Mardi-Gras Beginning

Tonight marked the opening of Mardi Gras season here at the Plantation and surrounding areas. Mike and I have never been a part of the true Mardi Gras celebration. Living in LaGrange, Georgia we obviously were aware of Mardi Gras but it was not “celebrated” in the way that it is in this area of the country. One of the things we wanted to experience in living the full-time lifestyle were the different cultures found in our country. I did a little research and found out that Mardi Gras or Carnival Season marked the beginning of the Epiphany and ended the day before Ash Wednesday or Fat Tuesday. Mardi Gras is French for Fat Tuesday which marked the ritual of the last night of eating rich and decadent foods before Lenten season begins on Ash Wednesday. There are many, many local parades to celebrate the season with the tossing of beads, moon pies and various other things I am sure. The children even get a day off from school on Fat Tuesday and many businesses are closed. It is a big celebration and if this evening was an indication…. a fun time.

The Mardi Gras celebration began this evening with the crowning of the king and queen of the Plantation. We all gathered at the clubhouse for dinner and at the end of the dinner we were all served a cupcake. Two cupcakes contained a tiny baby and whoever bit into their cupcake and found the baby was the king or queen. After identifying the (pre-selected) king and queen they were whisked off and dressed for their new roles. They will rein until the end of Mardi Gras (Fat Tuesday) when they will be dethroned. They paraded through the clubhouse to the tune of “When the Saints Go Marching In” and finally sat on their thrones and watch several skits for entertainment followed by a band and music. The celebration will continue with an early breakfast at the clubhouse tomorrow followed by several local parades. On Sunday we will have the usual ice cream social followed by the arrival of the king and queen with more skits and line dancing and karaoke. Monday will be the parade at Rainbow Plantation followed by lunch together and even more skits and music. On the last day, Fat Tuesday, we will have our evening meal after the arrival of the king and queen. We will once again have skits and costume judging with the theme being “Fractured Science Fiction.” After this will be the Mardi Gras Ball with the band North Wind providing the music. Should be an exciting few days here at the Plantation.

Tomorrow morning Mike and I are going to follow veteran Mardi Gras parade goers Darrell and Judy Patterson to Foley to experience our first ever Mardi Gras parade. I certainly hope the rains have stopped and the weather is a tad warmer for this event. Either way we are excited to experience our first ever Mardi Gras celebration here at the Plantation and learn first hand more about this annual event that takes place in this area.

This and That

Just when you think the weather just might get a little better you hear the news that there might be a chance of snow! Yes, you heard right…..S N O W…. in this area of the country???? Call me a skeptic but I’ll believe it when I see it. However, this has been a winter for the record books.

One thing that has been “different” for me in this full-time lifestyle is finding a place to get my hair cut. I am certainly not vain but at the same time I don’t want to walk around looking strange for several weeks while a bad haircut grows out. The operable word is “grows out.” A bad haircut will and does grow out. When we were in Texas I took the recommendation of the wildlife refuge manager and had her hairdresser cut my hair. It went well and I was very happy. During the holidays I got the pleasure of having my hairdresser in Pine Mountain cut my hair, all went well. Now, here I am in Summerdale and I need a haircut. I asked Judy Patterson for a recommendation and she gave me the name of the lady that cuts her hair. I called and made an appointment to get my hair cut today. Once again, all went well and I am happy. I am sure a bad haircut might happen one day but so far everything in the haircut department has gone well since going full-time.

For several years prior to my Dad’s passing away he suffered with a condition common to many people….macular degeneration. His eyesight was getting worse as he got older and the last few years of his life he relied on a machine to help him read the Bible, newspaper (especially the sports page) and letters/cards from my brother, Larry, and his wife. This machine was called a Low Vision machine. Since his death I had not known what to do with this machine until arriving at Rainbow Plantation. So today on behave of Mike and I as well as Larry and Pamela we donated the machine to the clubhouse here at the Plantation.
There are many people here that can benefit from this machine either for reading, which is how Dad used it, or for simply enlarging things they might be working on such as beading, woodworking and such. Mike demonstrated how the machine worked today at the 4:00 social hour.
I think the following comment sums up how it was received, “you just made an investment in heaven with this machine.” Yes, I agree and I am sure my Dad smiled when this fine gentleman made that statement.

This evening we joined about 22 people at Mellow Mushroom for pizza. We all sat together and just enjoyed talking, laughing and eating….after all it’s what we do!! The pizza was delicious and we had a great time. Mike and I feel like we have this huge extended “family” among the friends we have made here at Rainbow Plantation. They are all such special folks.

