Spring Break…Disney style

I took my princess, Kelsey, to Disney for her first college Spring Break.  We planned to DO IT ALL and did a good job of it.  Four parks in three days.  We had a blast and of course I had to do a post on our amazing and fun-filled trip because this Mama works hard for her money and likes to spend it on my girl !!!



Our first stop was our resort…the Caribbean Beach Resort.  As we passed under the Disney Welcome sign that goes over the road we both looked at each other and screamed…WE ARE HERE!!  We were so excited.  Then we noticed the buzzards…everywhere…buzzards circling overhead…did you hear that I said BUZZARDS!  Then we passed some sort of buildings, looked like some kind of industrial park or some kind of plant, and the buzzards were all over it. Flying over, sitting on, lurking around, hovering and just plain hanging out.  At first I was afraid everyone at Disney were dead…it had finally happened…people got Disney-ed out!!!! I was glad to see that was not the fact.  Pug told me later that it was a sewage plant.  I assume I have passed it many times before but in all my trips to Disney THAT is NOT a memory I remember.




Our room was great but we really did not see it much. It definitely had an island feel and was decorated with Finding Nemo characters.  I personally loved the pineapples carved on the bed posts and the large pineapple that was etched on the head board...reminds me of  my daughter-in-lae, Annie :)   We jumped on a bus and headed to Magic Kingdom. 

               

We are an ice-cream family and ice-cream is what we do to celebrate pretty much EVERYTHING. Kels got really good at taking our pictures…no need to bother strangers on their vacations.  We got to ride all the best rides…lines were not too bad…we did not mind waiting…we considered it “our quality time” together.  I was in the best company EVER.  We had a great day and decided to head over to Epcot.  We ate in Italy…really great pizza and gelato but it took a while and the park was closing at 9:00.  We were not ready to go back to the room so we decided to go back to Magic Kingdom…just to get an apple.   My Kels loves caramel and chocolate dipped apples.  We also decided to ride the monorail to the park.  My Kels loves the monorail.  And when we got back to the park, just to get an apple, and to ride the monorail…the Electric light parade was happening!  My Kels loves a parade…especially with lights.  I would say we hit a home run with that apple decision.

               

My girl enjoying the parade.  I remember that same look on her face years ago when she was little.
 
               

The apple that got us the home run :)   and you gotta love the monorail.



Poor Mickey.  We got back to the room and had a pig party… the apple and some blue cotton candy!!!! Yum!


                           

The next day we hit Animal Kingdom early.  We did the Everest/Yeti roller coaster first.  It is our favorite ride.  I had to buy the picture.  I am not sure if it was because of mine and Kels’ faces…which were kindly priceless…or for the fact that the people in front of us evidently were not on the same ride as us…he looks like he is yawning and she must be on some serious meds.  The ride was fun but we got sprayed with a fine mist at the end both times…not sure if the Yeti tinkled on us or spit on us…I guess we will never know…..

                       
                                      

The Dinosaur coaster that spins is always a must.  We laughed so hard I thought I would bust a gut.


                                              

I really wanted Kels to get her picture with this guy!!  She refused so I got one of him from the side.  It is a family joke and it makes me laugh so hard and…..SQUIRREL!!!!!!



                   

The Festival of the Lion King was really really good!!!!  The singers and dancers were awesome!!  The monkeys were my favorite!

                                     

AKUNA   MATATA!!!   means no worries for the rest of your days!!!!!! :)  Yes, I sang it LOUD!!!



My sweet Kelsey…she always waited patiently for me to go potty…she has a bladder of steal…got it from her Daddy.  At least she finally stopped saying “AGAIN” every time I would tell her I needed to “rest”.  She takes good care of her old Mama.  There were many times the bus driver would announce “please take small children by the hand” and Kels would grab ahold of mine and smile.  And if we had a dollar for each time one of us looked at the other and said"I am so glad we are here!!!", I think our trip would have been paid for.

