Emma and I were lucky to leave Minnesota when we did. The weather was horrible and the cold flurries were coming in. Luckily we were heading west to San Francisco, so the weather would not effect us. We found out from the captain on the flight that other planes were grounded and were not allowed into Minneapolis/St. Paul due to the bad weather. On our trip, Emma decided to take a friend on board with us - George. George was on an adventure from Emma's school. The kids take turns with George, each one taking him for a weekend of adventures and documenting them with pictures to show the class. George has had more of an adventure than we ever thought possible.
We made it to San Francisco in good time. The down side - the waiting. Flights to Australia do not leave until late at night, so we had a good 6 hours to kill in the domestic terminal. We found out early on that flying business class on stand by was out of the question. Children apparently need to be 8 years or older. This made our chances of getting on stand by decrease considerably. With hardly any place to go and no Starbucks to be found, we found many interesting things to do to occupy our time and keep us awake.
As the time neared to board the plane, there were a ton of people. As the staff started to set up for the flight, I was treated very rudely when I asked about the status of stand by passengers. Odds of getting on...plummeting. Closer to take off time, we were told there were 40 passengers waiting to get on stand by and not everyone would get on....plummeting lower. The rudeness continued. After everyone was boarded, they called two elderly couples to get on and stand by was complete. We did not get on the flight...plummeting complete.
Luckily, my fantastic husband was at home with his trigger finger just waiting to click accept on two tickets to Sydney for the next day. There was light at the end of the tunnel. Now, we just had to go back and get our back from the baggage claim and find a hotel. By this time, it was 11 p.m. Pacific Time, 1 p.m. Central Time.
We finally got our bag off of the baggage claim and Matt had reserved a hotel for us. Now, a cab ride over proved to be interesting when the driver had no clue where to go. However, we made it.
By the time we got in the room and got Emma into bed, it was 12:30 a.m. Pacific Time, 2:30 a.m. Central Time. My gorgeous girl did great and that really helped me keep my sanity. Cost effectiveness was out the window by this point, but I knew we were definitely getting on a flight to Sydney, so that eased my mind. 
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