It’s Mardi Gras…February 27, 2011

The Mardi Gras season is in full swing with parades and activities happening everywhere.  I know a lot of folks believe that New Orleans is the home of Mardi Gras but it actually began in Mobile, Al which is just a few miles from our park in Fairhope.

We went to our first parade this afternoon in Fairhope…the Mystic Mutts of Revelry.  It is certainly my favorite parade.  Here are a few pictures.

Snooki and The Situation from The Jersey Shore…er, I mean the Eastern Shore.

We then hung around for the night parade put on by the Knights of the Ecor Rouge…this year’s theme was Toyland.  Unfortunately it is very hard to get pictures after dark.  We ran into friends from our park and had a great evening.

Chris, Larry and I are waiting patiently…

I wanted this gentleman’s big beads but he wasn’t giving them up.

Dottie, Barb, me and Chris.

And here came Ron, Vern, Jeannie and Joan.

These find folks are ready to attend one of the balls following the parade.

It’s been a long day…more to come.

Moving on.

Robertsdale Quilt Show February 3, 2011

This morning 13 ladies from our RV park, drove a few miles to Robertsdale, AL to a quilt show at one of the local churches.  This was not a juried show and evidently all quilters were encouraged to submit quilts for viewing.

The folks that were running the show could not tell us exactly how many quilts were on display but they knew they had at least 300 and probably closer to 400.  I don’t think I have ever seen so many quilts in one place before…I should say so many beautiful quilts.

This show is presented every other year.  I asked one of the ladies that was selling the tickets why they don’t do it every year and she say because it would kill them!

Here are a few of the quilts.

There were quilts everywhere…here are the ones displayed in the sanctuary.  Not a great shot…you can’t really tell just how many were in this room.  The quilt just to the left of the yo-yo quilt is circa pre-civil war.  There were several dating back to the 1800s.

They even had quilts in the area where they were serving lunch…along with live music.

I did not get a picture of it but there was a quilt made up of about 1” squares of fabric…it was very large and contained 20,000 squares!  I took their word…wasn’t going to count them.  Jeanie told me she would give me $500.00 to make her one like that so I agreed to do it if she would cut out the squares.

This lady, sorry, did not write her name down, was presented as a master quilter and had a room just for her quilts. And here she is.

 

This was my favorite from her room…a glorious peacock.

These were done by one gentleman including all the embroidery.

And then there were the quilts made from a man’s ties.

We left the quilt show to have lunch and most of the ladies returned to the RV park but Jeanie, me, Eleanor and Lois went back to see more of the quilts.

It was a great day to be inside as it is soooo cold in Fairhope, AL.

Moving on.

Happy Birthday to Bob in Fairhope, AL.

Tomorrow, January 25, is Bob’s 70th birthday…yipee!  We decided to celebrate his birthday today along with Martha who is celebrating her 79th…wow.  We had a cake and ice cream for each of them at the clubhouse where we were joined by quite a few of the folks that are wintering here also.

Here is the birthday girl and boy.  Bob’s cake was really not crooked…just looks like it.

A good time was had by all.

Moving on.

It’s Been Quite A While…January 1, 2011

First of all, Happy New Year to each of you.  I have been so lax in posting that It will take several postings to catch up.  I may actually work backwards…I seem to function better that way.

We had a wonderful Christmas even though Bob and I were apart for the first time in 22 years.  Bob flew to Atlanta to spend some time with his son, daughter-in-law and grandson Owen.  Grandpa had so much fun playing with Owen…he has been trying to get Cissy and Buddy to build caves with him but it doesn’t seem to be the same.

I spent the holidays in Georgetown, Texas with my sister, brother-in-law, nephew and our cousin.  Karen lives in Vail, Colorado and it had been around 20 years since I had last seen her.  Susan, my sister, prepared so much wonderful food for all of us.  We enjoyed shrimp gumbo and king crab legs on Christmas eve…my nephew, John, even got all of the meat out of the shells for us…what service!  My sister, Susan, cousin Karen, brother-in-law Tom and nephew, John.

On Christmas day we had a beautiful meal of turkey, ham and all the fixings which included a traditional Texas dish of tamales.  The tamales were made by Mrs. Gonzales in Karnes City, Tx.  They were really good.  Everything was wonderful!