After Animal Kingdom we went to Hollywood Studios…mainly to ride the RockNRoll roller coaster.  We did and it was awesome!!!!  Definitely worth the wait!!!


                  

We could not pass up the Beauty and the Beast show.  It was great…and our Annabelle’s favorite princess, so we would never miss a chance to say hello to Belle.  We decided to go ahead and eat there before heading to Epcot.  We looked at a few restaurants but they were all full and lines were really long.  We finally decided on the Sci-Fi Star-lite Drive-In.  We had no clue that it was a real drive-in.  We were pleasantly surprised.

                  

We were glad we picked it because it was so different and we wanted to “do it all” !!

                  

We had some great chips and dip, a steak and of course a chocolate milk shake for dessert.

                  

It was a really fun experience and we would highly recommend it.




                    

Well I brought my own princess and we found her a castle…so I went in here to get her a prince.  But before I could pick one out they hollered at me and rushed me out!!!  How rude…I thought this place was supposed to be magical????  Luckily I had a dream the night before (yes, me and Martin Luther King) and I actually met Kels’ prince charming…his name was Will…actually it was God’s Will…get it…haha :)…anyway…..



                       

It is not a trip to Disney without seeing Mickey and the princesses.  We “did it all”!




                                      
                        

We wanted to “do it all”  but not “buy it all”…so we may not have purchased ears…but we got pictures wearing them!!!!




Mickey’s Phillharmonic in 3-D…yeah, we make this look good!



We saw Captain Jack Sparrow!!!! This show was really cute until he started into the crowd and getting all up in everyone’s face doing that mouth breathing thing…Kels grabbed me and says “TIME TO GO”.

                            

Look who we ran into…more spring breakers who are also some really awesome life-long friends.  This is really an amazing group of girls. :)


                              

I got to see REAL princesses at Disney.  These girls hold a special place in Kels’ heart…mine too!!!




               

My princess…my girl…my heart... my world.  We had so much fun and I am so glad she still likes to hang out with me.  I do love many others and I love many others really BIG…but I love no other as well or as big as I love her!!!


                      

You know how back in the day you would go to these parks and the lines would be so very long, the prices of food and prizes was so expensive, kids were worn out and tired and acting like brats, parents were grumpy and hollering at their kids, there were scooters everywhere, large groups of people that would just stop in the middle of the walkway to discuss what they were going to do next all the while stopping the already slow flow of traffic, and of course there was the fact that not many people spoke English, well ......................IT IS STILL EXACTLY THE SAME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

But I DID have the pleasure of seeing some of this magic they talk about…as we were waiting to see the “Dreams Come True” Mickey show I saw two kids who had to be siblings because they had the same flaming red hair.  They were close in age and the brother was so excited he reached out and hugged and kissed his sister on the cheek. He could not contain himself.  I saw elderly people who have already paid their “rush around” dues and were just walking hand in hand enjoying themselves and ignoring the hustle and bustle that completely surrounded them.  I also some couples “scootering” along doing the same thing.  I saw kids that were experiencing Disney for the very first time.  I saw many special needs children who had the greatest parents EVER who were being so patient with them and giving them the best day EVER.  It warmed my heart and reminded of why we were there in the first place.

Disney…the magical place…we saw a giant singing and dancing mouse, ate dinner in Italy, had lunch in the middle of a rain forest, rode a coaster up Mount Everest (a little spray never hurt anyone), tested a race car, flew in a space craft to mars, had steak in a car in a drive-in theater, sailed with the pirates, frolicked with the ghosts, sang Disney songs OUT LOUD, oohed and aahed at the princesses, rode with a mermaid, flew with Peter Pan, ate ice cream twice in one day, bought overly expensive t-shirts, walked until our feet hurt, sustained roller coaster hangovers for 3 days, ate too much, laughed and screamed just the right amount and to top all that off we sat in our hotel beds and read our bible each night at the same time.  Yeah, it was magical and we made some amazing memories…time and money well spent.  There are some things you cannot put a price on…this trip was one of those things. :).......and I got to ride home with my very own princess.  :))

 

Disney princesses ain't got nothing on my princess!

