Crawfish Boil

These are Crawfish

This is a cooler of 30 lbs of the little creepers

Ryanne and Ben decided to have a spur of the moment crawfish boil before they left for Guatemala.. and we were totally game for it. Ry and I set the plan in motion and ended up with this:

Okay so.. Dustin and Ben really did all of the work but we got the party started. 

Dustin is my go to man for anything that we need that involves cooking for a large group. I usually do not do any of the work.. HE DOES IT ALL!! Well, I clean up the huge mess afterwards. But all of the credit goes directly to him. Sadly, in looking through the pictures I only have ones of Ben and Ryannes backsides.. Hopefully someone else took pictures and I can add to this. 

These kids were pretty fascinated by the crawfish and played with them a lot... poor things. 

HP was a huge help in getting them ready

Helping dad get the burner going.. Look at the huge pot! Shane and Tawyna Richardson let us use it. They did question our capabilities of even knowing how to do a crawfish boil. 

This is pretty much Aiden all of the time.. he always has some sort of critter in his possession

Raigan wondering what the heck we were thinking getting ready to pour these unsuspecting innocent organisms into the hot water

Juan indulged us with his presence even though he was not feeling very good from a returning trip out of the country.

Huge success, lots of fun with our Dome Family. Another extraordinary Louisiana experience.

Cajun Pride Swamp Tour

We went on a Cajun Swamp Boat Tour this last weekend with some of our friends. The kids have been so excited to go and since this was going to be Dustin's last weekend in Louisiana we decided we better get to it.

This little guy is 2 1/2 years old. Skyler loved him, after he was put back in his box he kept trying to get sneak him out. 

The boys: Tyson, Felipe, Devan, and Mike 

Everytime an alligator would catch a piece of chicken Skyler would yell "Good job you got it" 

Skyler pretty much thought he was the bomb-diggity 

This was our tour guide.. he was as Cajun as they come. He was really good at his job, we learned a lot that "we would never learn in no school". 

Mike was scared :)

I really wanted to take him home with me

Ben and Ryanne 

Dallas and Shelby - They were troopers and came straight off of there cruise

Ben and Ry on there phones playing games

Dallas sets lovely examples for my kids and taught Tyken how to get the alligator to jump at you

Had to put this one in there for Raigan.. she has a MAJOR crush on Felipe

Roxy the Raccoon, you can barely see him, but he follows the boat around everywhere. It was fun to try and spot him throughout the tour. 

It was a great day with the kids and with our awesome friends. I LOVE that we get to see and experience all of this amazing stuff. Really, I never imagined that we would be in a swamp in Louisiana  watching for alligators and learning about the cajun people. 

Mardi Gras 2012

This might be silly to most of you but I did not know what Mardi Gras really was until I was talking on the phone to my friend Heidi and she asked. I decided to look it up using the trusted source of Wikipedia :) and it all made a lot more sense. 

Mardi gras is French for Fat Tuesday, referring to the practice of the last night of eating richer, fatty foods before the ritual fasting of the Lenten season, which begins on Ash Wednesday. In 1723, the capital of Louisiana was moved to New Orleans, founded in 1718.^[13] The tradition has expanded to the point that it became strongly associated with the city in popular perception, and embraced by residents of New Orleans beyond those of French or Catholic heritage. Mardi Gras celebrations are part of the basis of the slogan, Laissez les bons temps rouler, (Let the good times roll) and the nickname "Big Easy".^[12] Mobile, Alabama, the former capital of New France, also has a long tradition of celebrating Mardi Gras. Other cities along the Gulf Coast formerly occupied and owned by the French from Pensacola, Florida, and its suburbs to Lafayette, Louisiana, have active Mardi Gras celebrations. In the rural Acadiana area, many Cajuns celebrate with the Courir de Mardi Gras, a tradition that dates to medieval celebrations in France.^[16] 

source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mardi_Gras

There are ALOT of parades during this time, we planned on going to a few on Saturday but we were RAINED out.. flash floods and all. Our friends the Pena's were even able to Canoe in there backyard!  We ended up taking a drive to New Orleans on Sunday after church to go to the Krewe of Bacchus parade. We ended up seeing one right before that as well. It was crazy how many people were there. When we read about this particular parade  we were kind of nervous because it said that several HUNDRED THOUSAND come out for this one every year.  We debated back and forth on whether or not to take the kids.. we are so happy that we did. 

Mainly because of this guy right here: 

We love Will Ferrell. The kids are constantly citing his movies. This picture above is of him handing beads to Dustin, Skyler, and Tyken. 

Here he is looking right at me.. probably because of the constant flash that was going on. 

We were worried that the kids would see things that were inappropriate to say the least but the dirtiest thing we saw was this: 

This was bunch of beads in horse manure.. it was kind of fun watching the marching bands and cheerleaders try not to step in it. 

And this is what all the streets looked like, full of garbage and beads that were not caught. 

The ladders were made to sit on top so you can see the floats that came by. 

And this guy here was the most disturbing thing that we ran into. 

Kennedy and some random girl she asked to take her picture with. 

Every time Skyler would get something he would yell "I WON I WON" 

So happy that we got to experience our first Mardi Gras in New Orleans. We love living in different places and getting to experience the awesomeness that each area has to offer.