My Family

I just got back home from a great trip visiting my family. I was so blessed by God´s provision to allow me to go. I was hoping to get to go home for my reunion but was prepared to forgo it if things didn´t work out. Well, my whole family pitched in to make it possible. My grandma paid most of my ticket from Cartagena to Ft. Lauderdale. Jorge and I bought the ticket to NC. My mom paid my ticket to CO to see my brother. My brother paid my ticket to FL to see my dad. And my dad took me to see my granny and paid my rental car and hotel back down to Ft. Lauderdale to catch my flight back to Cartagena! The hardest part, as usual, is not being able to see everybody that I would have like to, but besides attending my class reunion, I chose to focus on my family this time and it turned out to be a really special time!

With my mom and MawMaw in North Carolina.

With my brother, Kurt, in Colorado.

With my dad in Florida.

With my granny in Florida.

You can CLICK on the TITLE of this blog entry to see more photos from my trip!

And, on a side note...here is a copy of an email I sent to my family when I got home to Cartagena. I had a little luggage crisis but finally made it home in one piece! I´m sure many of you can relate to my story:

Well, I made it home safe and sound today. I had quite an ordeal this morning at the airport!! When I arrived with my two check-on bags and my two carry-on bags they informed me that we were only allowed ONE check-on!! I of course went on to explain that I didn´t know that, etc... yada, yada...and the lady was nice but insisted that there was absolutely nothing she could do, that the city of Cartagena has an embargo with SPIRIT airlines and only allows one check-on bag. I asked to speak to her supervisor and gave her the same speech and she also gave me the same speech back and that was their final answer, there was absolutely no exceptions...only ONE check-on! So I got weepy and am asking them WHAT can I do???? There were several options mentioned but none really seemed do-able...bottom line...she tells me, well, try to get all the stuff in your back-pack into your suitcase to combine those two bags and then you can take the suitcase as your second carry-on (my other carry-on was the guitar and the check-on was a rubbermaid container). I´m looking at my stuffed back-pack and my stuffed suitcase and I´m thinking that this is impossible. She also mentions that I can put more stuff in the container and pay an overweight fee. I was also thinking that that container was already stuffed and it just all seemed impossible. She kept encouraging me to try and said, you can take out some of your clothes and put them on...I´m thinking yeah, right!! So I drag all my stuff over to the side, by a wall and start wading through all my stuff...can you picture this?! You can imagine my state of mind! They told me, just call somebody to come pick up the bag! I said tearfully...I don´t HAVE ANYBODY!!! So, anyways... I take out my two jackets and tie them around my waist. I take off my sandles and put on my socks and tennis shoes instead to use less space, I took out two bags of stuff that weren´t really all that important (magazines, snacks and some other stuff...sniff, sniff). I took out all my toiletries and filled a third bag because I was thinking that they are all liquids and won´t be allowed on my carry-on. So, then I cut off all the tape on my container and find that there is actually some room in there...enough to put my toiletries in and a few other odd items from the bags. I narrowed it all down, taped up the container again (Kurt, it was totally GOD that led you to insist on me taking that roll of tape with me!!! I would have been in a mess without it!!) So I eliminated my back-pack and got it down to the container to check-on and then the guitar and my suitcase to carry-on!! I had to leave behind the other 2 bags of stuff! I never thought that would be possible! So I drag everything back up there and check-in to my flight. The container now weighed 55 pounds...only 5 pounds overweight!! Guess how much they charge me!! $50 USD!!! I cried some more as I handed over the $50 dollar bill Granny gave me before I left. I was having a hard time but finally I had to change my perspective and instead of seeing how I got ¨jipped¨ of my precious extra cash, I had to just be thankful to God that He had provided it for me for this situation! I thought, now what if I didn´t HAVE any money, now that would really be something to cry about! I thought also in the midst of this, I really don´t want to let this put a damper on my trip because I had such a good time! So, I had to just let it go. So anyways, the rest of the day went just fine and I arrived safely after a very rough start!! I was home by 1:30 pm. Moral of the story...if you travel on SPIRIT AIRLINES to CARTAGENA you are allowed ONLY ONE CHECK-ON!!!!!!!!

PS: After all the hassell about the luggage, would you believe that our plane had room for about 150 people and I estimate generously by saying there was only about 50 people on the plane!!! Uuuuggghhhh!!!!