N'awlins

J went to a conference class for his seminary class in New Orleans and then I came down and met up with him. Now I've been to New Orleans once before when I was a wee one but the fam and I only went to the aquarium. So needless to say I've never really experienced the city of New Orleans.
Before I got to New Orleans I wasn't too thrilled. I didn't really know what to expect. Well those thoughts went by the way side when I finally arrived.
I loved the history and beautiful architecture of this city!!! I got to enjoy this city with the man that I love. We had such a great time!!

Here's the city of N'awlins from the interstate and on the ferry.



Here's J and I when I first arrived on the Mississippi.


Jackson Square at sunset


And I FINALLY got to experience Cafe Du Monde!!! At the corner of Decatur and St. Ann Street lies Cafe Du Monde.

This place was absolutely wonderful. Cafe Du Monde is famous for their French doughnuts; beignets!! Beignets, pronounced bey-nyay, are delicious deep fried pastry coated with powdered sugar. It's a bit of heaven people!! They are soo good! If you're ever in New Orleans, this is a MUST!





As we walked around town, we passed by the St. Louis Cathedral. This is a statue outside in the courtyard of Jesus shadowed on the wall. It's so beautiful.


Here's the front of the cathedral.


In honor of Memorial Day J took me to the WWII Museum in honor of his Papaw, Mr. Ervin W. Miller. He fought in WWII and survived. It was so incredible to see where he fought and all the history that lies within all the veteran's stories. J's papaw passed away a few years ago and in his honor his family placed a brick among many others leading to the entrance to The National WWII Museum in New Orleans. It was an honor and a joy to share this moment with J.


We had a wonderful weekend in N'awlins. Great food, good music and good memories. We can't wait to go back soon!!!

One day at a Time

Oh my! it's been almost 2 months since I've posted a new blog entry, my deepest apologies. Between finals week between myself and the Hubs, end of school stuff for my work and endless graduations and end of the year activities, plus planning new things for the busy summer schedule, and being super sick, there's just been ZERO time. But I've finally found time to sit down today and blog!

So class is out for the semester but have no fear I've got LAME summer classes to do so that should be TONS of joy. Now if I can just get done with work I could go swimming and get my tan on!

J and I have been planting flowers. We planted Sunflower and African Daisy seeds. Unfortunately, the daisies were flooded out due to the excessive rain we've had the past two days so I'll have to replanted some more daises. However our sunflowers are on the go! They have grown SO much! I'll post pictures later of them.

J and I also have been to one wedding so far this summer and we are going to one next month and July. This is SO exciting for us. We've really had a good time. Not to mention we've almost been married a YEAR!!! I can't believe time has gone by this fast!!!!



I'm SO glad summer is here. I need some time to not think about much of anything.

Happy Summer Y'all!!

"Just Try It"

As I mentioned before my parents got to come down since I was on break and such. We did LOTS of shopping, cooking and just hanging out and it was SO great that I got to catch up with them. But while they were here J and I wanted them to experience "Louisiana Style".

Since I've moved to Louisiana the culture here is so different than Oklahoma. My taste buds have changed so much since the move it's unreal. The food seasoning is SO good. I can't believe I've never tried this stuff before!!

But I digress.

Anyway, we took mom to Copeland's "The New Orleans Cuisine" for her birthday so J and I knew that eating crawfish was the next stop.

Now this is a first for my mom and of course my dad has eaten crawfish before so he was excited to eat some again, but I was interested to see how my mom was going to react. And let me tell you it was HILARIOUS!!!

I should mention that the place we went to dine was very casual. Here's what I mean.
At the restaurant there are picnic tables underneath a big tent, with a play area for kids and a tiny inside area incase you weren't comfortable eating outside with the smell of spices in the air.

My mom couldn't believe we were eating outside like that. Luckily the wonderful weather made it comfortable for her and she was ok with eating outside. But it all changed when they brought the crawfish out like this. Not to mention, you don't eat crawfish on a plate, but instead on tray and a shell box.


Mom's eyes got really big and she said, "It's the whole thing!!" I think in her mind she thought they were going to come out like shrimp does, peeled, ready to go. But with crawfish, it's a different story. Eating crawfish is all about peeling it and getting messy, like you would eating BBQ ribs.

So J, Dad and I started in peeling and eating and at this point I thought Mom was going to loose her lunch. She could NOT believe that I would eat this stuff and enjoy it. It's a good thing that Mom ordered a Po Boy as a back up in case she didn't like crawfish.

Here's J and I getting enjoying the first taste of crawfish this season.



Here's she is trying it for the first time! She seemed ready to go. Notice the napkin in her hand as she's holding the crawfish :)



But here's the moment of truth!



Needless to say, Mom did NOT enjoy eating crawfish or the tingling sensation on her lips from the seasoning, but she did enjoy the atmosphere and the company.

Maybe next time we will just stick with her favorites: peeled shrimp and fish.

Break Time

This week is my school Spring Break and my work Easter Break and I LOVE IT!!!! I've needed this break so bad and I'm so glad it's here. There's nothing like starting out the week by an Easter party. At work we had our Easter party and it was blast. We went to the church and spent all day just playing and eating cookies and popsicles!!
My parents came down for a visit and we have had a blast. We celebrated Mom's birthday and went out to Copeland's and it was delicious! Mom and I went shopping and between the two of us we bought 14 pairs of shoes!! She bought new spring clothes and I bought new church clothes, what a wonderful day of shopping!!! Jordy and dad worked on the Dolphin Dasher and we have cooked TONS! Spring time is here people and we are loving it!!
Jordy and I celebrated our first Easter this year. It was such a special time with my parents here and the service at church was simply wonderful. We are so blessed with a wonderful church family. We are enjoying being outside and soaking up the sunshine!!!
Hope your Easter was a wonderful time with family!

