After Paris, we headed to the former French colony Louisiana for some extended family time. The flight from London to Jackson, MS is long and arduous, the worst part being that we have to switch planes in either Dallas or Houston. Luckily Mom was traveling with us, but I spent about half of the flight taking Evie to the bathroom and both girls got hysterical during the last couple of hours (at the same time, of course). Evie kept howling, "I want my mommy! I want my mommy!" which prompted a concerned flight attendant to ask me if I really was her mommy. And after all that, one of the Dallas airport beagles sniffed out an apple I forgot I had packed and we had to go through "Agricultural Control" with all the other people who were trying to smuggle in illegal plants and seeds or really just didn't know that it wasn't legal to bring those kinds of things into the country (or, like us, forgot that they had packed an innocent apple for their children to snack on). Anyway, it was slightly hellish and we actually thought we were going to miss our connecting flight. But we didn't and eventually we made it home.
Tallulah isn't Paris, but it's beautiful in it's own way and I"m always so happy to be back on the farm. On their first morning (which probably began super early, but I have repressed that memory), Evie donned her breakfast gown and the girls had a healthy breakfast together.
Going outside called for a different dress:
Biding their time on the new swing set, in anticipation of the arrival of cousin Cora (we spent a lot of time out on the swing set):
Millie: Future concert pianist/ballet dancer:
Uncle Andy! Everyone (almost..we were missing Will and Hope) came into town to see us AND to celebrate Pigfest, which is an annual pig roast party that Dad helps to throw. The last Pigfest I went to was just before I moved to London (Jim was already here) so I was excited to be home and to take the girls. And it was even more exciting with Kate, Andy and Shug there, too.
Louisiana falls are not spectacular, but the brown magnolia leaves still provided some outside entertainment. Unfortunately, because of the drought conditions and the unseasonable (but not really) warm weather, the fire ants were really out. On our first day, I sat down on the ground to rest my weary bones and got a bottom full of really painful fire ants. I think it's fair to say I had ants in my pants that made me do the boogie dance. Evie and Millie also experienced their first ant bites on this trip (not on their bottoms, though). England just doesn't have the same options of biting bugs and poisonous things that Louisiana has to offer.
Rocking horse with Beautiful Cora!
She also had her first hay experience, which she thoroughly enjoyed.
The hay benches were a lot of fun for all the girls:
As was hanging out with Uncle Andy, the child whisperer:
All the girls (and passing on the bunny ears tradition to the younger generations):
Day 2 of Pigfest was my 35th birthday and Kate and Shug surprised me by decorating the "Carpenter Compound" with festive Happy Birthday bunting and balloons. Kate also did her best spider interpretation as part of her birthday homage to me.
Millie couldn't take all the birthday excitement:
Evie, with amateur face paint, wig and princess crown. She is, I'm sure, the most passionate celebrator of birthdays in the world at this point in her life:
High Five 35! The queen of Carpenter Compound (with Dad) in my "Lady Gaga" wig (although most people said I looked like Marilyn Monroe. HAH! I wish!):
This never gets old:
We had to knock some little kids out of the way to get a turn on the rope swing. When there hasn't been a drought, there is water in the bayou under the swing, but since there was only dirt to fall into, we took a chance. It was fun!
The cousins Gural at Carpenter Compound:
Pigfest is, obviously, a pig roast, but in addition to the pigs, everyone also brings pot luck, so there are lots of delicious, Southern-style foods to choose from. Millie really enjoyed herself:
And Evie astounded us all by chowing down with great enthusiasm on a very spicy piece of rib. She makes her Daddy proud with her carnivorous tendencies!
Cute little cousins:
Jenny and Millie:
Hay Joy:
You would think after all that food and action, we would be tired, but we had birthday cake to eat! Back at home, we ordered pizza and daiquiris and I opened the present that Will and HOpe sent, which continues to provide great entertainment. It's a fake candle that you can blow on and off. It can be blue or yellow and, in the absence of birthday candles, I blew it out (after some confusion). It now resides on our dining room table, where the girls like to make it turn on and off by screaming at very high pitches during dinner.
Double high five for breakfast!
Once Pigfest was out of the way, we had to focus on Halloween.