We will see what tomorrow brings, hopefully NOT snow.

Flat Tire Surprise

We got up this morning with the intentions of dressing and visiting a church in the area. What we found was a flat tire. Some time during the night the rear passenger tire on our Jeep went flat. We called AAA and in about 30 minutes a serviceman came to the motor home, took the tire off and checked it. He didn’t seem to find anything wrong with it. No nail, no slow leak (that he could tell) nothing. He put the tire back on and inflated it to the proper tire pressure. We are to watch it and see what happens. So far today it has remained inflated and there has been no further problem. Tomorrow we will take it to a tire company and let them take a look to make sure it isn’t something we can’t see. The tires were purchased in November so they are still under warranty. Good thing.

We did a grocery run at Wal-Mart, enjoyed a coke together at McDonalds and came home in time to attend the Super Bowl party and ice cream social at the clubhouse. We walked over around 5:00 and enjoyed talking and laughing with the friends at our table. In fact, some of us laughed so hard we cried. We all seem to have such a great time when we are together. If laughter is good medicine we all had a great dose tonight. After eating our ice cream we walked slowly back to the motorhome where we watched the rest of the game.

Hopefully tomorrow we will find our tire still inflated and nothing seriously wrong with it. It has been a good weekend…..hope yours was also.

The End of a Great Week

All good things must come to an end or at least that is the way it is with vacations. Unfortunately they do come to an end but oh the memories they leave behind. Now for Mike and I the vacation never ends but for Stephen it did so this morning. He followed us down to the Loves Truck Stop on highway 59 which flows into I-65. We stopped with him at the Arby’s there for a quick bite before he headed toward LaGrange. We ate, he filled up his car with gas and we hugged “so long.” I can’t say it enough……we had a really wonderful time exploring the Gulf area together and eating until we couldn’t eat another bite! We enjoy each other a great deal and with Stephen’s great sense of humor he is so much fun to be around. He is not only our son he is our best friend.

We stopped on the way back to get the oil and filter changed in the Jeep. As we were doing the maintenance thing on the Jeep Judy Patterson called. We had originally planned to go with Darrell and Judy and their friends from Maine to the Mardi Gras parade in Fairhope this evening. But as luck would have it, it is freezing cold outside and with the wind doing its thing it feels colder than the temps read. She was calling to let me know that they were wimping out on the parade and had decided to have dinner together instead. So instead of sitting in the freezing cold and getting beads and moon pies thrown at us we are going to be sitting in a warm motorhome eating and enjoying the company of friends. Sounds like an excellent trade off to me. Besides, Mike and I will get to meet two new friends tonight, Mike & Peggy. They are long times friends of Darrell and Judy from Maine.

That is about it for today. We came home and pretty much just rested a bit. I did a load of laundry and we are now getting ready to go “chat and chew” with some great folks. Life is good!!

A Slow and Easy Day

The rains came in with vengeance last night and brought with it some nice wild winds. Around 7:00 Friday morning everything had pretty much passed through this area. We got up slowly knowing that today was going to be a slow easy kind of day. We talked and enjoyed the morning. Around 11:30 we decided to head for our last big eat out of Stephen’s vacation. We promised him a good fish dinner and knew that Big Daddy’s Grill would not let us down. Oh my, I can’t believe I ate all that food. I told Stephen he would not leave hungry but I’m not sure he believed me but I was right….he even left some food on his plate.

We will definitely be back to eating more healthy and walking our two miles a day once Stephen leaves. It will take awhile to walk off all pounds we’ve put on!
After leaving Big Daddy’s Grill we drove to Office Depot to purchase some CD-Rs in order to make Stephen a copy of all the pictures we took while he was here. We also wanted to go by Verizon so Stephen could show us a few phones we could upgrade to that would enable us to use VZNavigator. We have been wanting to purchase a GPS but Mike didn’t like the idea of the yearly maps update and with the Verizon version we don’t need to do that….it updates automatically. The new VZNavigator does everything the GPS does including voice directions. The screens on the phones he recommended to us are about the same size of the GPS. He used his while visiting this week and we were very impressed. We can upgrade our phones in June so we may give this serious consideration.

This afternoon we all attended the 4:00 social at the clubhouse. We have been wanting to introduce Stephen to a few of our friends but we have been so busy there just hasn’t been time. It felt good to be back! It’s amazing just how quickly you begin to feel at home here.
Before calling it a night we decided to take a walk around Rainbow Plantation. It was a perfect evening, not too cool, lots of stars and complete with a symphony of crickets. We just didn’t want to give up the evening so we walked a little longer than we originally planned.
Stephen is leaving in the morning for his drive back to LaGrange. It has been a wonderful week, a busy week and a memorable week. It seems like it flew by but that’s the way most vacations go isn’t it? Thanks, Stephen, for spending your vacation time with us here in the Gulf!!