Dolphin Dasher

Before Jordy and I even got married, he has been wanting a scooter. Now growing up in the world of cycles, I knew how much these things were going to cost. Once Jordy and I got married I created a "savings for a scooter" fund. Jordy would put money back until he could save enough money to buy a scooter.

Well we looked for a scooter for a while and again, we didn't want to pay a whole lot of money for one of these things. One afternoon I get home from work and he shows me a picture of this scooter he had found for a very low price. I asked him about is his fund and he told me he could pay cash for it. I couldn't be more proud.

So Jordy contacted the man with the scooter to get the 411. It was too good to be true. Great price, great condition, low maintenance and a helmet. Off to Jackson, Mississippi we go then one Saturday morning. We get there and we just knew we couldn't pass this up.

We are now owners of a 2004 Blue Kymco Scooter!!!

On the way home, Jordy and I were trying to think of a name for the scooter, since Henry (his truck) and Maxine (my car) are apart of the family, there's no reason why the scooter should be left out. Well I should explain that when Jordy and I play Mario Cart he is always his Mii character and he always drives the "dolphin dasher". Jordy has conquered the whole game and so I thought Dolphin Dasher would be a fantastic name for the scooter, not to mention it's blue. So Dolphin Dasher stuck :)

Here I am on the Dolphin Dasher.


Here he is on his pride and joy!


The Dolphin Dasher taking us away!!!

A Dead Leak

This past week has been quite the week for the McKaskle's. Let me explain.

Last Sunday afternoon, Jordy and I got home from church. I went into the kitchen, flipped the switch and no lights come on. I then look up at the ceiling trying to figure out why in the world the light isn't working. And to my surprise the ceiling is lined with even lines and circles all over. I yell for Jordy to come in there to see what the problem was and he started shaking his head. Well at this point, I knew things weren't looking good. He said, well this looks like water. Pulling up a chair he touched the ceiling and he replied with a, "yep, it's damp alright." How wonderful. So come Monday morning I give our land lord a friendly phone call. In the meantime, I start moving all my decor on top of the cabinets since I know that someone should be coming soon since it didn't look to hot. When I moved a plant, the paint on the wall looked like it was falling off the wall, not to mention the rippling all along where the ceiling meets the wall. Land lord shows up Monday morning and she tells us that our bathtub has a hole in it obviously causing it leak all of the place. SUPER! Well that same Monday, my car decides to not start correctly. So the hubs has to take that thing to the shop. All last week he is my carpool to and from work AND school, while we are praying that we don't fall through into our kitchen while we are sleeping.

Thursday comes and we still don't hear anything about our bathtub, but I do get my car back. YAHOO! But while driving home I noticed that the battery light AND the emergency brake light were on. Hmm. So I call the hubs and inform him. Come Friday morning I go out to my car to run errands and I put the key in the ignition and turn. Nothing. Seriously. NOTHING HAPPENS!!! My car had just left the shop!! So, I call the hubs. Again. He was NOT happy! We comes home with the jumper cables and jumps the ol' Nissan. Well my car is only running on Jordy's truck. As soon as he would take the cables off, my car would die. We think that the battery might need to be charged and so we let it set there for a while. While Jordy is messing with my car, I'm holding his brake in his truck (his emergency brake is broken and his truck is a standard) and then he takes off the cables and then I notice him telling me to cut off the engine. I get out and ya'll if I'm lying I'm dying, there is a flame!!!!!!! And we all know where is smoke there is FIRE!!!! People, something under my hood is on FIRE! CODE RED!!!! So Jordy and I run into the house to get water and start pouring on it. Well the good news is we got the fire out; bad news, car didn't work at ALL after that. You can only guess what happens next. A tow truck arrives.

My car is then towed to mechanic and the tub still wasn't fixed.

Until today.

Today was the day people that not only did my car come back home, but the bathtub was fixed. The downfall; we can use the tub for another 2 days and the smell of fiberglass was taking over my house!

Hopefully soon we can go back to normal around the McKaskle household.

Feeling Kind of Fat This Tuesday?

Well today is Fat Tuesday and there's only one thing that means. MARDI GRAS is happening people!! This year I got to celebrate Mardi Gras!! And it has been SO much fun!! Since I've moved here to Louisiana I knew about Mardi Gras, but I had no idea what it included. And boy is it fun! Jordy and I went to the Monroe Mardi Gras parade. I want to go to New Orleans sometime for Mardi Gras, but Monroe will do for now. We spent time with his family and we had a blast. I couldn't stop yelling, "Throw me somethin' Mister!!" Jordy and I thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.

Jordy and I before the parade started. Thanks to my teacher at work for the necklace to get me started :) it even lights up!!


Here are a few pictures of the floats! They were so cool! Hubs says that it's way better in New Orleans!


This is the Mardi Gras Queens float. She threw out white pearl beads!


I'm thoroughly enjoying myself, can't you tell :)


I even got to taste my first King Cake and let me just say people it is DELICIOUS!!
I didn't even know what it looked like. But here it is!! The delightful tasty King Cake!




So far my first Mardi Gras experience has been super fun!! Look forward for more Mardi Gras fun to come!