17 pieces of luggage!

We made it!!! Somehow Shira managed to finish packing up the entire house by 10 Wednesday night so we could get a decent night's sleep. We were both up around 3 to put the last few things into the duffel bags like the blankets and pillows and the last load of laundry that was in the dryer overnight. The girls woke up around 3:30 and were very excited. The van came just before 4. There were two benches in it and the back two benches had been removed for our duffels. I started shlepping out the luggage one by one - 16 duffel bags, 1 hanging bag, 2 strollers, 2 boosters seats, a garbage bag full of food, 6 carry-ons and Shira's purse. Ari, the driver, loaded them in the van and it all fit perfectly. In the meantime the boys had woken up and Zvi let us know that he wasn't going to Israel. He went to the bathroom and went back to bed. It didn't phase him when I took his blanket, pillow and sheet from under him. He just stayed in bed. He didn't seem to care that we were leaving for a year but finally after a bribe of a lollipop he agreed to come (he knew he was coming anyway so he figured he was better off getting a lollipop than continuing the fight). At 4:35, we said goodbye to our house for a year. The house wasn't quite clean but the cleaning lady was supposed to come on Thursday so hopefully it will be clean by the time the Beckers arrive.

The drive to JFK was uneventful. Ari was a really nice guy and played music for the kids and talked to us most of the way. I had to daven in the car because I was afraid we'd hit traffic and I wouldn't have time to daven any other time. We got to the airport before 9. We couldn't find a porter at the airport so we needed Rivka and Zvi to help us a lot. We got three carts plus Yeshaya's stroller (we put the other stroller on one of the carts. The kids helped a lot and we got all the stuff to security. They were very nice there. They started weighing the bags one by one (25 kg limit)... 22, 25.4, 22, 9 (pillows and blankets), 22, 22. Finally the guy said, "Do all your bags weigh 22 kg?" I told him what an amazing packer Shira was and how she pretty much evened them all out. He said I could stop putting them on the scale. Then we had just three more lines: one to drop off the luggage, one to get our passports checked and then to go through security.

We got to the gate at 10:15 or so and we found out the flight was delayed until 12:30 (from 11:30). Not so bad. The kids were just happy to be finished with the lines so they could run around a little and so Zvi could play Backyard Baseball on the laptop. We got early boarding since we're travelling with young kids and we had excellent seats (bulkhead in the front row behind business class). We were also sitting next to our cousins, BJ and Hindy and next to the Reichers (friends from Baltimore). It never hurts to have a little protektzia. The kids were pretty good on the flight but I was hoping that they'd sleep a little more.

We got to the airport and my father met us there. My mother would have too but she was busy meeting movers for us at our new house. They were moving stuff from Zichron that my sister and Shira's brother had arranged. BJ and Hindy were a huge help at the airport. I have no idea how we would have managed without everyone's help there. We got our car and loaded the 17 duffels in there and then I drove a jam packed car with all the luggage while everyone else took a taxi. Now we're at my sister's house in Chashmoanim. All in all, it was an excellent trip!