Homesick

Is it possible to be homesick for a place you've never lived? I say yes, because when I'm there I feel like I'm at home. As you all know, I.LOVE.THIS.PLACE.......

We weren't going to take any trips this year, but Jason's grandpa passed away last month so we took an impromptu jaunt to Louisiana. Round and round we went about whether Jason should go alone or we should go as a family, and it was decided we'd go together. The gas and the mileage was going to be the same either way. We hated to take Xander out of school but had we not done it last year we wouldn't have seen PawPaw before he died, so I'm still glad that we did it. I take every opportunity I can get to go to Louisiana so that we can embrace this part of our family we rarely get to see and so the kids can learn about the other half of where they come from.
Since we had the time we decided to spend a day in Jason's hometown because we'd hate to go all that way and not see half the family only two hours away. The kids liked playing with their cousins and great-grand-mawmaw.


We also went to dinner with friends and took the kids to the park. It was in the 70's every day we were there! I was clearly standing out, wearing tank tops every morning while the locals had on long sleeves.


Jason's aunt and uncle also built their broom factory in the months since our last visit. It was neat to watch them make brooms and mops and chat with customers.

In Lafayette we stayed with Jason's cousin, Monica, and her family. We also stayed with them last May when we were down. They're fabulous hosts and always make us feel right at home and our kids love playing with their kids (when they're not all fighting or tattling).

How can you not love this sweet little girl?

On the nights we weren't at PawPaw's service we had homemade Cajun food....

....spent some time outside, did some shopping and watched the Saints beat the Vikings so they could go on to the Super Bowl.



It was so nice to be "home."

Majestic

Isn't it hard to think of anything bad when you're looking at something like this?



Last week, on the same day, my step-mom was trapped in Haiti during the earthquake and one of my uncles had to have a triple bypass. The next morning I went to let the dog out and saw the beautiful sky. Mind you, I detest the color pink. But something about the bright sky with the wavy clouds and the snow was really pretty. And it made me feel like it was a sign that everything would be okay.

Today Jason's grandpa Latiolais passed away and then we got in a car accident. Luckily we are all okay and the car appears to be fine right now, but I had to pull up my sky pictures again because they make me feel good. It looks like we may all be traveling to Louisiana for the service, so we would appreciate your prayers for our very long drive there and back. We weren't going to travel this year but Jason was going either way and his cousin graciously offered us a place to stay, so we figured we'll all go down. Hopefully the family visits and some warmer air will lift our spirits a little and we can return to a calmer, less stressful 2010.

Cajun cookin'

One of my favorite things about Louisiana is the food. A lot of it is things that you just can't find anywhere else. Or you can find them other places, but they don't taste as good as you know them to be down south.

There were a few things I didn't get pictures of, especially the appetizers Jason's uncle made. Taken apart I don't like any of the ingredients on their own (except for the bacon), but together it was an amazing treat.

And I didn't take any pictures of our breakfast fare from Rob's Donuts. We all know what donuts look like so I didn't think it was necessary, but they are truly the best donuts I've ever had.

Here are some favorites from our trip:

Cajun Potato Kitchen serves huge baked potatoes loaded with a variety of toppings. I can't even remember what mine was, I think it was steak and gravy, and Jason's was stuffed with crawfish etouffee. They're so good.

Dinner at the Half Shell was interesting. It's a local hole-in-the wall type place and all the customers seemed to know other customers. The kids also made a gentleman friend at the table next to us. This is just a crabcake sandwich, which you can get pretty much anywhere, but it's one of the best I've ever had.

We took the kids to lunch at Frostop because it served kid-friendly food. We like it for the amazing root beer served in frosty mugs.

Sarah and I had never had boudin, so a public initiation at the family cookout was set-up. This kind was synthetic so didn't have the gross casings, otherwise I don't know if I'd have tried it or not. But we thought it was tasty.

My second ever crawfish boil. This picture's a little blurry but I like it anyway. Everyone makes boiled crawfish differently with different sauces as well. I usually get pretty good at peeling it by the time I'm full. I just can't look at their beady little eyes, it creeps me out. Jason and his cousin's husband actually caught all of this crawfish for our dinner.

LaBayou is one of my favorite restaurants in the French Quarter, and it just so happens that when you ride the street car it drops you off right at the edge of Bourbon Street where the restaurant is. Jason and his brother ate here twice in three days.

Crawfish cakes with a crawfish remoulade.

Crawfish pasta had sauteed crawfish in the pasta and fried crawfish on top. The sauce was a Cajun alfredo and there was paremsan cheese on top. My sister-in-law and I shared both of these for dinner and ate every last bite.

