This is the day that Dylan and I finished the gingerbread house - and what a spectacular gingerbread house it is, too! Dylan especially liked adding the gumdrops, skittles, and sprinkles - and he did a great job. He's going to save it til Wednesday, so Chip and Tom can see it - and then they can eat it up.
We left the house around 10:30, and headed to see Santa at the Palm Beach Gardens Mall. The Santa set-up there was absolutely gorgeous - very festive and decorative. They even had a couple of snow machines to blow "snow" over the shoppers. It was some kind of small bits of foam which melted on contact. Dylan's picture with Santa turned out really well, and he had quite a chat with Santa, but he wouldn't tell us what they talked about.
Then on to West Palm Beach to the airport to catch the flight home. Security isn't as bad as it's been made out to be - we just walked right through every time. You do have to remove your shoes and jackets, but that's certainly no big deal.
We waited for them to call our names after everyone had boarded, and when they did, we got boarding passes for first class! Sometimes I really love stand-by. The flight attendant's name was Katashina and she was from Poland. She was very difficult to understand, but friendly and attentive. A couple with a seventeen month old baby daughter sat across the aisle - she gave her parents a tough time the whole way. They never got a chance to relax. But they did drink a lot of wine! Katashina kept refilling those glasses.
The plan was to land at O'Hare, and get on the American Eagle flight to Traverse City. But it seems that due to windy and cold conditions, the flight was weight restricted. They blocked off 10 seats so they could add more fuel. Sometimes I really hate stand-by. Fortunately, I have a husband who plans ahead, and we had a reservation at the Ramada Plaza Hotel at O'Hare in case we couldn't make it home today.
I was boo-zausted when we got to the Hotel, and once we got to the room I really didn't want to go back out again for dinner. So we called room service and stayed put. The Ramada Plaza has been "completely renovated" and it's very attractive and spacious. The furnishings are all new - it was a nice place to be stranded.
