Mom's Surprise!!!

A few months before Christmas, I asked my mom what she wanted. She gave me a couple of ideas and so I started my Christmas shopping. Nothing I saw really hit the spot. I did find a really cute snowman for her at Hobby Lobby. I figured she already has a bazillion, so she definitly needs one more! But I still needed something to go with it.... Well, I took one of my dogs to the vet to get her teeth cleaned and when I went to pick her up, one of the ladies at the desk asked if I wanted a puppy. I looked up and saw a really cute, really tiny chihuahua puppy. I told her no, that I already had 2 dogs and that was enough. I left and as I was driving home, I thought of my mom. I called her to kind of joke with her about the dog and at first she thought I was talking about getting it for myself. I told her that no I was thinking about it for her. She wasn't sure if she wanted a dog right now, or even what kind...etc.

I got home and was telling Wyatt about my idea to get the dog for mom for Christmas. We threw the idea around a little, but I wasn't even sure if the dog was male or female or anything else about it. So, I called the vet and asked to talk to the lady about the puppy. I asked her a few questions and let her know I'd call her back and let her know if I wanted it. So, Wyatt and I talked it over a little more and came up with a few more questions. I called her back and asked her the other questions. By the end of these questions, I had made my mind up. I was going to get the puppy!!!

So, I went and picked up the puppy and she was so sweet and loveable. All she wanted to do was cuddle and lay on my lap. I was pretty sure that would go over real well with my mom. It was so hard to keep the secret for almost a week - I got the puppy on Tuesday evening and gave her to my mom on Sunday afternoon. After I got home with the puppy, we decided that we should go get a little carrier for her. So, Wyatt dog sat while I ran to Wal-Mart to get a little carrier for her. Of course, my dogs weren't too happy with me for bringing home the puppy. I really wanted to wait and surprise my mom when we went over on Christmas Eve, but Cari came to visit on Saturday and then my mom was going to drive half-way over to meet us and drop off my cousins so we could take them shopping for their Christmas presents. I figured that would be way too much craziness in my house and it would also give mom some time to bond with her new baby before we all went over there for Christmas. So I decided to take the puppy with me and surprise my mom on Sunday afternoon (since I wanted to let my mom name her, I just called her Little Girl).

Little Girl only wanted to lay in my lap on the way to meet my mom and pick up my cousins. I was a little worried that she had already bonded to me. Anyways, we get there and are pulling into the parking space next to my mom and Little Girl is trying to climb out the top of my coat. I managed to keep her hidden. So Cari and I get out and go stand next to my mom's door, now mind you it is FREEZING outside. We chat a little and then I inform my mom that I am having a really hard time wrapping one of her gifts.... In the mean time I am trying to pull Little Girl out the bottom of my coat, but all she wants to do is stay inside! So, I finally manage to get her out and at just the right time, mom looks over at Aunt LeAnn in the passenger seat (Perfect!!!). I say, "So, I decided to give it to you today," and sit her on the door. My mom turns around and her jaw hits the floor!!! She was shocked and didn't know what to say. It was great!!! I hopped in the car and quickly told her the story and what I knew about Little Girl. She and LeAnn decided that LeAnn had better drive home so mom could bond with her new baby.

It didn't take long for Little Girl to bond with mom and understand that she was her new mommy. Now, anytime mom is out of her sight she whines a little and is really only content sleeping on mom's lap. Mom picked out the name Sassy Ann(after me) Sargent. I think it is a great name and matches her perfectly. Here are a few pics of Sassy while she was at my house.

Cuddled in the blanket sling I made for her

Dinner time!

Trying to get her to pose with the presents

Bath time

Isn't she pitiful?!?!?

Dallas Aviation Expo

On Friday, another instructor and I flew into DFW for the Dallas Aviation Expo. The second week in November there was a flying contest to determine which instructors got to go. Whoever got the most flight hours that week, got to fly one of Spartan's airplanes to DFW. So, I thought it would be fun to go and then maybe get to see Cari. I worked hard to get the most hours, but because of some cancellations, I was 0.9 hours short of winning. The instructor that won was trying to get more time in the seminole so he could get his MEI (multi-engine instructor license). Since I have mine and could sign him off, I got to go also. We met at the airport at 5:30 Friday morning (too early for me, especially since I had too leave my house at 5!). We eventually got everthing ready to go and took off toward Dallas. We were a little nervous about flying into DFW since it is such a large and busy airport. Usually, airports like DFW don't like it when they have general aviation arrivals because we are much slower than the commercial airlines and cause sequencing problems. We got to their airspace around 8 and luckily they weren't too busy... yet. The controllers were all very nice (not grumpy like we expected). They had us land on the far east runway and then told us unfortunately we were going to have to taxi all the way to the west side of the airport, which was about 3 miles. Needless to say, we had a pretty long taxi. When we finally arrived at the American Airlines hangar where the expo was being held, we saw several other airplanes.

This is an airplane taking off while we were holding short of one of the runways.

The C130 can actually back up!!! We were getting ready to leave, but the C130 was blocking us in. So, we just sat in our little seminole and waited until they left to start our engines. It was pretty impressive.



The expo was for elementary through high school kids in the Fort Worth area. There were a couple of recruiters from Spartan there that had a booth set up. We pretty much just hung out all day and answered any questions anyone had. When the expo was over, we flew to Spinks airport, which is just to the southwest of DFW. Cari and Calloway came and picked us up and we went to eat. Since my birthday is Wednesday, Cari bought me lunch/dinner and got me some super cute pajama pants. It was a lot of fun to get to see her and play with Calloway. I can't believe how big she is getting and that she is almost 1!!!!

This one is really good of Cari and Calloway.














She is so cute and I can't wait to see her again at Christmas!!!!!