social butterfly. The Little Family That Could recently traveled to Charleston, SC for the 5th Biennial Conference of The Toni Morrison Society and yours truly (not the baby) presented a rather unsexy paper on some existential ideas in Morrison's Song of Solomon. Scholars and lovers of Morrison from the US and even to the far stretches of Japan "jumped for the sun" in the beautiful Charleston and instantly, Ms. Noodle was the jovial flower that she is and became "the baby at the conference". Papa Bear also garnered some admiration who added to his chest armor the baby carrier the entire weekend. I preferred our travel stroller that have the best maneuverable wheels since EVER, but hey, he's got the strong back. Me so delicate...Anywho, the TMS was so great and so energizing, I didn't want to come back. I tend to suffer from mental dentritis when I come back from trips like this and then return to work which lacks that "engagement" that any scholar needs to survive - and not just thrive. Now let me talk about stuff that may not interest 90% of
the traffic that comes through here. It was so great to be around scholars like Houston Baker, Judylynn Ryan, Stephen Conners and to have Toni Morrison walk past you, be in her presence, hear her giggle, to see her up close, spill her water while reading from her new book 3 rows away...and the lovely and graceful Phylicia Rashad! Such a beautiful time we had. Though 
my bourgie baby won't remember any of it, but we have pictures to archive this fabulous and historic occasion.So on our journey back, our Noodle who was angelic on the plane there and the entire time at the hotel and the conference decides to go riff raff crazy on the plane. Right as the plane is about to board, she decides to have a BM, so I"m running to the bathroom to do the change. Then she goes into the hysterical cry and I take her to the plane's lavatory to calm her down and to check her diaper again and she freaks out in there. We became "those people with the crying baby". Eventually, a stuartess came over to ask if she could do anything (I'm thinking, "Like what?") but I kindly let her know that I got it. Then Papa Bear hands me a bottle and I was like she just ate before we got on the plane but as soon as I stuck it in her mouth, BAM, three ounces down and she's fast asleep. I felt my blood pressure go down instantly. Somehow, I had drew up my butt cheeks because of the tension and pressure I was under because of the glares of our cabin mates...Wow! Traveling with a baby was an intense and eye opening experience. When we arrived in Atlanta, Noodle was a new and improved bourgie baby. She was smiling, squirming, eating Cinnabon, drinking water and juice, and taking regular naps all the way home. As we sat in our airport recliners across from Cinnabon in Hartfield airport, we heard over the intercom how a Delta flight to Bloomington, IL was oversold and they were willing to give yadda yadda to them in exchange of giving up their seats. I asked Papa Bear what he would do and he smilingly stated, I have no idea.
Somehow, I have these magical powers of bringing thoughts to reality and sure enough, our flight started out oversold and they were offering $400 travel vouchers to anyone who would give up their seat. We both looked at each other and that was such a no brainer! We got pushed to a flight that would fly into Mobile, AL and they would provide taxi service to GPT and we would be leaving in 45 minutes. So we had to haul ass to a distant concourse on Jackson Hartfield's fabu bullet train. Mind you we have baby, 2 carry on bags, diaper bag, golf umbrella, and our own bodies to haul in a hurry. We made just in time as they were boarding. Another passenger had also made the trek with us and she went into a damn asthma attack right as we're taking off. We later find out that our initial flight to GPT had been delayed because of mechanical errors and they were expecting to leave around 8:30pm! So that was our first and perhaps future experience of giving up our seats for what's behind Door #2.
I am glad to say, we made it home safely and Noodle was tired. We all climbed into bed and didn't see the light of day for the next 2 days. We had taken her out of day care for two weeks and in just that time alone, she has went up a shoe size, is comfortably wearing her next size up (9-12 month apparel), and can sit up on her own unassisted minutes at a time.
But as our summer vacation wanes to an end, our most surprising shock happened yesterday morning as my husband was playing around with her as I got ready for work and he asked, in disbelief, "Is that a tooth?" Sure enough, Bourgie Noodle Bean had sprouted out a tooth while she was asleep. Lord knows we have been on a
roller coaster during her pursuit of teething, but never would I imagine she would have teeth coming out, and at the top for that matter, so soon! Literally overnight...but something strange, maybe even foul, is amiss...the tooth has went "FIND ME!" It is gone, reabsorbed back in her gums, AWOL as of 7:29 pm yesterday evening. This is what I believe may be afoot.Overall, I just wish the kid would stop kicking her shoes off when she rubs her feet together. She absoluately obsessed with
gumming her toes. I mean, when you have some the kickingest (yes, kickingest) pair of butterfly Airwalks, this bourgie baby would rather be like her country mama and roll barefoot.
