It was definitely a crazy day, but it helped so much that Jolene was here, and I had an extra set of hands around to help.
I was definitely worried about Molly, even though she seemed to be doing really well, and I was extremely nervous about navigating all of our travel details on my own. We don't fly much at all, and I have never rented a car, or found my way around a big city on my own before. It was definitely a little nerve wracking.
With some last minute traveling advice, some hugs to the kiddos, and some good lucks to Mary, we headed off.
I was pretty relieved to find our way around the parking lot, shuttle and airport pretty smoothly. Once we got to the gate, and we were all settled, I did a huge sigh of relief.
I glanced over at Mary, and her jitters were just beginning. The poor girl was very scared for her first flight.
She sat like this until it was time to board the plane.
The flight was actually very turbulent, but Mary loved it, and by the time we had our layover in Houston, Texas, and were ready to board our second flight of the day to Fort Worth, Mary was completely fine.
The only hiccup was trying to figure out how to work the dang airline wifi....and they didn't serve Rootbeer, much to Mary's dismay. ha!
Due to some flight delays and the extra time it took to park and ride the shuttle to the airport, we didn't land in the Fort Worth, Texas until 1:00am! We were dang tired, and I had NO CLUE where to go to get a rental car.
We stepped off the airplane, and BAM, heat and humidity like nothing we had ever felt before. Seriously! I checked the weather and it was 92% and 40% humidity. 1:00am. Boo.
We followed the signs that took us outside, in the dark, into a creepy alley, and then....nothing. Absolutely nothing, but two white, small town Heber girls, in a deep, dark alley, in the middle of Texas, surrounded by some pretty scary people.
Not good.
I had finally just decided to sleep in the airport and figure it all out in the morning, when a big bus pulled up with flashing lights blinking "Car Rental." Apparently, the car rental shops were not in the airport. Nope, they were 25 minutes away on a bus.
We were so relieved to finally know what the heck we were doing, and we got on the bus. Poor Mary was so tired, and had an early practice that day, or the next day, depending on how you look at it.
We finally got to the rental shop, and the line was an hour long. Yup, 2:00am by the time it was my turn at the counter. Mary was sound asleep on a little chair in the corner. The rental car guy told me that the only thing they had left was a small pick up truck. Totally fine with me. I didn't care.
He gave me the keys, I woke Mary up, and we headed out to find our little truck. We walked out the door and almost fell over with the wave of heat that welcomed us. Geesh! We started looking around for a little truck.
This is what we found.
I about died! This does not look even close to how big it really was. We literally had to crawl up on to the seats to get in. We learned quickly that everything, and truly everything, is bigger in Texas!!!
We got everything in the "small pick up truck" and trusted our fate to Siri, my beloved GPS in my phone.
Luckily, it was 2:00am, so there wasn't a lot of traffic. Otherwise, I would have been terrified to drive this massive truck around Dallas/Forth Worth freeways, not knowing where I was going. I literally could not see over the giant steering wheel without sitting on the very edge of my seat and sitting up as straight as I possibly could.
I cranked up the country music, and drove us and our big truck through the Texas freeways. It was pretty fun actually. Poor Mary was completely zonked out next to me.
The hotel was a good 30 minutes away, but thankfully we found it, check in went smoothly, and we crashed into our big (really, they were huge) comfortable beds around 2:30am.
Welcome to Texas. Go us. Few!
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