Don't Rain on my Parade!

And so Mardi Gras season has begun (for a while now actually). Mardi Gras is something else around here. Official Mardi Gras is not until March 8th, but there are lots of parades that lead up to the big event. We went out Saturday night to the Caesar Krewe Parade in Metairie. This parade was nothing like any of the 4th of July parades we have been to in the past, which only throw out candy. They threw out all sorts of stuff...beads, of course, cups, doubloons (which are fancy names for coins), masks, etc. It was fun trying to catch all the throws from each float. This parade had mostly kids and families because it's part of Family Gras weekend. There weren't too many trashy people, but as to be expected, there definitely were a few intoxicated individuals. It kinda reminded me of a NASCAR game meets 4th of July!

Stephen and I went to Dollar General that morning and bought some camping chairs to be able to stake our spot at the parade. Everyone gets there pretty early so you need to sit while you wait.

And the parade began!!!

Darth Vader and the Storm Troopers!

This year's theme was Hollywood so a lot of the floats were based on movies. Each float had people who walked ahead and people who rode on the floats to toss out the throws.

The Terminator float

The Hydra Float...pretty scary looking!

Stephen got lucky early on in the parade. Someone threw out a whole pack of beads about the size of a small bag of rice. Woo Hoo!

The NASA float...I'm thinking maybe Apollo 13? Not sure, though.

The Saints Float

The Chef float. All the throwers were dressed as floats. That's a giants crawfish, not a lobster, for all my non-New Orleans friends! :)

Bob the Builder...Can he fix it? Bob the Builder...Yes he can!

The USA Olympic float

The Science float headed up by a giant microscope. The riders were dressed up in lab coats and mad scientist Einstein hair!

The Fireman float

The Millionaire Float...It reminded me of Monopoly! They threw out footballs. Stephen caught one. Since this parade was family friendly, this one was definitely a good one to start with!

Rollin', Rollin', Rollin', on the River...

Last weekend, my parents made the eight hour trek from Georgia to visit with us in New Orleans. It was really nice to get to see them and catch up for a short weekend visit. While they were here, we planned a riverboat ride on the Mississippi River on The Natchez Steamboat, New Orleans' last real steamboat. We also took them to a few of our favorite places to eat as well as down St. Charles Avenue to see all the pretty old style houses. I think they really enjoyed their visit here, but I definitely think they were ready to head home if for nothing more than the traffic, haha! :)

The view from the riverboat

The twin bridges on the Mississippi River

us on The Natchez

The humongo paddlewheel that powered the boat!

The view of the city of New Orleans

a tugboat!!

Civil War barracks

The Domino Sugar refinary

This boat was hauling sugar from the refinary to the cargo on the boat. I thought it was dirt at first, but then I realized it was sugar!!

The top of The Natchez. The big smoke stack was VERY loud when it blew!

Inside The Natchez is a restaurant. It's decorated in antique style...very interesing! They also have a jazz band that plays during lunch and dinner. We enjoyed going inside just to sit because it was very windy and cold on the deck. Of course, this week, after my parents went home, it's 75 degrees! Go figure!

Conventions, Concerts, and Cuisine

January has been a pretty busy month for us. We started back to work and school, and things haven't slowed down since! Last weekend we celebrated Stephen's birthday by going to Emeril's Delmonico on St. Charles Avenue. Emeril's Delmonico is in an old antebellum house that was later converted into the restaurant Delmonico's. Emeril then bought it and made into one of his restaurants. It was lots of fun getting dressed up and eating deeeeelicious food! I had an epiphany while we were waiting on our food to arrive at the table. I was looking out the window by our table and saw one of the trolleys driving down St. Charles. I thought to myself, "How cool is that?! How often in my life am I going to live in a town that still has a working trolley system. Probably not ever again to be honest! New Orleans is such a strange and bizarre town, but it does have a lot of interesting culture and history. I am glad to say that Stephen and I getting the opportunity to experience all of this.

This past week I had the opporunity to attend a conference for Christian educators in Galveston, Texas. I was very excited because I've never been farther west than New Orleans! This is the beautiful lobby of Moody Gardens where we stayed for the ACSI conference. It was a super nice place to stay. It was nice to get away for just a little while, even if it was for work! I really enjoyed the opportunity to fellowship with some of my coworkers and get to know them a little better. It was also nice to learn some new ideas to implement in the classroom.

This was the view from outside our hotel window. We could see the Galveston Bay and the Aquarium!

The first night we were in Galveston, we all went to eat at The Rainforest Cafe. It was a really fun and yummy place to eat. I've always wanted to eat at one of those restaurants. Stephen and I had a chance to eat at one in Disney, but because it wasn't on the dining plan, we didn't want to waste money eating there! However, after eating there, I now know it would've been worth it!

We had to walk under this beautiful aquarium of fish to go into the restaurant!

These were the elephants that we shared our table with. They trumpeted about every 10 minutes!

My "little" turkey club sandwich that became lunch for Thursday as well!

me and Cha Cha the frog!

We concluded our evening by watching the volcano on top of the restaurant "erupt." This was no small feat because we stood out in the cold waiting for about 20 minutes for this event to actually happen. The volcano "erupts" on all the half hours, but for some reason, this particular eruption was delayed! You can't rush nature I guess haha!

Stephen and me getting ready for the concert. On my way home from Galveston, Stephanie, one of our seminary friends and neighbors in our apartment building, invited us to go with her and Jeff to Biloxi to the Rock and Worship Roadshow hosted by Mercy Me! We off course were happy to tag along! The artists included The Afters, Matt Maher, Thousand Foot Krutch, Jars of Clay, and Mercy Me.

The Afters opened up the concert!

Matt Maher...one of my favorite artists of the night! :)

Mercy Me puts on a VERY good show!!