Flying with 2 kids...

Did not go too badly.  The kids were really, really good.  We left Eagle after a stop at Yeti's on Wednesday morning.  We were dropped off at Nick's cousin's house where we had a short "layover" until we could check in to our airport hotel that afternoon.  The kids played well and we had a good lunch with Jodi, Nathan, and Charlie before heading off to the hotel.  We got checked in and headed down to the pool.  Since I was very concerned about what I'd have to carry, I didn't bring life jackets.  So I had my hands full with two little kids that loved swimming at the pool.  They got to take turns jumping off the pool stairs or the side of the pool.  After swimming, we headed out to Ruby Tuesday's, which was across the street from the hotel.  The kids did a really good job (aka no one threw anything across the restaurant) and both kids went to bed uneventfully :)  We got up early the next morning to catch the hotel breakfast before our 6 am shuttle.  And that's where I started to stress...
Lindy is walking pretty good, but not as good as it takes to walk through DIA and around busy airport shuttle traffic.  So, I had to carry her.  And our large backpack.  And both kids' car seats.  Although we moved slowly, we were doing pretty good.  Until we hit the first escalator.  This was my Facebook post about the escalator:
Seen today at DIA: lady carrying a child's car seat, large backpack, and 15-month-old child down an escalator. Lady says to her 3-year-old child "come on." He says "no!" and proceeds to sit down at the top of the escalator and cry. So the lady, the car seat, the small child, and the backpack are now almost all the way down the escalator. What does the lady do? She runs up the down escalator, in flip flops, while still holding the small child, the car seat, and the backpack. And when she reached the top of the down escalator, the 3-year-old child started laughing.

And that is how this lady got her workout in today...

Once we finally got to our gate, we had a Jamba Juice and hung out entertaining everyone else in the terminal :)  Slight issue when we were boarding the plane.  The gate agent told me Cayle's car seat (the one I had carried through the whole airport, the one mentioned above in the escalator incident) was not aircraft acceptable.  I knew it was but she was adamant it wasn't.  That agent and I had a not-so-pleasant interaction.  Instead of dropping the car seat off right before we got on the plane, I found the first flight attendant on the plane and explained to her that the seat was indeed aircraft approved.  She told me she would go speak to the gate agent and get back to me.  In the meantime, I lost my preferred boarding while dealing with the situation, so things were a bit stressful trying to find a seat for Cayle and I (Lindy was a lap ticket).  The flight attendant had to wait until the entire plane was boarded and then brought me the seat.  So the plane was pulling away from the gate, I'm trying to get Cayle's car seat situated, both Lindy and Cayle were majorly confused, all within the space of two inside seats on an airplane row.  O, and the flight attendants were letting me know we all needed to be seated.  No.  Duh.  

The rest of the flight was uneventful.  Until it was about 15 minutes before we landed and Cayle decided he had to pee.  Right then.  So as everyone is cleaning up and fastening seat belts and whatnot, I am taking Cayle and Lindy and climbing over some poor guy to run to the bathroom.  Let me tell you, airplane bathrooms are not made for young children who are just learning to use potties, nor are they intended to allow parent assists!       

Once we got off the plane, we headed down to baggage claim, grabbed Lindy's car seat, and found grandma's car in the parking lot with no issues.  Whew.

After I shared my car seat story with Nick's mom and my sister, both encouraged me to call Southwest Customer Service  So, I did.  And I now have a $75 voucher for travel on Southwest.  Yay me :)