Mardi Gras Mambo

This past weekend was a monumental first for my little chickadees. After talking about going for years, we finally bit the bullet and made our way down to New Orleans for Mardi Gras 2012. Because nothing says fun like being trapped in an overloaded car for 9+ hours with 5 little children, right? Hahahaha.

We've been planning on going to Mardi Gras this year for a few months now. The kids had never been, Scott had never been, and I hadn't been back since I left for BYU over a decade ago. With Mardi Gras falling the day after President's Day this year, and the kids having a 4 day weekend anyway, we decided to seize the opportunity and make it an all-out vacation! And was it the most fun vacation any of the kids could have ever hoped for?? You better believe it. And we have the pictures to prove it!

But before I go any further I think I need to clear a few things up -- Mardi Gras is not the complete and total den of moral depravity that popular culture makes it out to be. Are there plenty of people who are drinking and partying? Sure. BUT, there are also tons of families, kids, and other sober people (like us) who join in the fun and celebration of the holiday and manage to have just as good a time. :) Even the missionaries from our church were allowed to go to a parade on Mardi Gras day! I know Scott got quite a few quizzical looks from people at work when he told them where he was going, but believe it or not it is possible to have a good time (and catch lots of beads) without being drunk.

Without further adieu, I present "the best vacation EVER"...

To start, you know it's going to be a looooooong drive when you're already stopping for food and to get out of the car after only an hour and half of driving, right? Hahahaha. Unfortunately, that's just happens when you travel with 5 kids ages 8 and under. Poor little Alex probably had the roughest time on the trip. His tolerance level maxed out at about 2 hours of being trapped in his carseat before he would start fussing and crying and causing Ethan to scream things like "He's so annoying!!!" and "Why won't he stop crying????" before burying his head [Ethan that is] in his pillow and freaking out some more. Hahaha. As a result we had to pull over and stop a few more times on the trip before finally making it to New Orleans on Friday night. The trip should have taken about 9 1/2 hours and ended up taking 12. I know you wish you were with us.

My mom and Jacob so graciously welcomed us home and spoiled us rotten while we were there. We are no longer a small group and between me, Scott, the kids, and all our stuff, we kind of took over the whole apartment. So, thank you mom for putting up with us -- especially the kids' occasional (and not so occasional) lapses in good behavior for the 5 days we were there!

It poured almost all day Saturday, but Sunday was beautiful and after going to church in the morning we headed over to Thibodaux to visit my mom's side of the family. My aunt had a gathering at her house which just so happened to be up the street from where a parade was going on. Now, normally we never went to parades on Sundays growing up, but since it was just down the street and they didn't get to do any parades the day before because of the rain, we let the kids go on down with my aunts and uncles and cousins for their first taste of Mardi Gras. Don't judge. Hahahaha. Everyone was SOOO nice to them and caught them all kinds of junk. Grace was pretty much in heaven.

My Paw-Paw was so cute playing with Alex on the floor.

Monday was another beautiful day and we spent the morning driving around town looking for "Bead Dogs" to take pictures with. Scott and I headed over to Camellia Grill for my BLT and chocolate freeze fix for lunch, and that afternoon we headed over to the parade route to get set-up for the evening's floats. Our church building is right on St. Charles Ave and the parades pass right in front of it which is awesome for both parking and bathroom purposes! :)

















It was so fun seeing some of our good family friends at the parade. The kids were especially excited about the ladders that the Gruwells had brought for them to use. Even though the evening was a bit chilly, everything else was practically perfect!

"Throw me something, Mister!"

Street peddler selling more junk.

On Tuesday morning (Mardi Gras day), we headed off bright and early to stake out our spots in front of the church. After getting set-up, we went for a walk along St. Charles for a little people-watching and picture-taking of all the cool costumes along the route. I don't know why exactly people dress up, but it's been a tradition for as long as I can remember. Not everyone is in costume, but enough are that it makes it a lot of fun!

I loved this little clown -- I think I remember my brother Freddie dressing up like a clown when he was a kid for Mardi Gras. :)

This lady made their costumes which were AMAZING!

I'm not sure why, but a little group of girls stopped us to talk to Jane. Hahaha.

Here you can see Ethan and Grace's lingering attitude after fighting over who would get to sit in the ladder that day.

Still not quite over it.

And still not over it.

Before the parade started that morning we had another little dose of fun with a dislocated elbow on Jane. Wait, what? Yeah. Never a dull moment! Hahaha. Ethan and Jacob were swinging her by her arms apparently and then when they brought her over to me she was holding her arm, not moving it, and crying. I didn't know what had happened at the time and didn't realize it at first until Scott pointed it out. It seemed like it was her wrist that was hurting her, but in the end it turned out to be a case of "nursemaid's elbow." I was worried that the whole day would be ruined before it really started with a trip to the hospital, but luckily Jacob and Scott were able to track down a medical student from church who was able to pop it back into place for us! Whew -- thank goodness!

Nursing a Pop-Tart.

The rest of the day was spent going back and forth across the street from the parade to the church where the ward was having their annual Mardi Gras barbecue with hamburgers and sausage from the Bourgeois Meat Market (the market that has been in my mom's family for generations). Mmmmm, mmmmmm, mmmm. SO good. So, so good. It brought back so many memories being there! It was so fun to be with family and to see friends from back home. Although, it was kind of crazy that my small little Uptown Branch that I grew up in is now a real ward (the New Orleans 1st Ward) and I don't know most of the people in it! All in all it was a vacation to remember. :)

Just doing a little missionary work. :)

And I guess you can see who won out over the ladder. Poor little first-born. Poor little lamb. Hahaha.

At the barbecue.

The leftover bucket of beads. This was after the kids had already taken out a huge bag of their favorite beads and trinkets to take home with them!

The trip back home was thankfully a little bit shorter than the going, and Jane got 5 gold stars for making hardly a peep during the whole 9+ hours. The older children responded quite well to outright bribery and each earned 10 dollars for "good" behavior on the drive home. In closing, my mom really deserves a million thanks for hosting us all while we were there. She was definitely the hostess with the most-est! We promise not to overrun you every year, but we just might make Mardi Gras an occasional family tradition while we're still close enough to drive! :)