Surprise!

During spring break T's uncle called him to say he was coming to Philadelphia and wanted to meet our boys. He was coming in his company's new private jet and he wondered if the boys might like a ride.

Um, that'd be a yes.

We didn't tell the boys because we didn't know if the weather would allow for a flight and the disappointment would have been crushing. In fact, we didn't tell them until we were on our way to the airport. When we finally revealed the surprise, D threw up. Luckily he recovered quickly and was soon doing the preflight check with the pilot.

A had no hesitation and was very excited to check the plane and get ready for the flight.

There was one more surprise for them when we got on the plane. The boys could take turns sitting in the copilot's seat and helping to fly the plane. Yup, this happened.

D did the takeoff. He got to put on the headset and put his hands on the controls, under the pilot's guidance.

We flew to New York City and turned over Manhattan.

Then it was A's turn.  He took over the copilot's seat and the yoke for the return flight and the landing.

I have a policy of not showing our boys' faces on this blog, so you'll just have to imagine how enormous their smiles were. If they had grinned any bigger, I'm pretty sure their ears would have popped off.

Today when I ran errands with D he told everyone he met, "I flew a plane!" Everyone responded exactly the same way: smile because he's so damn cute, pause as they processed what he said, smile more uncertainly as they tried to decide what he meant, and then look at me for an explanation, at which point I confirmed, "Yes. He flew a plane."

We have a couple of really happy kids in our house right now.