Our journey to Guatemala was definitely not an easy one, but
in the midst of the struggle the Lord's goodness was evident to us. We awoke at 4:00 am and we got ready, packed the car, (when I say packed the car I
mean to the top with everyone's laps full of luggage too)and we all squeezed in
the car and off we went to the airport. Since we packed for two year as we
arrived at the airport everyone was looking at us as if we were crazy, and they
were right! That CRAZY looked like five large suitcases, one pack and play, one car seat, two large
carry on suitcases, two HEAVY backpacks, and a diaper bag! Oh yeah, a baby and
a dog TOO!!!! We just kept repeating
back to each other "go big or go home" ! However, the longer the day
went on for some reason this saying didn't seem as funny. As we finally made it to the front of the
line to get the tickets the airline agent said," you have a dog, so where
are the papers?". I had a shot records to show her but that was not the
papers that she needed. Evidently we needed a international certification within
the last 30 days. Well we did not have this paper since I had called the airlines customer
service the day before and they had said that for Guatemala I did not need
anything and I had them double and she still said there was not any papers that
I needed to bring. Long story short trying multiple ways of figuring out what
we could do and being told we were going to miss our flight we were finally(an
hour later) offered the option of changing our flight to a later time in the
day. Our friend that had dropped us off at the airport and had just made it out
of Atlanta traffic had to turn back around and pick up our dog, Luna, and take
her to a vet five minutes away from the airport and bring her back to the
airport for us. Finally all was done and we had the papers in hand!
Ok get ready cause here is where
we start to see the goodness of the Lord and we were so amazed by how good he
is to us even in the a mundane airport trip. At this time there is a very long line just to
get to the ticket counter , so PJ goes up to the same lady who was working with
us before and asked if we are ready to go now that we had the papers. She said
yes! We did not even have to wait in the line! Thank you Jesus! She proceeds to
tell P.J. that it was a good thing we did not take the earlier flight because
it broke down and never even left the tarmac. Thank you Jesus! Miraculously all of our luggage was within
weight requirement except one which was a pound over, but she did not even look
at it and just let it pass through. Thank you Jesus! Now, we have everything
checked in and have tickets in hand and off to security we go! We are down to
two large carryon bags, two HEAVY backpack, a diaper bag, a baby, and a dog.
Since all of us have been up since 4AM and it is now 10 AM kala has fallen asleep
in the carrier. As we got to the security station they told me I did not have
to take Kala out of the carrier, but I did need to take my jacket off. Well my
jacket was under the carrier, so the man told me to wait a minute he came back
and said I could leave everything on and could to a pat down. Thank you Jesus! Now,
through security and P.J. is working like a mule trying to get all the bags off
the line, put my shoes on for me, and get everything ready to go to our gate.
As we are now ready to go to our gate we
look on our tickets to figure out where it is; since we are at the Atlanta
airport and it is HUGE we are readying ourselves to walk a long way with backs
breaking. We look up at the signs to see where our gate is and it just happens
to be the one right in front of us. Thank you Jesus! At this point I am
laughing at how good He is to us! We get
to sit down and take a break for a few minutes while Kala is still
sleeping. When Kala woke up I went to
get some food for us, a banana for kala and burger for us to share( little did
we know this would be the only food we would have for a long time). When I came back from getting the food P.J.
tells me they were asking for people to check some carry-on items for free so both our huge bags (we didn't
even know if they would fit in the over head space in the plane) got to go
under the plane. Thank you Jesus! Now they are asking again if anyone has more
carry- on items that they would like to check and they will do that for free
too. So we checked one of our HEAVY back packs too. Thank you Jesus! We are now
down to only a diaper bag, one backpack , a baby , and a dog. This seems a lot more
due able now.
We made
it Miami for our layover with little to no issues and Kala only cried a little
bit on the plane; however, wiggle worm does not even start to describe her for
the whole flight. Our layover was 4 hours, so Kala was able to get down and
play for a little bit and the dog got to get out of the carrier. During our layover
Kala got pretty sleepy, so I walked her to sleep and went back where all our stuff was. Believe it
or not there was a pink rocking chair right beside all our stuff! I hadn't paid
much attention to it before now, but what a perfect place to rock my baby as
she slept. Thank you Jesus!
We made
it on our flight to Guatemala with no problems. We are so excited we are almost
to Guatemala and the pilot comes on to tell us we are 30 minutes out from
Guatemala, BUT there is ash from one of the volcanoes near the airport, and it
is not safe to land so we will be re-routing to El Salvador. We made it to el Salvador
and we had to go through a check point and customs. They saw that we had a baby
and let us skip to the front of the line. Thank you Jesus! We stopped to ask if
we needed to pick up luggage or if they had decided to keep it on the plane over
night. They told us that the luggage would stay on the plane. Thank you Jesus! Now
we get through customs no problem, but no one knows where we need to go to get
our vouchers for the hotel, so we all are following each other like chickens
with our heads cut off! We find the place to get vouchers and we make a LONG
line, but little did we know there was no reason to make a line because they
were just calling out names as they came to them. We get on a bus with vouchers
in hand and a man gave me his seat up front because I have baby. Thank you
Jesus! At this point I have a migraine like no other and am nauseated as a result
of it and I am just watching the clock
in the bus thinking, "you can make it! We are almost there! It won't be
much longer!". Well 45 minutes
later we arrive at the hotel and by God's grace I did not vomit! The hotel is beautiful,
but to be honest we could not even enjoy it because now it is 11 pm and we
haven't eaten in 12 hours and have been up for
almost 20 hours with a baby who has only has two 30 minute naps. We get
to the room, I put the baby to bed, and PJ goes to get food from the hotel.
They told P.J that you can't take food to the rooms, but P.J. explained or
situation and they let him. Thank you Jesus! We scarf down our food and go to
bed as quickly as possible since we have to be back up at 4:30 AM the next morning. We made it back the airport and through all
the check points in El Salvador no problems and as we waited to board the plane
we got to talked a guy, Mathew, that was
coming to Guatemala for 6 months to backpack. We had a great time getting to
know him and he even helped us carry our diaper bag through the airport!
We made
it Guatemala after a quick 30 minute flight. They let me go through the
handicap customs line since I had a baby. Thank you Jesus! We had a guy put all
our luggage on a cart and we went through the last security check and had our
dog's papers checked( thank goodness we had them!). We went out of the airport and Hilmar was
waiting for us(I had face book messaged him the night before about all that
happened but wasn't sure if he received it since we did not have international
phones). Thank you Jesus he was there!
Thank you Jesus for provision! Thank you Jesus for the gifts
we do not deserve! Thank you Jesus for being our LORD!
