels were in flight. I'll only post a few of the MANY pictures that Daddy took.

On Sunday, we went to Lake Erie (the beach). We got to eat our lunch there and spend some time being lazy. Lake Erie is one of Veronica's favorite places to go when she has some free time.
I stopped to take some pictures on the rocks.
The mandatory family shot. Nathan's not sleeping. he just woke up from a nice long nap on his blanket. I think he liked sleeping under the tree.
After our time at Lake Erie, we went back to our apartment complex where we could watch some more Blue Angels from the Penthouse. The planes flew right over us a few times and they were really loud from up there.

Poor Nathan was getting really hungry so we took him back downstairs and fed him a bottle.
For dinner that night, we went to Shooters. There was a Reggae band playing and we had some time to kill before we actually got seated. So, we checked out this huge bridge. Uncle Tony and I walked all most to the end of this bridge.
And, here's a picture of all of the kids on the bridge.
We left pretty early on Monday morning. Before we left, Regi gave me this great new toy. It is a Blue Angel. I didn't let it out of my sight during the entire ride home (except for when Mom took it from me). When we got out at one of the rest stops, I stretched my legs by taking the plane out in the grassy area.
To Regi and Veronica: Thank you for making this weekend a complete success. We really enjoyed ourselves and hope to do it again some time. You two are the best.