Off to Florida we go...

We took off for the weekend to go visit our lil' hoot (our daughter, Brittney). Her & her boyfriend just bought a house in Central Florida as well as bringing home the newest addition to their family... a gorgeous Doberman Pinscher named Dash.

We just had to make a trek to go visit them and enjoy all of these firsts with them, plus it was nice to get on the road again, even if it was just for a short weekend trip.

We wanted to leave the house no later than 7 on Friday morning and ended up leaving the gas station at 6:35 a.m., so we were happy about that. It's about a 9-9.5 hour drive, and we were sure driving through Atlanta on the 4th of July would probably put us in some traffic. The great part? We were wrong about the traffic AND Atlanta and never hit either one! woo hoo...Nothing worse than driving through a major city on a holiday!

The drive, for the most part, was nice & easy. During the last two hours of our drive, we endured some pretty heavy rains accompanied by BIG thunder & lightning storms. We finally arrived at a restaurant-bar I used to work at, at around 5:15 p.m., to meet our lil' Owlings for dinner & drinks. It was so great seeing them!

At Jax, we had some wings, beer, hugs and great conversation. Daddy got to meet B's boyfriend for the first time and they hit it off, talking up a storm about technology, sports and technology!! (Did I say technology?) Brittney & I talked about our usual stuff, giggling and loving just being together again!

After dinner we headed to their new house. It's in a quiet, cute neighborhood centrally located to their town and Orlando...not too shabby!

We went out back to play with the dogs, all 4 of them, Savannah & Chili and their two Roscoe (Dachshund) and the newest baby of the family Dash (Dobie). The initial playtime was interesting because Dash is full of spunk and tons of energy and Chili is so small and kept getting stepped on, Savannah has to play referee and Roscoe just wants to play with everyone! It was funny to watch and their backyard is HUGE so it made it a little more enjoyable to run around, throw balls and just be goofy! They were all running around like crazy dogs so the only actual picture I could get was of Roscoe, he is thee sweetest boy ever!

We settled in for the night a couple of hours later, after deciding that tomorrow we will go on a Casino Cruise. JP & Brittney had done it once before and said it was a full day of fun...so heck, why not!

It's good to be with our girl again and we are so proud of how her family is growing as she becomes more of a young woman. We just love JP, the dogs, the house, everything that they have worked hard for, they seem very very happy and I think, as parents, that's all we really want for our babies!

Off to the snoozer ...

PEACE

Flyin' High, Flyin' Low...Flyin' to Orlando!

On my second plane of the day. The time is roughly 5 p.m. on this Thursday evening. We woke up at 4:15 a.m., took care of "The Bugs" morning rituals, fed myself with a ham and cheese toasted sammie and diet coke...yep, the breakfast of champions! By 5 a.m. we were out of the house. My flight didn't leave until 7:25 a.m., but I wanted to be a good flyer and earn my wings and get to the airport 2 hours early like "they" say. We were at the San Francisco airport in about 25 minutes and I was checked-in and through security in about 9 1/2 minutes!! I found a plug and opened my computer to do some "work"...uploading pictures...I was only able to load half of an album due to the slow connection, but it's half of an album that I didn't have loaded, so it's all good! The plane boarded and left pretty much right on time for Charlotte, NC...where my layover was.

[caption id="attachment_5063" align="aligncenter" width="350"] See ya Charlotte[/caption]

The flight was about 4 hours and 45 minutes long but it went by pretty fast due to my awesome luck of being seated next to two amazing women from Hawaii. We talked for the majority of the flight, in between napping, reading, stretching and potty breaks. While I am flying to Orlando to help 'the moms' move...they are enroute to Rome! They flew through the night last night, flying from San Fran to Charlotte and they're going to keep on truckin' to Rome, then once in Rome they will take a small cruise ship to Greece! How awesome is that!?

During the flight we talked about all kinds of stuff from our van-life to their lives in Hawaii. One of the women, Vicki, can watch her kids and hubby surf from her kitchen window as she makes brekkie for the fam and at times, when it's mating season, has to close her windows due to the whales making so much noise splashing their tales and bodies and moaning! They spoke of how amazing the sunsets are and how they never get old to watch, as well as how magical the views are...even after living there for 30 years! We talked about our kids & our husbands, our mothers & our siblings...and of course, the Nana Bug!

It was great to be seated next to such wonderful energy, I sure needed it after the few days leading up to this trip. For some reason, I was majorly stressing about the flight, which flying has never bothered me or scared me before. I'm sure it was driving J' totally batty listening to me for three days about how nervous I was! haha So thank you ladies, my prayers were truly answered by sitting next to you and I hope you (Margaret) had an amazing 80th birthday reminiscing in the magical city of Rome! (I'm upset I didn't get a picture of them, darn.)

They gave me a pretty good push to truly start writing my book. I've really got to get my thoughts in order to start that thing, just seems like something else always gets done before that...hmmmm. So another thank you, to you, ladies!

So...yes, back on the plane. We took off about 15 minutes ago out of Charlotte and should be arriving in Orlando in about an hour or so. I'm pretty excited...actually I'm super freakin' stoked! I not only get to see my mom (after almost two years) and hug and kiss her... this mama gets to see her Baby Owl too!

My, not so little, girl and I are going to have a sleepover and just be giggly girls together and of course I get to put the official mother's stamp of approval on her man, her house & her pup! She's a really great "kid", so I'm sure her life and everyone around her are just perfect. It should make for a really nice trip all the way around and if I get to see my best Aussie mate, that will make it even better!

[caption id="attachment_5065" align="aligncenter" width="350"] Rainy Florida[/caption]

For the next 7 days, I'll be giggling with my little owl, moving the moms, unpacking boxes and shopping for furniture for her new home and I'm sure a lot more that I haven't planned for, purty fun stuff...actually, it does sound fun to me! haha I'm always happy for the time I get to spend with anyone I love even if we just lay on the floor, stare at the popcorn ceiling that hasn't been scraped off yet and using a shower curtain for a blankie! Just kidding mom...you can have the shower curtain! I'm there for the quality time and adventure.

We're coming in for a landing.

[caption id="attachment_5066" align="aligncenter" width="225"] Crazy Cloud!![/caption]

So, here we go.......

PEACE