National Naval Aviation Museum

Our friends Gene and Judi Curp told us all about the National Naval Aviation Museum in Pensacola and I must say it was everything they said it would be. The museum is located inside Pensacola Naval Air Station. Yes, you to pass by the base security to go in this area. I guess we looked harmless because after Mike showed his driver’s license we were allowed to enter. It is a short drive from the base entrance to the museum where we parked the Jeep and went inside. Just as we entered we heard that the next IMAX movie would be “Fighter Pilots…Operation Red Flag. Stephen got excited about that so we decided to purchase tickets and take in this movie. It was awesome!!! I never realized what all fighter pilots go through during their training. The base for Red Flag training takes place in Nevada near Las Vegas. It is twelve intense missions that provides tougher conditions and more stress than actual battle. You walk away with a newer appreciation for the dedication these men and women have made for our country.



After the IMAX movie we went out into the museum. This is a huge area housing hundreds of planes along with tributes to the Navy as well as individuals. It is divided into two levels which have planes sitting on the floor as well as hanging from the rafters. The areas are divided into different wars that have been fought. The atrium area displayed jets from the Blue Angels. The museum is free admission as well as the guided walking tours and the trolly tour showing the planes in the outside restoration area. We arrived too late to take the trolly. That will have to be another visit. The IMAX movies have a charge of $8.00 with discount for senior citizens, students and military. We spent a great deal of our afternoon there but could have literally spent the entire day. There is that much to see and take in. We highly recommend the National Naval Aviation Museum!!


I needed to get my glasses adjusted so we used Stephen’s VZNavigator on his phone to find Cordova. Mall where there was a Lens Crafters. This is a huge mall with many stores to walk through and enjoy but I mainly wanted to visit Lens Crafters. I got my glasses adjusted and we walked to the food court for a coke and to rest our feet. By the time we arrived back at Rainbow Plantation the rains were falling hard and the winds were blowing. Glad we made it back before the rough stuff began. We were so tired we all fell asleep quickly listening to the sounds of the rain on the roof. It was another very nice day!!!

Panini Pete and Putt-Putt

We started our day slowly. Ok, I admit it we are not as young as we used to be and being on vacation with Stephen is wearing us out. Oh, by the way, he was the first one to fall asleep last night in the recliner. I guess that means he’s not as young as he used to be either. We just hung around the motorhome for a while and around 10:30 we started driving toward Fairhope.
We took CR 32 to scenic 98 and scenic it is. There are lots of beautiful horse ranches and large country homes along this road before you actually get into the Fairhope area. Once in the Fairhope area it becomes just plain quaint. We drove along the waterfront area and then made our way into town. We parked and walked into the French Quarter area of town to the point of interest for today…..Panini Pete’s. Panini Pete was featured in the book by Guy Fieri’s…. Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives. When we arrived around 11:15 the place was already very busy. We opted to sit outside in the courtyard.


The weather was a little cooler today but by sitting in the sun we were just fine. Mike and I both ordered the Turkey Panini sandwich with the bow-tie pasta. Stephen went for the special which was Italian Grilled Chicken and the home made fries.
The food was excellent! Much of what he serves is made fresh right in the kitchen including the mozzarella. The treat came when Pete came out and introduced himself to us and signed my book and we got a few pictures. We talked for awhile and found out he is attending the Super Bowl this Sunday with Guy. Obviously, they remain good friends.

From here we decided that it wouldn’t be a real vacation if we didn’t play a round of Putt-Putt. I usually beat the boys but not today. We drove to the Pirates Island Putt-Putt and supposedly played the easy course. Stephen won, Mike came in second and guess who came in last?? We had a wonderful time.






On the way home we made another stop at the Tanger Outlet Mall where Stephen purchased a pair of shorts and a hoodie on sale. He got some really good deals. We stopped at Vallartas Mexican Restaurant and got a soft taco and coke and called it a night.

We have had such a wonderful time with Stephen and are so glad he was able to spend some time with us in this area. One of the great perks of this lifestyle is the wonderful vacations our kids can take. We look forward to other special places he might want to visit and getting there ahead of him, he flies or drives in and spends his time enjoying the area. Sounds like a win-win to me. Well we don’t have many more days to spend in the vacation mode so we’ll see what tomorrow brings. Thanks for stopping by.