em-eye-ess-ess-eye-ess-ess-eye-pee-pee-eye part 1

i'm not even sure how to begin this entry so i guess i will just dive right in. today we flew from austin to houston to jackson, mississippi and then drove to starkville. i can't put into to words exactly how much i was dreading flying with maria but omg she was absolutely amazing! she was such a great little trooper today!

our first stop was dropping daisy off at the vet. we decided for her health and our neighbor's sanity we should have a professional tend to her wounds while we are gone. i know that right now she is a pathetic pile of fur and sad eyes because she isn't at home but her bite wounds are taking a loooooooong time to heal. poor thing. chris took her into the vet while i stayed in the car. i have to say- he has gone above and beyond the call of being a beagle parent to her these past several days.

the next stop was ABIA. here is a shoutout to the fine ticket agent folks at the southwest airlines counter. not only were they super friendly to us but they gave us a little certificate for maria to commemorate her first flight. thanks to the business select ticket purchase we breezed through security. we got to skip to the front of the line. if you are flying southwest it is totally worth the extra money to do this. plus you will get drink tickets for the flight! speaking of security. . . it wasn't as bad as i thought it would be but i forgot a lot of things- like taking off my shoes, leaving my cell phone in my pocket, struggling to get maria out of the car seat. i think i was just so happy about skipping the long line that my brain ceased to function. yes- i was that person. sorry to all hundreds of people behind us. . .  after we got through security we got our picture taken with santa. it was free! i'll post the pix when i get home and can check email.

now for the dreaded take off and ears popping. we gave maria a bottle and she was happy as a clam. she fell asleep before we reached altitude. she was such a great little baby. chris did a wonderful job holding onto her so naylor, laura and i could enjoy a quick drink! the layover in houston was shorter than expected and take off went just as smooth as the first one. this time we added some cousins to the flight. oh yeah- my grandmother was with us too- just in a different part of the plane. . . .we turned in another drink coupon and before i knew it we were landing in jackson. my brother and cousin kelly picked out rental cars and my niece and nephew ran off some energy. chris and i ended up driving with my cousin kelly and fiancée, kara. maria mostly slept the whole way. she was awesome. i love my little traveler.

we got checked into the starkville hampton inn and went out to dinner at mugshots. we cut the after dinner talk short because we really needed to get maria back to hotel and put to bed. she was still awake after we got her bathed and fed so we joined the rest of the gray's in the lobby. we looked at a bunch of pictures and news articles that my grandmother had saved through out the years. some of the news briefs were kind of funny- like my uncle had a party at the house- there were 18 teenagers in attendance for informal games and dancing. i didn't know that my grandmother had a masters in journalism from the university of iowa.

well, this was a long entry but today was long day. i'm really happy we made the trip out here.