Elliot's Debut World Tour

While I get homesick for the US fairly often, one of the advantages to living in Europe and specifically Norway, is the vacation allotment. Husband has roughly six weeks, plus sick days and this year, because of Elliot's arrival he also has the "Papa Permission," which is another huge sum of weeks of paternity leave.

I'm leaving that vague, not because I don't know, but because I don't want this to become a discussion of the family system in Scandinavia vs the US. But I do mention it, because, without it, visiting home would immensely hard.

Door to door to either San Francisco or Sacramento, both cities close enough for the Durel family visit, is nine time zones and 22 hours.

Door to door to Atlanta, where we fly into for my family would be six time zones and about 18 hours door to door.

Also, for those unfamiliar with US geography, Georgia and California are on opposite ends of the country---four time zones and a six hour flight.

So as you can imagine, scheduling anything gets complicated.

For most visits, we can only manage one location or the other, but because this is Elliot's big debut, we want to stop on both coasts. His California family has not met him yet. And most of his Georgia family hasn't either.

We also are homesick for some of our best friends, so we are using the cross country travel as an excuse to stop in Colorado for long weekend. Plus, we're building in a few days with Andrea and Deena in San Francisco and may even get a wee visit with Lisa. (And of course we're going to try to see all our Georgia people.)

But back to Husband's liberal vacation time...

In just a few weeks, we will head off for Elliot's world tour and I say world tour because in the course of five weeks, we will leave Stavanger and touch down in (for various amounts of time, of course):

Part One:
Stavanger
Copenhagen
Seattle
Sacramento
San Francisco

Part Two:
Atlanta
Gainesville
St. Simon's Island

Part Three:
Denver

Part Four:
Sacramento
Chicago
Amsterdam
Stavanger

Of course some of those are just buzzing through airports for a plane change, but because we will have a baby and all that entails in tow, I choose to count them.

Since we've made the plans, I've been waking up to scrawl notes on a pad I keep beside my side of the bed...thus far they range from how many diapers we'll need to which bag to carryon to whether or not the floor we'll have enough room to wrap Elliot in a blanket. And whether or not his favorite rattle will drive everyone around us nuts.

Luckily I am breastfeeding and have almost perfected the art of draping the two of us with a shawl, so we won't have to deal with bottles of formula or flashing strangers internationally. He doesn't tend to be a crier, unless something obvious is wrong (hungry, wet or hurt, etc...) so hopefully he won't be the plane pariah. And he's so young that perhaps the time zone changes won't freak him out so much.

But, overall, packing for the planes, not to mention what all three of us with need for five weeks is a little daunting. (I'm thinking we'll just pack for just about a week or so and plan to do laundry...) And the travel and timing are all going to be a little nuts. We’ll all probably need a week-long nap when we get home.

But those are just the details---overall I'm soooooooooooooo excited.

While I love our life and all of our adventures, I get so homesick for my family and our friends. Because of the pregnancy and travel restrictions and all that goes with it, I haven't been in the US since late November and haven't seen my branch of the family tree since early that same month.*

Sure, there's time to plan...we have about six weeks before take-off, but I am already counting the days.



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*Yes, the BigD was here for ten days in April, but that wasn't enough. I miss my mom, so does Elliot (and Husband a little bit, too. Seriously.) We need to see the D, not to mention my dear sister. Also, Elliot has two cousins who are boys and about his same age. They need to get well acquainted so they can start planning who will steal the beer.