No Ball This Year

Wow, i will Not have to find the perfect dress, let alone try to fit INTO the perfect dress, will not have to spend an evening freezing while wearing strappy, uncomfortable, high heels, and MOST important, will NOT have to figure out what to do with this mop head of stuff called hair on top of my head!!! There will be no Ball for Ed and i this year. He is gone and with that all the stresses of the Ball evaporated into thin air! I am sure Ed is thrilled to have gotten out of his one obligatory slow dance with the wife for another year. If he plays his cards right, he might just be gone for next years Ball as well. LOL The desert is probably feeling pretty good to him right about now! LOL I figured i would post a few of my favorite pixs from previous Balls since there won't be a new one to post this year...


I love this picture, hanging out with my two favorite DI's! We were spoiled on the Drill Field with Ermey's presence! What a great guy! This has been one of my favorite Balls so far. I just wore a whatever dress and did my own hair, which, i am glad i didn't pay to have it done, as it was pouring rain and my hair was pretty wet by the time we made it inside, so i was a wreck, but it was an evening with some of our favorite people!


This was our second Ball, 1997 I always laugh at this picture! I had found what i thought was the perfect dress, i did my own hair and it was just how i wanted it AND i thought i looked pretty good, well as good as i was capable of looking, but as usual, Ed was oblivious, and as soon as dinner was served we were outta there! He wanted me to change so we could go walk around. I was a little bummed walking by everyone who was still on done up with thier guy in blues, while Ed and i were back in jeans. Yes, it was Vegas, but STILL, i would have liked to have stayed done up just a minute or two longer, or atleast had dessert or maybe a dance....but i learned to not waste time putting myself together for these events in the future. LOL

This was my favorite dress i had made for me on Okinawa. I don't think i will ever have a dress i love more than this one!


A collection of Ball pictures wouldn't be complete without a VERY prego pix! This is Nov 1999 when i was already due with Ty. Ed's buddies twirled me all over the dance floor hoping to break my water so i could have the little guy! Our Ball that year was on the actual Marine Corps birthday! Ty didn't come....in fact i came home from the hospital with Ty on Thanksgiving Day!

This was the really bad hair night Ball. My code name was Medusa!!!!

This Ball i looked like a giant marshmellow, but it was sooo worth it for the experiance of having those two little Okinawan ladies wrap me all up in the traditional formal dress of the Japanese culture! I was not cold at this Ball! It was wonderful!

Couldn't leave Asia without having a Chinese dress made to match Ed's uniform!


Last but not least, the random shot captured by Jorden!

Beaufort Ghost Walk, Oct 2009

There are soo many stories and legends here on the East Coast! Lots of amazing history, fiction and nonfiction. I love it! We decided to check into the ghost stories of Beaufort in October and do the Ghost Walk to put us in the Halloween spirit! Ed’s Dad and Debbie were also visiting, so it was extra fun to share this adventure with family!



We met our guide at nightfall along the water. He was appropriately dressed as a……..yes, you guessed it, PIRATE!!! There were only 4 other people on this walking tour with us, so we were able to get a lot of extra tid bits and ask plenty of questions to a pirate who seemed to know all about this very old place in America! Beaufort is actually the third oldest town in North Carolina and the 12th oldest town on the East Coast! We heard all kinds of stories of the haunting of Beaufort! Many of the Bed & Breakfasts are haunted, Ed and I can’t wait to stay at each one and see what happens! We actually smelled breakfast cooking at one, it somehow always will smell like breakfast foods because of something that happened there. I will not tell the stories as it would be more fun for you to take the walk and hear the stories as you walk by the various locations. The street light went out as we approached Blackbeard’s house! Another story of a boy dressed in long ago clothes being seen playing pranks such as making street lights go out. We didn’t see the boy when the light went out. It came on a few minutes later. There were these misty blurrs and some orbs in the pictures I took where I was by myself, but when I was with the group my photos were “orb and blurry” free! Not sure what that means, just making note of it as I found it interesting. The rest of the family, including Ed was getting creeped out, but I never felt anything funky.



After the tour we drove over to Blackbeard’s house. Vicki and Ty were too creeped out by this point to even get out of the car to let me take their photo in front of his home! Blackbeard was a pretty bad guy! I know you already know all the stories about this guy, so I won’t reiterate the stories in my journal to here. But he was one big guy to fear!!!





He loved each of his wives and conveniently killed each one before he took his next one, what a sweet guy, NOT!! Anyways, had to take a pix of the tree where he hung one of his wives.




I can’t wait to go back during the day and walk the streets so I can see these beautiful old homes! If you have the opportunity, take this Ghost Walk! It was $15 per person 12 and older, $10 ages 2-11 and under 2 was free. It was about an hour of walking to see all the sites and hear all the stories. The guide is not able to take you to Blackbeard’s house as there are not sidewalks, so it is a liability, but he will show you where it is and you can go back later in the dark and find it! We had a little difficulty finding it by the time we got back to that area but it is worth the hunt! It was dark, I put glow sticks on Ty and Ryan. Wear comfortable shoes! Next year we are planning to do the Wilmington Ghost Walk!

The Girl Buried In The Rum Barrel

The legend starts with a husband and wife who emigrated from England…..
After settling in North Carolina, the two had a daughter. This little girl was very inquisitive and really wanted to see where her original family came from. Her mother kept saying no every time she asked. She was too worried about that trans Atlantic journey her daughter would have to take to see where they had come from. After begging with her mother to let her go, the girl’s mother finally said yes and let her go with her father with one condition: that he bring her home in the same condition as she left. The father agreed to the promise and they set sail.
On the return voyage, the mother’s intuitions became a reality as the girl came down with pneumonia overseas and died as the ship left port. With weeks ahead of them sailing home, the only recourse the father had to fulfill his promise was to put her body inside a full rum barrel, hoping the alcohol would preserve it from decomposing.
Apparently the daughter is buried in this cemetery and was buried in the rum barrel. Some people have actually brought equipment that x-rays the ground to confirm that her casket is the shape and size of a run barrel. They say that when toys are left on her grave that she plays with them and they will be scattered about the grave yard the following morning when the gates open, and of course there are those that have claimed to see her running and playing in the graveyard at night. You can believe or not believe, I am just relaying the legend of the Girl Buried In The Rum Barrel