Bob returned on Dec. 28th.  We left Georgetown on the morning of Dec.30 headed to Texarkana, Tx. with Sue and Tom following in their car.  We stayed at a beautiful park in Texarkana called Shady Pines RV park…they have an RV dealership located next to the RV park.  This was one of the nicest parks we have ever stayed in…forgot to take any pictures.

We went into Texarkana, had dinner at Red Lobster and stopped at Best Buy to return my Nook (an ereader put out by Barnes and Noble).  Had problems with it and thought the trouble had been resolved in Georgetown but not so.  They did not have another one in Texarkana so just had to get my money back. 

Left Texarkana headed for Little Rock, AR.  We had planned on getting there early enough to see the Clinton Presidential Library but began hearing about the horrible storms in Arkansas so we stopped at a rest area for a couple of hours watching the Weather Channel to see how long it would take for the Little Rock area to be clear.  We arrived in LR about 3:30 which did not give us enough time to do the library…and it was to be closed on New Year’s Day. 

We stayed at Downtown Riverside RV Park in North Little Rock.  The park was not the best but we certainly had a great view out our front window facing the Arkansas River.

Left North Little Rock this morning, New Year’s Day, headed for Tunica, Mississippi where we will stay for a few days then on to Red Bay, AL for our yearly service appointment at the Tiffin motorhome service center.

Moving on.

OHMYGOSH…Oct. 21, 2010

Just a short post.  We are now and have been in Coffeyville, Kansas, for a little over a week.  We are among 600 or so workampers who have come to southeastern Kansas to work the Christmas peak season for Amazon.com…this is our third year to do this.  We will go for our meet and greet on Sunday afternoon and then actually start working on Monday with an all day orientation.  We have worked the night shift the past 2 years but won’t get our assignments until Monday.

Anyway, we are staying at an older mobile home park, Buckeye MHP,  that has opened up to us RVers.  We are in the back of the park with 9 other rigs and we still have room for 3 more rigs in our area.  There are probably 12 other RVers scattered among some of the mobile homes that remain.  The owners are super nice as is the lady that works in the on site office for them.  They are putting in bathrooms and a laundry room that will be super nice for the RVers that don’t have laundry facilities in their rigs.  This is a picture of our space. 

The biggest plus for me, besides seeing friends, is the fact that they have 2 ponds on the premises…yippee!  I found a bait shop where I was able to buy minnows (my bait of choice) and have been fishing the past 3 afternoons.  I was not even getting a bite for 2 days but yesterday was rewarded for my patience…see my bass Mark!   

Then a short time later my friend, Natalie, hauled in this monster.   

Her catch was soon followed by my last catch of the day…mmm, perhaps not a trophy fish.  Whoops, forgot to take of picture of the 3 inch monster.

The weather has been absolutely beautiful…warm fall days with cool nights…just doesn’t get much better plus we are only 60 miles from Tulsa, OK where we can get a Whataburger hamburger, 50 miles from great barbecue brisket in Joplin, MO and only 3 miles from some of the best Mexican food we have ever had…El Pueblito right here in Coffeyville.  We are also within a short distance of several casinos. Life is good.

Moving on.

Backtracking A Bit October 4, 2010

I am going to be jumping around a bit trying to get caught up on some of the things we have done and places we have been. 

When we left Hill City, SD we travelled to Pierre, the capital of South Dakota.  We learned early on that Pierre is pronounced “Pier” and not “P-air”…hope you understand that.  We stopped at a rest area on our way and saw the folks below.  Sorry it is such a bad picture but I had to take it through the screen because I did not want them to know that I was taking their picture.  I have never seen anyone with their laundry hung out to dry at a rest area before.  I thought it was okay to post this picture since you can’t identify the people.

We stayed at a really nice city park in Fort Pierre which is just across the river from Pierre.  We had full hookups with 50 amps for $10.00 a night.  We stayed 2 nights and we were right on the Bad River.  They probably have about 15 spaces.  Would definitely stay there again.

At this location, Lewis and Clark made the first contact with the Teton Sioux.

This is the covered pavilion located at the park.

The leaves were starting to show their brilliant fall colors as we made our way into Minnesota.  We are starting to stay at small city parks when possible.  As we are totally self contained we don’t need hookups for at least several days.   

Moving On…