They see me rollin’

I switched jobs again.  I am back to sissy rolling.  I call it sissy rolling because I only roll this big huge roller across the ground and it is kind of hard to even see anything being done.  Unlike my other rolling, it is actually called chopping, where I can see where I have been with all the devastation and chaos I leave in my wake.  Briars, weeds, vines, small trees crushed, rolled, and chopped.  There is no mistaking that I have been there.  I can see the need in that.  Van assures me that there is a good reason for doing this other kind of rolling…something about leveling the land to get ready for next crop,  making the land more even…flattening out the old rows.  Regardless, if Van says it needs to be done then I will do it.  It is the same field I rolled a few weeks ago…we need to roll it once more and then it should be good.

The very first time I ever rolled (years ago) it was in another field and it was just black dirt so it was “easy as cake”.  No doubt where I had been and needed to go next. The last time I rolled this particular field (a few weeks ago)  it was kind of easy.  I could see the old dirt rows and rows of cut silage stalks.  That helped me stay in a straight line.  There was not as much grass and I could see the impressions of where I had been as I rolled along.  I also could go by the flattened piles of cow poop and the flattened mole hills.  But this time would be different.  There was much more grass, the piles and hills were already flat except for a few new ones.  This was not going to be so easy…I may need to change the name from sissy rolling to rolling with the big dawgs now.  Oh yeah, and this was the kicker…last time I rolled east and west, going with the rows.  This time I was to go north and south totally against the rows.  This is where it got interesting.


             

This is the 80 acre field I rolled.

             

This would be my view if I was rolling east and west.  Nice rows to keep me in line.  I can even see the rows of cut silage stalks.

                                

Even the back view is great… only this is not the way I am rolling :(

                              

This was my view going north and south. Nothing to help me stay in a straight line.


My first day of rolling went pretty well.  But by the second day it was getting harder and harder to see where I needed to go and where I had been.  It is kind of hard to explain but I will try.  I am really trying to stay in a straight line, first problem…I like to consider myself a “straight shooter” but not so much a straight tractor driver, especially with no lines to follow.  So that is a job in itself.  As far as rolling, IF I am in dirt it is so easy to see where I have been and where to go next.  I can’t turn sharp so that means I have to leave quite a large space between my rolled rows so I can’t just move over one row and start over…I have to go all the way down the field, turn really wide, and then go back down the field the opposite way.  Kind of like a giant square that moves over after each go round.  Unfortunately I can’t see much dirt because of the grass that has grown in.

                                                   

This is a close up of what I am seeing, only I see it from a little farther up on the tractor and I am moving at the same time I am looking.


I can sometimes look hard and see either hoof prints from the cows, or rain drop imprints in the dirt, or fresh (not flattened) poop piles or mole hills next to the row I am rolling.   But there are times that I cannot tell if I am really seeing hoof prints or if it is just tire tracks from the tractor.  It seems odd but you really have to be there to understand what I mean.  I should have taken pictures the day that I was rolling but I am not sure if they would have been clear enough for you to “get the picture”.  I did not take pictures that day but I went back and took some later just to TRY and prove my point.  I have evidence that MAYBE I am not completely crazy.  There are times when I can see exactly where I have been up ahead of me.  It is like the ground I have not rolled is a different shade of color.  It is very subtle but I can definitely see it and it makes it somewhat easy.  If I can see it ahead then I cannot see it behind me.  If I cannot see it ahead, then I can see it behind me.  I still have not figured that out but I think it has something to do with the way the sunlight hits it.  I noticed real quick that when the sun was behind the clouds I could not see any trace of where I had been and it did not matter if I looked ahead or behind.   It was so strange.  And I am sure it sounds even more strange !!!!



                 

This is a fresh mole hill and a flattened mole hill.  Seems easy enough.

               

This is a fresh pile of poop and a flattened pile of poop.  Again, seems easy enough.

