Snow!

Not sure how this will affect our travel plans tomorrow, but we definitely got snow tonight.  Our friends skyped Lauren (from 2 blocks away) to show her that they were "ice skating" on their deck.  Sliding around was more like it.  Pretty funny.  The power went out at 9:15 and came back on  about 90 minutes later, so I have been doing all the last minute things by candle light and flashlight.  It was crazy!

Turns out I ended up having to completely repack everything except Lili's suitcase.  We took out some clothes, grabbed an extra roll-aboard, and eliminated one carry-on.  We basically redistributed the weight--the concern is that within China we are each allowed only 1 piece of checked luggage, and 1 eleven pound (I think that is what I read) carry on.  And I think they count our small backpacks ("personal items" here in the states) as your carry on.  I don't know for sure though, but the point is we had to do some juggling--IN THE DARK.  And here I thought we were ready to go.

The worst part was Scott had just gone down into the infamous under-the-stairs storage, crawled in--and that's when the lights went out.  Poor guy.  Lauren quickly grabbed the kitchen flashlight (after dropping a puzzle in the hallway, running into a table, then tripping on the threshold) and rescued him.  Of course, all the other flashlights we grabbed were nearly dead, so I sent her down in to the dark laundry room for the batteries.  Oh--she loved that....

Anyway, EVERYTHING is ready to go now.  Really.  This time I mean it.  We are ready.  Scott re-set the clocks, and the alarms are set now too.  But I don't trust them, so I'll use my iPhone as a backup!  And my travel alarm.

Lauren decided to sleep on the couch in her sleeping bag because her bed was already made and she didn't want to have to mess with it in the morning.  At least she is not sleeping in her clothes, like we'd do as kids the night before camp (!?)  I guess we thought it would get us to camp that much sooner.

We are supposed to arrive in Beijing Thursday night around 8:30 I think, which would be 7:30 am Eastern.  Pray that we will all be able to sleep some on the plane!!!  And that we can take off on-time.  I have trusted that everything has been God's timing, so I need to remember this is all part of it.  We'll get there.