Coming Home

Our luggage came today, and everything that was supposed to be in it was in it. So that was good. =)
Our trip back was less painful than our trip there, thank goodness! We were anticipating some security delays due to what happened on Christmas, but things went quickly and we had some time before our flight. We stopped by the USO, and it was really amazing. I've been to a couple but this one was by far the biggest and best-supplied. There were also cards from individuals, classes and scout troops all around, and it was humbling in a way because I know that the generosity of all of those people is what made this particular USO as nice as it was for us. This one brought tears to my eyes - if you click on it you can see the response a staff sergeant left on the corner.

The girls explored the play space before the volunteer in charge had them go pick out a toy from the bins of donations at the door. Bree picked a baby doll and Carly picked a Barbie that only barely escaped Paul's censoring (she's in a two-piece bathing suit)...but that was just because he didn't notice until we were already on the elevator to get to our terminal.

See what I mean by well-stocked? This was just the half of it. The other side had private restrooms, a movie area and a computer lounge.

Hooray for bulkhead seats! Bree still screamed and fussed for the entire second half of the flight when she had to be held due to turbulence, but it was such a relief to let her bounce around without worrying about the chiropractic health of the people in front of us.

So then after a mad dash to make the next flight because our original flight (and all flights for the next seven hours) had been cancelled due to weather, we settled into the last two rows of our little puddle jumper for the ride to Baton Rouge. I know the picture quality is not great, but I thought Bree snuggling her new bayyyy-beee was just too sweet. She rocked the baby back and forth just like her dad does.

And then she dropped the doll on the floor, ripped off her shoes and socks and climbed up the seat to make faces at Carly and Paul. Nobody minded her being a monkey...we were just grateful for no crying.

And then she discovered the tray. And sat on it for a while.

Sorry about the light...I keep promising that I'm going to figure out how to take good pictures with this camera, and really one day it will happen...but THIS is the face my precious angel gave me before doing the whole routine again. Meanwhile Carly just watched movies (Portable DVD players = best invention EVER)