Off to Wal-Mart we went! Having lived in England the entire time I've had children, I was amazed by this super long shopping cart, which allows you to bring your entire brood with you to Wal-Mart. We had to be careful steering it, so we didn't knock any unsuspecting Wal-Mart shoppers down as we rounded the corners:
The costume options were limitless! Here is Evie in an elephant costume that was way too small for her:
Millie was very distraught and humiliated by her lion costume, so this was the only time she had to wear it:
Little Lady Gaga:
Shug, the Glamor-Puss:
Since Finchley left, we have been forlorn and cat-less, so it was nice to spend time with our old cats Emma and Chowder. Emma scratched all the children on multiple occasions, but Chowder was very tolerant and interested and liked all the attention he got from them. That said, I'm not sure he would be thrilled to move permanently into a house with little kids:
During the heat wave we had (90 degrees in October), Millie donned her underwear and we headed down to pretend to drive the tractors.
It was hot!
Lala showed us the baseball moves we didn't know she had! What a swing!
And Peepaw manned the swings for a while.
As Halloween loomed large, Kate and I practiced our super-skilled face painting. Here Kate models the very professionally done Halloween daisy chain which I painted on her face. I won't quit my day job, but our botched efforts gave us a good laugh.
The flowers looked cuter on the little girls (I had perfected my technique by then), who did their first trick or treating in Vicksburg's downtown.
Followed by coffee for the grown ups and milk for the little girls (and a bunch of candy).
Back on the farm, Pee Paw took us all on a hayride to the "pumpkin patch."
After the girls picked their pumpkins, the hayride continued.
It was fun, and a little creepy, to ride through the dried out bayou..but mostly it was bumpy. Here's the view from when we all almost flew off the back of the hayride:
After the hayride, it was time to chow down on some pumpkin:
All the girls enjoyed getting their hands into the pumpkin innards:
Peepaw is a master pumpkin carver:
Millie tasted our pumpkin again, just to make sure it was carved to perfection.
The finished products!
I was all about taking all of the little girls out for trick or treating in Vicksburg, but (wisely) we decided that Cora and Millie should probably stay home. They still dressed up as Strawberry Princess and Bumblebee Ballerina, respectively.
Evie donned a very intricate headdress made of Peacock and Pheasant feathers and headed out to wow the Vicksburgians as a Peacock Princess. Millie was very taken with her head gear.
The peacock princess was very well received by friends and strangers and came home with a
lot of candy, very little of which she actually got to eat. She seemed to know this was going to be the case and made sure to eat as much candy as she could on the ride back home.
The celebrations didn't quit after Halloween was over. We had Millie's birthday to think about! While we were all together, we had an early birthday party with some really healthy Kroger's cupcakes and the best ice cream in the world--Bluebell!
Millie wasn't really sure what to do with her candle...
But she had no problem figuring out what to do with her cake and ice cream!
And she had her Peepaw wrapped around her finger:
As a special treat to me, Mom and Dad offered to keep Evie and Millie while I went to New Orleans to see Meg and Dan (and the adorable Sebastian, who I forgot to take a picture of). It was great to have a couple of care free days to spend with friends and to be back in New Orleans. We crammed as much fun as we could (without overdoing it) into the short time we were there. The first night we joined Meg's parents for a delicious meal at Dick and Jenny's and on Saturday we all headed out for an afternoon and night in a hotel. We went to a squash festival in the Marigny (I can't remember the name of the squash) and met Nelson and his baby there for a little while:
Then we wandered through the Julia Street galleries, which were open in the evening on the first Saturday of the month. After the galleries we went to the SPCA fundraising gala, where we sampled delicious food (courtesy of our friends Leigh and Will) and enjoyed people watching.
And finally we went to hear some music on Frenchman Street. But, despite being in New Orleans, we still were in bed by midnight because we had the prospect of travel and children to look forward to the next day. How times have changed!
Mom and Dad (and Evie and Millie) were really glad to see me when I rolled up after my weekend away, but I think they also all had a fun time together without me. On our last night, we made the mistake of going out for Chinese, where Evie misbehaved and MIllie dumped an entire plate of Chinese food on the floor. It was not very relaxing.
But on the horrible trip home, the girls were good as gold. It was everyone else who shocked me with their unhelpful behaviour. Despite the fact that I was loaded down with two kids and all the stuff you see below, very few people offered to help me on the seemingly never ending journey. And to top it off, the man who was sitting next to us on the plane, spent the entire flight cursing his bad seating luck loudly and for all to hear (even though the girls were sleeping for most of the trip and happy during the part when they weren't asleep). Once we finally dragged ourselves and all our stuff off the plane, we got stuck in an hour long customs line. And Evie threw up in the cab on our drive home. I have never been so happy to get back home and have vowed never to travel by myself again. After my restful three weeks in the country, I was back to being exhausted... but travel is like giving birth. Once you get past it and get some rest, you forget how hard and horrible it was. We'll be back to America and Mexico in January, but this time Jim is coming with us!
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