Frequent Flyer

Some people are lucky to be able to travel. Some people prefer to stay close to home. Some people take their first plane ride in elementary school, some not until they go away to college and some never get on a plane. Our little Emma Bean has become quite the frequent flyer and world traveler. Last week, Emma and I arrived home from an all to short visit to Pittsburgh. The flights to and from 'Da Burgh' marked Emma's 12th and 13th flights, all since our flight home after Christmas. Pretty impressive for a 13 month old, I'd say. We already have number 14 and 15 coming up in October when we travel to Indiana in October for a weekend at IU with my family.

I've gotten pretty good at travelling with Emma. This time was both the easiest and the one of the hardest. Now that I don't have to pack bottles and formula in my diaper bag, my load is much lighter. She is entertained by anything that isn't actually a toy, so other than a few books and her favorite 'babies', I left the toys at home this time. No baby food needed since she can eat table food. I even remembered to being a back pack instead of my diaper bag so I could wear it on my back with worrying about dropping it.

On the other hand, Emma doesn't want to sit on my lap and wait patiently. She wants to crawl all over the place and cruise along the chairs. She wants to grab the laces on the nicely shined shoes of business men and pet the little tiny doggies that people carry onto the plane. She wants to race into the busy foot traffic in the middle of the terminal. Keeping her contained and clean is the new challenge. Thank goodness the Pittsburgh airport as a place space in the Jet Blue terminal! What a life saver!

Now if only the TSA agents in Boston could lend a hand to a mother struggling in her bare feet to wrangle a toddler while hurling a full size stroller on to the x-ray belt, when no one else is line, instead of standing behind the monitor in groups of four or five twiddling their thumbs! Oh did I mention I was in the designated FAMILY FRIENDLY line??!!

Whether difficult or smoothing sailing, I'm grateful to be able to travel with Emma so much whether by car or by plane. If we had a choice, Jeremy and I would make our home closer to our families. We've been lucky enough to be close to Jeremy's families since we moved to the North East, but we'd like to be close to both families. Maybe we could all just move to the same town! Since we have 6 more years of the Navy telling us where we will live, we make the best of it, travelling when we can and welcoming family to our house when we can't. Thanks to every one's willingness to travel, we get to see our families more often than many families in our situation.

I was trying to include photos of our recent visits with our families, but I'm having trouble. So maybe I'll have to do a separate post of pictures which is what I know you really want anyway ;)