Mommy's Home & The Tooth Has To Go!!

My trip to Dallas could not have gone any smoother. Mike was so sweet to get up and take me to the airport at 4:30. My flight left on time and I arrived in the Dallas airport at 7:30. I had until 8:15 to get to the Gaylord Hotel, so I took a taxi that cost me $23 (yikes!!). There was a nice girl from Canada waiting in the lobby to take the same tour, so we hit it off and talked the whole time we were gone. Her husband was in a business meeting, so she was trying to see a little bit before they had to go home. I got to see the 6th Floor Museum and and most of downtown. The only thing I was sad about was the fact that we didn't get off of the bus except for once. I would have loved to have had 15 minutes to walk through the farmers market to buy some fresh fruit.. The tour ended at 1:00, but it was 1:45 by the time they got me back to my hotel. I ran into Amy from Wichita and Patty from NJ in the lobby.. Our first session started at 2:00, so I had just enough time to go to my room and freshen up. I really enjoyed the speakers the first night and it was totally open for questions, so I learned a lot from listening to others and asking questions. After the first session, I went back to the room and Kim had finally arrived. I can't give any good reason for why I chose her to be my roommate over any of the other girls that responded to my email, but it worked out perfectly. She was super sweet and fun to hang out with. She was from Phoenix. They had a meet and greet that evening with appetizers and a cash bar. I was starving. My cinnamon roll from 9:00 had worn off, so Amy, Kim and myself went over the the Galleria with Kim's graphics artist to eat dinner. We ate at a Tex-Mex restaurant of course!! The Galleria is an amazing mall. It is three stories tall with an ice skating rink in the middle. They had an American Girl store, but I didn't make it in there. They also had all of the high priced stores, so that helped me to save money.. After dinner we came back and crashed. The girl on the left is Amy and she publishes the Kids' and the Wedding Directory in Wichita. The girl in the middle is Kim and she publishes the Kids' directory in Phoenix.

aturday, our morning started with a speaker from New Jersey. She was amazing. She started her first directory in 2004 and she now has three Kids' Directories. After she finished speaking, we had a panel of experience publishers which I really enjoyed. They covered a lot of great information. Then we ate lunch and headed back in for our third and final speaker. I could have totally lived without her. She was suppose to talk about how to increase your profit (duh, more ads = more money).. Instead she talked about how to complete yourself. We were so happy when she finished.. Kim, Amy and myself ran back over to the mall to actually look in some stores, but we didn't have much time. We had to be back around 6:00 to get ready for dinner at 7:00 which no one mentioned was a little dressier then I came prepared for. There were an equal number of people that were dressed casual as there were people that went all out. .I didn't stand out too bad. After dinner, we went to the hotel bar and hung out with several of the publishers until they kicked us out at midnight. Then we moved our conversation out to the lobby until 1:00 AM. There was four of us that were able to hang on until 1:00. One girl was from Sacramento, but originally from Canada. She was sweet - she even told me she loved my accent!! The other girl was from Orlando and she was by far my favorite of the more experienced, larger size directories. She was very real and very humble..

I got up at 8:00 this morning. Luckily, Kim and I had flights that were just twenty minutes apart, so she let me ride back to the airport with her. Unfortunately, we were at two totally different terminals, so we had to hang out at the airport for two hours separately. I got home at 3:00 and my family was waiting for me at the airport. I can say that I missed them all very much.. I enjoyed going alone, but there is something to be said about having someone you love with you..

The tooth was still hanging on by a thread, so I warned Maggie that it had to go before she could go to bed. She was of course not a happy camper, but after 45 minutes of hugging, crying and not opening her mouth, it finally came out. She was so proud of herself when she realized it was out. I am so proud of her!!