Yesterday I showed you my dolls on the landing today we move on into my living room Most of my Integrity dolls I play with (because they are articulated) but some are just so perfect they need to just....be! The dolls in the smaller (IKEA) case are all from my one and only IT convention. As some of you might remember this did not go without a hitch... or six. It's a very long story but I will try and make it a little shorter. It started with the flight from Heathrow to Orlando. There was a big storm but this was more south of us and we would be flying around it (I asked) So we take off in what should have been an eight hour flight on the Monday morning. Due to arrive in Orlando (with time difference) about three in the afternoon. Convention started on the Thursday with early booking in on the Wednesday afternoon. The idea was to pend a couple of days wit mum and my girls going to Sea World etc and the the convention and mum would look after the girls. So anyway fifteen minutes into the flight the pilot comes on the tannoy, they can smell smoke, we will be emptying the fuel tanks and returning to Heathrow landing in about twenty minutes. We understandably were a little nervous, the plane was very quiet. Then about ten minutes later another message "we will be landing in a couple of minutes .....May Day May Day...." Now you could hear people crying, a lady behind us on the right had a heart 'thing' another to the left had a panic attack. We held hands I thought about my dad home alone... how would he look after my ten cats? What would he do with my dolls? We stuck with our plain of many years that we hoped we would never use. Mum was in charge of Sophie and I would look after Amy. We removed our shoes and glasses head in the brace position but still holding hands. I glanced out of the widow the ground below was covered in coloured lights red, yellow, blue and white (quite pretty really) The emergency services were out in full. We landed fast with a lot of bumping, but we did land! As soon as we came to a stop we were told to stay in our seats and the fire and paramedics rushed on. Firemen looking for hot spots and paramedics to help the heart lady and the panic attack lady. Anyway turned out there was nothing wrong with the plane the smoke smell was from the fires in Portugal being blown up to us on the storm wind!!!! So an hour later off we went for a second time (with an extra pilot because of this time limit stuff). All was going well, dinner was burnt but we had our own food so no big deal! Thinking about landing and working out it would be about eight in the evening before we got to the hotel..but that was fine at least we were on our way! NOT! Tannoy announcement "we have a sick child on board and we are running out of oxygen so we need to make an emergency landing" OMG!!! OK, so will we land in New York? maybe in the Carolina's? Nope WE are going tooooo.... Bermuda! So we land in Bermuda having avoided the ⛛. By now we are exhausted the pilots and cabin crew are over their flying limits so we are going to have to stay overnight. After a couple of HOURS we are taken off the plain and through customs we had to collect all our luggage and take it with us. Bermuda airport has never had a plane as big as ours and have no way of handling so many people! We are ushered onto buses at get to hotels all over the Island. Our hotel was amazing (one of these six star jobs) Room was wonderful and pretty big. It was by now two in the morning and we had to be ready for the bus by ten the next morning. After a couple of hours sleep we had breakfast and a short walk around to stretch our legs. All the umbrellas etc are being packed away as a big storm is coming in! So anyway bus turns up about eleven and we go back to the airport. So we take up the WHOLE airport, we are told that we need to book back in and do the customs stuff ...the lot! Oh, and there is no one to book us in so we need to wait for the virgin reps to be sent fro New York! Lunch will be provided. Lunch turned up about three in the afternoon. We eventually took off about seven that night. I wont go into detail of the two big arguments I had with a choir or the strop with the customs guy. OR for that matter the loud mumble I made about getting on the plane. So in the end we arrived at our hotel in Orlando two am on the Wednesday! Staying awake for convention was difficult, girls and mum did not leave the hotel.. no sea world...no Disney. But I did get some lovely dolls.... First two pictures are on the plane and Bermuda airport!
