Call Me Crazy

 Late this morning, the Girls and I boarded a plane. Alone.  Call me crazy.  J certainly has, countless times in fact, since I

booked our flight.  Admittedly, I was a bit nervous about flying solo with all three of them, mainly about keeping Baby Sister entertained.  That and the fact that our flight was not direct, but rather three separate flights with short layovers that left us little wiggle room to get from one gate to the next.  Surprisingly, the biggest challenge we faced was on our last flight and it came from the Girl who had been a wonderful helper all day.  The plane was small with two seats on either side of a very

narrow aisle.  I had planned on having the Girl and Little Sister sit together with Baby Sis and I across the aisle.  But, as she was a lap passenger we were required to sit on the other side of the plane as it was equipped with the extra oxygen mask.  The Girl went into hysterics at the thought of having to sit next to a "strange man," who in fact wasn't a man at all but rather a friendly looking teenage boy quietly reading a book and apparently oblivious to the commotion being caused on his behalf.  We were in the very last aisle and

as such the stewardess witnessed the Girl's panic and unwillingness to switch seats.  She was very sweet and tried her best to convince the Girl that it would be fine but in the end the only thing that worked was my reasoning that we had two choices 1) switch seats or 2) get off the plane and be stranded in the airport.  Luckily, she chose option one.  As a reward, the stewardess who had a jumpseat in our row, let the Girl announce over the plane's PA, "Welcome to Oklahoma City" as the plane was

touching down.  She thought that was pretty cool and so did I!  I was thankful to have such an empathetic and helpful ally in our last and longest flight.  Ten hours after our journey began we arrived in our destination city at 10:20pm.  As for the "why"...all for the love of friends.  The kind that fall into the category of 'the family that you choose.'  We met them when we lived in Colorado, we bought their condo.  A meeting that I know without a doubt was divinely orchestrated.  A simple prayer that God answered in ways that I didn't expect and couldn't have ever imagined!  His plans for us are always infintely better than our own.