You can't go to New Orleans without stopping at Cafe du Monde. We took the kids here for dessert. I must admit that the beignets were not the best I've ever had. They were decent, but I think they didn't hit the powdered sugar soon enough after coming out of the fryer. I was really surprised though at how much I enjoyed the frozen coffee. I really love their coffee and chicory au lait, but it was so hot that night I opted for the frozen and I'm so glad I did.

Watch Man v. Food on the Travel Channel? We saw the New Orleans episode and decided we had to eat at Mother's. This is the file gumbo. I ate the whole bowl. After a very long day in the French Quarter we got off the street car at VooDoo BBQ & Grill, a restaurant we passed every day on St. Charles Street. It was SO good. I got a platter of pulled pork and Caribbean jerk chicken with macaroni and cheese and corn pudding. The chicken was so good I gave my pulled pork to Jason before trying it. It looked good though, and they had sauces on the table for you to choose from. I think they need to get a franchise up here.

Sarah and I spent one day shopping and eating in the French Quarter and we'd been wanting to try some fried alligator, so we ate lunch at Cafe Pontalba. The beauty of the French Quarter is that all the restaurants post the menu outside, so you can find what you want before you decide where to eat. This place is right in Jackson Square across from St. Louis Cathedral and is open on two sides, so we had a great view and a fun time. The alligator was pretty tasty, too. I don't know that I'd order it again just because there's other things I'd like to try, but now that I've tasted it I wouldn't shy away from it in the future.

We also shared this crawfish fettuccine. It wasn't as good as the crawfish pasta at LaBayou, but we still liked it.
On the way back to our hotel I had to stop at NOLA and get these bourbon mashed sweet potatoes. Sarah couldn't believe I spent almost $7 for them, but it is an Emeril restaurant afterall, and you only live once, so I got them. They weren't as fantastic as I had hoped, but still good. The green onions added a nice flavor. We also stopped at The Gumbo Shop. She got some gumbo to take back to the hotel and I got bread pudding. It was really hard to find bread pudding that didn't have white chocolate in it, so I was elated when someone at the Tabasco store told me I could find it here.
Another crawfish boil, different side of the family. Also some amazing desserts this day. I think I have recreated cousin Shannon's frosting for brownies, so I'm pretty excited about that.
Thus ends the food journey (insert sad face here). I can't wait to go back and do it all again.

We're back. Sigh.

We've been home from our trip for five days now, and going down there just made us realize how much we don't like being up here. But I suppose there's really not much we can do about it as much as we'd love to live there.

We took about 600 pictures which I've downloaded and have been trying to organize. Obviously I can't show them all here, nor would everyone want to see them all, but I thought that my first post would be some of the non-typical vacation pictures.

Sometimes my favorite pictures are the candid or in-the-moment shots, where you can't really tell where people are or what they're doing, but how they're feeling at the moment. Where the kids are concerned we tend to get better pictures of them that way as opposed to when we ask them to pose.

So that's what we'll start with today.

You'd think he was the one that had driven all day.

Love the little belly and her fascination with the weed.

Jordis always has sweet eyes for her daddy

So excited to be here!

Xander thought no one was watching him trying to take some cake.

Jason's godfather/uncle and his little girl.

Jordis shaking her groove thing with Jason

Xander takes his dancing very seriously

Nothing gets in the way of this girl and her dessert

Father and son

Hopefully the only picture I ever see of my daughter leaning up against a pole on Bourbon St.

Watching for street cars

Fish fascination

Had to put pillows between them so no one was touching the other one and Jordis' baby had to have proper accommodations as well.

Would love to know what she was looking at

Love the sunlight streaming in on my sweet boy

So curious

Jason's cousin Shawn, still crazy, ha-ha. The entrance/exit to the bounce house was way too small. Maybe because it was meant for children. Of course I have no pictures of us in there because we would never partake in such childlike behavior. Nope, not us. Or Shawn's wife. Or Jason's aunt and uncle. Nah. We didn't all get in there after every one else went home. Not us.

Jason's cousin Morgan. Our flower girl. She's in high school now. Sigh.

See, too many pictures already. Next I'll be posting my adventures with food. Yep, I take pictures of food. I'm sure you can't wait.

We're headed out

We're headed out in a few hours for a long trip south to visit Jason's family. Jordis was sick for five days this week so we're very thankful that she's better and that Xander only had it for one day. Luckily they were on the mend before I heard about swine flu, or else I'd have been certain that's what they had.

Now we can set our sights on visiting some well-loved people and places.

Jason's childhood friends Josh and Jerad

Aunt Sheila and cousin Shannon

Dusty and Clare (who are getting married), Parrain Eddie and Anna, and Cade, who is no longer a baby.

Jackson Square

Saint Louis Cathedral

Cafe du Monde

Of course there are many more people and places we look forward to seeing, and you'll be able to see them as well when we get back. I'm sure you can't wait, ha-ha.