From the Road....

I woke up Saturday morning and felt sick. The thought of lugging two suitcases, a laptop bag, a diaper bag, a carseat and a stroller through the airport with a screaming baby was NOT something I was looking forward to. I got ready anyway. My sister and brother-in-law rode with me up to Omaha where we ate lunch at the Rose Garden. (Great Great Great Chinese food!) After that we headed to the airport. They helped me into the airport with all of the luggage. I carried the diaper bag, Kelly carried the baby and the pack mule, er I mean Andy carried everything else to the counter. We got checked in. The baby was great. We got him in the stroller much to his dismay but once we started walking it was fine. I lugged my backpack and strapped the diaper bag to the stroller. THAT was the easy part. Security check was a bit difficult. I had to remove my shoes, remove the laptop, cellphone and quart size ziploc bag full of travel soaps and run those through. The baby's stroller had to go through... The removal wasn't the issue.. It was putting everything back while I was waiting for the stroller to come through. I held up the line.... Until someone so nicely helped me. I got seated at the gate only 2 hours before my plane was due to take off when so nicely my name was paged. I was expecting the worst. My sister and brother-in-law had crashed the car. I was sure of it. Nope.... I left my boarding pass at the security checkpoint. You see, you have to have that out too.. Apparently it didn't get put away.
The plane was fine. The baby slept the entire way to Chicago. At Midway we had Potbellies for food. I ate half of the food before I understood that we were all lining up. I hurriedly put everything away grabbed all of my "cargo" and headed for the pre-board area. The great thing about having a small child.... YOU get on the plane first. I knew the baby wasn't going to sleep this time, so I got out a dum-dum and a bib... His first lollipop. gross. grooossss. groooooosssss... But a nice grandmotherly lady sat down next to us... She WANTED to sit next to my baby who was drooling a nice sticky combination of cherry dum dum and baby spit. She was very friendly and didn't seem to be nearly the 65 she claimed she was. It was wonderful. She played and flirted with the baby. That trip went swimmingly as well. She made sure I found the rental car place so I wasn't wandering around the airport forever.
Then there was the rental car. The man who was at the counter was a BIT off-kilter. Perhaps it was the 80 degree 100 percent humidity air... Perhaps it was the late hour, but he was an odd one. He wouldn't give me one car because the miles were too high on it. I had signed up and paid for a compact car. A Ford Focus type thing. He wanted to give me a Mustang... I thought about it. SWEET!!! I would LOOOVE to take a Mustang!! I thought about asking him if it was the newest body style for about 3 seconds before I asked him if a car seat would fit rear facing in the back. I am driving an Explorer. At no extra charge. They pulled the car around for me. (that's a big big big bonus! Lots of places I have been to you take a shuttle to a parking space...) Then the trouble began. The poor exhausted baby is sitting in the stroller. I am struggling with the carseat. I spent 20 minutes trying to figure out why the latch system wasn't working.... Turns out the latch straps aren't long enough to latch in rear facing if they are in the slot setting for forward facing.. Hmm.. Imagine that.. After sweating to death (did I mention I forgot to put on deoderant! ew!!), getting lots of "are you SURE you're qualified to be my mommy" looks from my son, and finally getting the carseat in I relaxed a bit. I got in the car's a/c and grabbed for the phone so I could call the person I am staying with.... I couldn't find my phone... LORD! I had left it at the airport in Chicago... Or did it fall out of the diaper bag on the airplane (I found a bib that had spilled out as we were leaving).... Where did it go? I got out of the car and I completely emptied the contents of the diaper bag... I reloaded the diaper bag. Rinse and Repeat. 5 times. No cell phone. Then I noticed my old phone (the one I let the baby play with.) Hmm.. Maybe that one will still work?? I turned it on.. No luck. So I just got in the car. Sick to my stomach again and headed for Chesapeake. On the way it dawned on me.. As I was hurriedly re-packing things.. I put a LOT more stuff in the computer bag because I hadn't needed very much earlier... I stuck my hand in the top.. and viola! I stopped sweating and feeling sick. My cell phone was there.. :) Yay!

Today we went to a birthday party and hung out at the house for the evening.. Tomorrow is the beach with a friend, then dinner with a different friend.. Tuesday I am going to wash the laundry we've used.. (I hate travelling with dirty clothes.. Ick!) and re-pack for the next leg of our trip... Internet where we're going is flaky, so I probably won't update while we're there... BUT I'll update when I get back...
Oooh.. and if you are in the Hampton Roads area and I didn't get to see you this time, I will be back in October. Please don't hate me. I only have a few days, and things are quite crazy!!