PDX to CLT

Well, we finally made it! (My apologies for this post being a little belated.) We arrived in Charlotte Monday evening around 5:30pm EST. It was a full day of flying and had you been a bystander at the Portland airport, you would have laughed watching the chaos. It was like a three-ring circus! Picture this... it is about 4:45am, there are hundreds of people waiting in line to check-in and here are the 3 of us, sleep-deprived and trying to manuever no less than 8 bags, one box, a carseat, 4 carry-ons and one semi-sedated cat through the madness. Quite the site! After we paused to address the tantrum that Lauren was having, we made it through security and to the gate just in time to board the flight. Whew!!




Lauren did surprisingly well on the plane, for this being her first time flying. She wasn't scared of the loud take-off noises, like we thought she might be. In fact, when we first lifted off into the air, she exclaimed, "Yahoo - we're flying!!" and threw her hands up into the air. She stayed fairly well occupied during the 4 hours that we were confined to our seats. We gave her the window seat, which helped...and she had so much fun looking down on everything from above the clouds. We were blessed with the most beautiful view of Mount Hood as we left Portland

We flew through Chicago and had just enough time to grab a bite to eat at the airport before we boarded the next flight to Charlotte. Thankfully, the second flight was much shorter (about 2 hours), so we didn't have to keep her entertained for as long. I will say that for not having a nap (for a girl that usually takes 3-4 hour snoozes), she did extremely well in holding herself together. And she was rewarded with lots of little treats along the way (compliments of my mom, who snuck them in my bag at the last minute). When we finally made it to North Carolina, we were relieved and exhausted. We couldn't wait to get to the hotel and jump into bed. But, there was still more to come!

Have you ever made one of those decisions that you later regretted? Well, I experienced that when I agreed to let Ryan go get the rental car while I got all 8 of our bags off the carousel (including the carseat and box). I struggled to do this, all the while holding one sleepy girl on my hip, one howling cat in her carrier, plus my purse! Thankfully, several people were generous enough to help me pull bags off before they whizzed by. And one lady even went and found a skycap and brought him over to where I was so he could load everything onto his cart and help me outside. Gotta love that Southern hospitality!!

Once we got everything loaded into the car, we set off for Huntersville via Billy Graham Parkway. Of course, we had to stop at the grocery store to get a litter box and litter for Casey. As Ryan ran in to buy them, I sat there in the car, talking to Lauren about all the fun things we would do and see in the coming week. I went on and on for about 5 minutes before I realized that she wasn't responding to me. I turned around to find her completely zonked out! (see picture below) So, she did get about a 30-minute nap, after all, on the drive to the hotel.




What a journey it was to make it to Charlotte!! But, how exciting to finally be starting our lives here and to be all together again as a family. We thank you all for your prayers for Lauren's sickness (she has recovered beautifully) and for our safe travels. I'll write another post in a few days to share about life in a hotel and our daily adventures.