Maybe we should have remembered the suitcase

Wow it has been a fun tiring eventful week. Last Saturday night we took to the road to drive part way to Chicago so that we did not have such a long travel day on Sunday for Kaiden and I. As with most of my travels you know somewhere there had to be a glitch.  Saturday was a hectic day - getting packed, saying goodbye - getting to see one last basketball game of Seth's West Central team, eating at the Comet Center fundraising supper - you get the idea kind of crazy.  So we were traveling on Interstate 80 and on the other side of Iowa City when Jes casually mentioned "we did grab Kaidens suitcase?"   Words cannot describe - well really Seth did have some choice words- when we discovered that no one had put it in the car.  We pulled over and evaluated the situation - what was in there that could not be replaced and luckily his homework was packed in my suitcase.  We ended up going to Walmart at midnight buying the essentials like underwear, socks a few shirts, pair of jeans and water shoes to take the place of the nice sandals we had found.  I am still trying to figure out how 3 adults could leave home without a suitcase for a kid who is leaving for a month- but it happened and we made do. The only one not really upset by it was Kaiden.
Thus began our trip back to Panama.
Kaiden had not flown since he was a baby and was so excited and soaking it all in.  He said his favorite part of flying was that they gave you glasses of pop - oh to enjoy the simple things in life.  He did have problems with his ears and not being able to relieve the pressure but other than that he was a trouper and so good.
 We arrive at 10 pm in Panama City and headed to immigration.  I had informed him that he was to stand with me and keep his mouth SHUT - this is not  a place to ask too many questions - well it ended up that I had lots of time to explain that as 2 flights had arrived at the same time and the line to get our passports stamped was over 1/2 hour long.  I was checking the time as I really wanted to make the midnight bus to David. 
We made it through, grabbed our luggage and found our driver who was starting to question whether he had missed us as it had taken so long. He spoke fluent English and I stressed get us to the bus depot and we flew.   He did made one wrong turn and then did not see the speed bump - poor Kaiden flew so high that he hit the top of the cab with his head!!
We got to the terminal and there was a bus leaving in just a few minutes -I was glad to see it was a double decker as I knew Kaiden would like that but was not happy when he begged to sit in the front seat of the top.  There is only one way I can describe what the ride was like - it was like sitting in a 3 D movie and riding a roller coaster at the same time-  he loved it - me not so much and the driver was out to set a new speed record.  We made the trip in a little over 5 1/2 hours - normally 7 hours.  One time we took a corner so fast that I slipped off my seat and luckily caught myself on the other seat just before landing on my butt on the floor. And then Kaiden goes to sleep while I see my life flash before my eyes and try to get warm as once again they had the air conditioning on full and  being the good grandma I was I gave Kaiden my coat. By the time we reached David I was a tall blonde popcycle and then it was about 6:45 AM and I called Bud to see if they were almost to David but because we had traveled so fast he was still in Boquete.

Kaiden and I piled up our luggage and he crashed in the middle of it an waited for Bud to arrive about 45 minutes later.
Kaiden was so excited to see Grandpa and me I was excited to see Boquete and unpack and not live out of a suitcase.  It was good to be at my "other home"