And as if I am not already dazed and confused enough…I turn at the end of my row and head back the other way and I see this!!!!!!!  A fresh mole hill in the middle of a flattened one.  Yeah, these little stinkers are that quick!!!!!  Even the critters have it in for me.

                     



Van once told me that sometimes I could kind of squint and see a faint line and he was right.  But it finally got to a point when I would see it and then it would just vanish. Like magic…there it is…there it ain’t.  Not funny AT ALL.  And NO, I WAS NOT ON DRUGS… but I am seriously considering drugs if it will help with this job.  I tried squinting, closing one eye, sitting up straighter, sunglasses on, sunglasses off, looking ahead, looking behind, hair down, hair in pony tail…okay that last one even had me asking “what the world???”   Desperate times call for desperate measures, so I reverted back to my childhood. When I would fish with my Grandaddy and not catch anything he would say “sister, you are not holding your mouth right”  and yes I did do that weird mouth thing and sometimes is really worked…hey if my Grandaddy said it…it was right.  So there I was on this tractor doing the mouth thing…and I think it actually worked, but only for a short time.  I got lucky and finally the sun decided to stay out long enough for me to realize that as long as I was going south I could see my lines but going north…I got NOTHING.



                          

Now bear with me…if you look close and kind of squint…in the center of the picture…just to the right of the single electric pole you can see a faint, dark row.  That is a row that I missed.  Now can you see what I was dealing with.  That is how I had to see where I was going to roll.



And this my friends is the same area only I went forward just a little and took another picture.  You can still see the faint, dark row BUT this time it is on the left side of the pole. AGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!! Can you please ‘splain this to me????????????????????


                 

                                      

On a lighter note…all the critters are not out to get me…the cows are always curious about what I am doing.  They loved watching me get the pictures for this post.  I love the looks on their faces. :)  So I had to include them.


I would do great rolling south but rolling north I was winging it by desperately looking down for any sign that I had been even remotely close the the area I was rolling.  I could look behind me and see where I had been and that helped some but I could not look back the whole time.  That is just NOT how I roll :)  I have admitted to being a day late and a dollar short and doing most things bass - ackwards but this was ridiculous.  I am doomed to stressful tractor jobs lately.  I cannot wait until I get to fluff hay again.  I just hope my sanity can make it through these other jobs.  So if you see me in town and I am running around like a chicken with my head cut off or if you see me flying into church or some other function looking like something the cat dragged in… WELL NOW YOU KNOW!!!  I did get the field rolled.  I even figured out later that I had rolled it twice in some places and completely missed some other places.  It is really hard to get good help these days but for the most part…I did okay AND I did not get fired :)  I am actually looking forward to going back to chopping even though it makes me crazy as a sprayed roach.  At least I can tell where I am going and where I have been.  And YES, I STILL love farmers…especially mine!!

music fixes everthang

I have been chopping for a few weeks now.  Believe it or not I have JUST been able to listen to my music while I chop.  Before I had to really concentrate on the task at hand.  I was trying to be so careful looking for stumps, holes, logs, anything that could possibly tear up the tractor.  I thought I was doing a good job…but then it happened.  I was going along into some thick weeds and I did not see the stump.  I was really going slow so it was quite a shock when the tractor just stopped abruptly and I heard a very loud crack.  Not a good sound at all.  Especially when I know how tough this tractor is.  I had to make that dreaded call to my boss man and give him the bad news…  that I had broke the tractor.   He was really good about it but I still felt really bad.  I had gone so long and not tore anything up.  He checked out the tractor…it was a tie rod problem with the right front tire.  Problem was it BROKE!!  Just cracked in half and fell off.  I was so glad to hear my boss man say that we had the part and that it could be fixed.  It was not an easy job but he did it and I was good to go again.  He also assured me that these things happen…I just don’t like it when it happens to me.

