If the first 24 hours in Charlotte weren’t enough, we still had another 48 hours of eating and quilting to go. Although I didn’t go AS crazy on the back nine, we still had a pretty great time. In the final part of our quick trip to Charlotte, I’ll highlight some (more) of the food we ate and also talk about what we learned on the flight home (quite a bit).
A few more things to eat…
So to kick things off Sunday morning, we had some breakfast biscuits from my favorite fried chicken chain, Bojangles, which should be pronounced bo-han-glaze for the maximum effect. While I love their fried chicken, I love their bo rounds even more – they are like tater tots/hash browns on steroids. A must have for breakfast!
After leftovers (of which we had a ton) for lunch, we had our last dinner in Charlotte once again courtesy of my brother in law and his Green Egg. This time he made his specialty rack of lamb which was just as good as his specialty pulled pork. I generally prefer eating out to home cooked meals because I am a profligate, but I must say that our home cooked meals were just as good as any of the fried chicken I ate.
For breakfast on our last day, we trooped it out to downtown Charlotte where we tried a relatively new creperie, Hazelnuts. Downtown Charlotte is weird, in that every time I’ve been there it’s felt completely dead. There must be a lot of people working there, but it just doesn’t feel like a city – it feels like empty streets. Still, there are some good places to eat, including Hazelnuts, which is on the first floor of a business-type building. We bought like four crepes – all were excellent. There are some pretty interesting ingredients and combinations, we got one breakfast crepe, two savories and one sweet. Personally, the “maple syrup doused ham and cheese crepe” (not the official name) was my favorite!
After a nice long walk home, the rest of the day consisted of me babysitting and Jess furiously – FURIOUSLY – quilting. Baby M spent a lot of time playing with the dogs, since her first word was “dog” she has always loved them, and these dogs were much calmer than ours so she could get up close in personal without getting smacked in the face with a tail. In the end, Jess finished quilting with about an hour to spare, and I must say the quilt looks great and has been of great use even in the two weeks we’ve been back. After that, it was on to Charlotte airport for our first flight with a wide awake toddler – here. we. go.
Our return flight of fun fun fun
Check in was relatively painless, though the airport was definitely more crowded at 5 PM on a Monday morning than it had been the previous Friday, the line was short. With TSA Precheck, we were through security in a breeze and headed to the Charlotte US Airways club which was very crowded. We managed to find some seats and sneak snacks by Baby M, though she had some crackers as well. Our plan was to feed her dinner on the plane and then just try to keep her occupied, hoping she would fall asleep around the time we were descending, or at worst on the car ride home (around half an hour past normal bedtime).
Now’s as good a time as any to discuss our strategy. Since Baby M is bigger now, we decided we weren’t going to be able to get away with carrying on everything. So we checked two bags, this was free thanks to the brand new free checked bag feature on the US Airways Mastercard. Then we just pushed Baby M’s caddy around with our bags in it while one of us carried her. We also had our Beco, but ended up not using it. Finally, we prepared ourselves with a bunch of snacks, Cheerios and puffs, plus crackers that we got from the lounge AND her dinner in tupperwares (pulled pork again). That plus an assortment of books was our hope to contain her on the plane.
After about forty minutes in the US Airways Club, we made our way to the gate. Since it was a bigger plane, we boarded with Zone 2 (again thanks to the US Airways card). We were seated in a window and middle seat in a row of three. I asked if there were any rows we could move into with an empty seat but the flight was too full (although there WERE empty seats on the plane).
Baby M was very different on this flight than our first one. Since she wasn’t tired yet, she was super active and curious about everything. As soon as we got on the plane, Baby M was climbing all over the place and us. She was super curious about the tray table which worried me.
My biggest worry taking a child on the plane is disturbing other people. For our flight over, I was worried about disturbing via crying since she was so tired. For this return flight, I was worried about things like her kicking the front seat or banging the tray table. I knew it was tight quarters, but it’s amazing how different it is when a semi-toddler is climbing all over the place!
Anyway, overall, the flight ended up being fine, though Baby M did stuff like grab the dude in front’s elbow through the space between seats (I guess he didn’t mind or was being nice because he didn’t even flinch). Most of the flight was spent tearing up magazines, reading books, eating dinner, and climbing all over us. We were both completely exhausted when it was all over – especially Jess who once again did an amazing job.
Final Thoughts
I’d like to reiterate my belief on traveling with lap infants – 6 months-ish is the time to go! Anytime before the baby is walking, essentially. The plane travel on this trip was much more tiring than any of our previous flights. The combination of high energy and curiousity just made things difficult. But I’m sure every parent who has traveled with their infant knows that. Overall, having a semi-well thought out plan and being “on” for the entire flight got us through without too many hiccups. But it was still way more mentally tiring than any flight previous. Overall, we had a great time in Charlotte, ate great food, and made a great quilt for the baby. Not too bad 🙂
Eric says
I want those tots
choi says
your daughter is so cute, reminded me of my youngest sister when i was growing up. you guys have a lovely family.
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