So now I am even more paranoid than before.  I am double looking now and I am seeing things that are not even there.  If a bunny or field mouse jumps out I am automatically thinking it is some flesh eating creature that has not even been discovered yet.  Anything that is long and skinny looks like a snake…no matter the color or the texture…I see SNAKE.  Piles of moss look like stumps.  My eyes are really playing tricks of me…more stress…just what I need. 

So to relieve some of this stress I decided to get my music.  It cannot be THAT distracting.  I will just have to refrain from my fantastic dance moves and not get so into my singing that I lose my train of thought.  Music makes me happy and relaxed and it worked in this situation too.  I could still concentrate on my job and “get my jam on!!”  I do believe music fixes everthang!!!!

Even with this stressful job I still have time to think…time to ponder…time to reflect on the meaning of life.  This is what I think about:

1.  NO ONE and I mean NO ONE should ever try to sing RESPECT… Mrs. Aretha has done it and it cannot be re-done.

2.  I realized that I can sing all three ranges, HIGH, MiDdLe, and low  in the song “I can’t get next to you” by the Temptations.  But the HIGH parts are the cow’s favorite and  it is one of their most requested songs.

3.  The cows also love “I’m sexy and I know it”…the wiggle, wiggle, wiggle, wiggle, wiggle part gets them every time!  They do get a little risque but hey…we are out in the middle of the woods, JACK!!

4.  3 words… Cha Cha Slide…I worry about these pregnant mama cows with the  6 hops and  the “how low can you go” part  but who am I to deny them of this…go on with your bad self my bovine sisters…get your jam on!

5.  GEORGE STRAIT… sometimes no words are needed…just a moment of silence for his utter and complete awesomeness………………………………………………. :)

6.  No matter how hard I try…when I listen to “Cupid Shuffle” I cannot stop myself from doing that shoulder up and down thing and when I hear the 4 Tops sing the words  “Sugar Pie Honey Bunch” I cannot stop myself from doing that bend at the hip side to side thing.

7.  Please do not tell my Kels but it sometimes scares me when I think of what I could do with a few shots, a stationary pole and the song “Low” by Flo Rida.  Relax…just cause I said I could do it … does not necessarily mean I would!!!!!!!!!!

8.  Whenever I sing the first verse of “I Love Rock and Roll” I feel like Mrs. Robinson…a young Dustin Hoffman is definitely not my type but that cutie pie Hunter Hayes….that is a whole nuther story.

  9.  After hearing “Pontoon” sung by my adorable 4 year old granddaughter…Little Big Town just cannot do it justice.

10.  It don’t matter if you weigh 90 pounds soaking wet or 250 pounds “butt neck-ed”, when you sing “Brickhouse” by the Commodores to the top of your lungs… you are ALL THAT and a bag of chips!!!

11.  My all time favorite song ever since I was a little girl is “Lean on Me”.  I have enjoyed all versions but I am most partial to the original by Bill Withers.  Nobody sings it like Mr. Withers.  I want this version played at my funeral.  So if you are there and some turkey head tries to get up and sing…  and it is NOT THE Mr. Bill Withers, please stop the program, pull out my i-pod ( I am sure my people will bury it with me just in case I have to wait in line somewhere in between…probably the Atlanta airport) and play the original song by Mr. Withers…the way it was meant to be played!!!!

Music soothes the soul, calms even the toughest of beasts, and makes my heart smile.  It is a whooge part of my life and I consider it one of my life’s blessings.  I think it is about the emotion it brings, the memories it awakens, and that place in your heart that can only be touched by a certain song.  Music is one of the reasons I love my job so very much!!   So enjoy life anyway you can…for me it is through music.  Jam on my friends and be happy.

Even after a good day of chopping, contemplating, and jamming I still had a mini heart attack.  I was getting out of the truck to open the gate.  I look down and for the FIRST time that day I actually said oh look, it is just a stick…and then just as I put my foot out of the truck and onto the ground, my “stick” slithered away quickly.  Of course the ONE time I let my mind go at ease…it just slaps me upside my head.  Oh well, we all need that every now and again-- WHOOP THERE IT IS!!!!  :)  I still love farmers!  Especially mine!