Shark Shack! We Found It!!!

We had a great time swimming in the ocean and were quite hungry!  We knew there was this one place called The Shark Shack somewhere on Emerald Isle that was a real casual place to eat at.  Yay for a phone with internet!  I goggled it, got the number, they answered, gave me directions, and soon we were there!  YES!!!  It is a place you can show up to in your swim suit, butt wrap, flip flops, and covered in sand!  All the seating is out doors.  You order at a window, grab a seat at a picnic table and you can play any of the outdoor games in between the tables while you wait for your food.  The prices were great and the food was fabulous!!!  The fish and chips were the best I have had since we have moved here!  Not as good as California, but the best I have had in NC!!!  The boys said they had the best Chicken Tenders they had ever eaten in their lives and the fries were yummy!!!  Sooo, if you are ever covered in sand from your fun on the isle and starving, just hit up the Shark Shack for a yummy meal or snack, you won’t be disappointed in the price or taste!

Hitting Up The Pier

We love to head out to the Pier on Emerald Isle, Bogue Inlet Fishing Pier. It’s a great beach with parking almost to the sand, showers to wash off all that sand before you get back into your car, and a great pier to walk to see what everyone is catching!  We have seen some really fun stuff over the years!  I probably haven’t blogged this Pier…..i usually don’t take my camera because the kids don’t like me making them look like tourists in our back yard!  But, I got some pretty good pictures with my phone this time and later when we were on the beach I actually took a few pictures of us at the beach and the boys in the water before I dove in!  It was fun watching these guys bring  in a Sting Ray, although, the Sting Ray didn’t look too happy, in fact he looked really pouty laying there on the pier while the guys were deciding what to do with him.  Bet he was glad when the decision was made to toss him back into his home!  He flew over and did a perfect belly flop below!  We saw all kinds of other fish as well as a small pod of dolphins swimming along the shoreline.  It was nice seeing those friendly fins because one of the fishermen pulled up a baby back tip shark!  Not sure where Mama was, but we had fun diving in the waves later with the dolphins swimming back and forth along our coastline!

Ryan's Big Guns

Ryan is sooo cute!!!  He could care less what people think and will pose any way asked of him!  He didn't even think twice when Ed asked him to show us his "Big Guns" in front of this picture. 

Winter Wonderland!

Friday night, February 12th, I took the kids to go see Avatar. It started at 7 PM. Around 8 PM Vicki's phone went crazy with all these incoming text messages! She was recieving intel from her friends from Havelock to Richlands that it was snowing! She leaned over and passed on the news to me. Avatar is a long movie, great movie, but long, so you can imagine how much snow was on the ground by the time we exited the movie! We were on a Marine base, so of course a full blown snow ball fight broke out in the parking lot! It was sooo much fun! Than the reality set in that i had to drive us home in this! UHG! Thank goodness we were in the Commander!! Much bigger than the jeep! We made it home without me crashing into anything!!! Amazing!! It snowed all night!!! Saturday morning we woke up to 6 inches of snow! It was beautiful!!! The kids had a ton of fun playing with their friends! Vicki made a snow angel, i made a snow man, Ty and Ryan had countless snowball wars with thier friends, Jasper had sooo much fun running thru it and digging for his tennis ball. Tank on the other hand......hated it!!! He would NOT go outside for anything! We finally carried him out and Jorden put him in a non snow grass area. But, nooooo, Tank did not want anyone to see him do his buisness, so he tried to walk back in the snow, sinking to his shoulders! He was NOT happy!!! Jorden went and got him and set up a litter box for him in the garage. Tank, the cat who refused to use a litter box in typhoons and would battle 150 mph winds to go potty outside would NOT go in the snow! Must be a tropical thing!

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

Two Walls & A Beam

I love it when we can take our kids places where they can actually see and touch things to get a real idea and feel of what I am telling them about. We were able to take the kids to three places today right here in Jacksonville, North Carolina! It was perfect, especially for this time of year. September 11th has just passed and the bombing in Beirut happened 26 years ago this coming October. First stop was the Vietnam Memorial. It was beautiful! Right there in the middle of the trees. All the names were engraved on the walls going around the fountain. The kids were able to get a good idea at how many people we lost in that war. Their Grandpa Kenny, my Dad, fought and received his purple heart in that war, so it hits closer to home with them. Next stop was the steel beam from the World Trade Center. It was brought here and put in a memorial for the Firefighters and the Military. The kids could actually touch it and feel how strong and big it was to get an understanding of the type of building it was. Our last stop was the Beirut Memorial. It is interesting that this is right next to the 9/11 Memorial; as the one who orchestrated the Beirut bombing is believed to have inspired bin Laden. Terrorist attacks started long before 9/11. I remember when this happened. My Dad lost several friends in this attack. I will always remember his face when he told me what had happened. Here is just a little bit of history on Beirut….
The Beirut mission began as an effort to stabilize a fragile peace in this war-torn country. Lebanon had been a mess since the Palestine Liberation Organization, having been literally kicked out of Jordan, they took refuge there in the 1970s. In 1975, a group of Christian and Muslim militias, some backed by neighboring powers like Iran, Syria and Israel, turned what once was a Middle East oasis into a no-man's land of basic urban warfare.

Than, Israel invaded in 1982, hoping to just wipe out the PLO. In exchange for Israel to withdrawal, the U.N. sent in a peacekeeping force of troops from Great Britain, France, Italy and the United States.

U.S. forces set up camp right there at Beirut International Airport. This was not an easy spot to defend because like the airport was still open for business and then there were still warring factions that happened to control the strategic hillsides nearby.

The situation fell apart quickly. Militia leaders of course began to think the United States and its allies were favoring the Christian-led forces of the Lebanese government. A car-bomb attack at the U.S. Embassy in April 1983 that killed 63 people solidified that.
On Oct 23 1983 a suicide bomber steered a truck loaded with the equivalent of six tons of TNT down the airport road in Beirut, Lebanon. He plowed into the four-story barracks where more than 300 U.S. troops from a U.N. peacekeeping mission slept and detonated what the FBI called the largest non-nuclear bomb in history
A splinter group of the Iranian-and Syrian-supported Hezbollah organization carried out the attack, which allegedly was planned by a man who later inspired Osama bin Laden. Then a tiny guerrilla outfit, Hezbollah has grown into a political and military force in Lebanon.
The Marines' departure brought Beirut no peace. The civil war raged for seven more years until a settlement left Syria firmly in control of the country.

Experts believe Imad Mugniyah played a key role in the twin bombings in Beirut and went on to mastermind the 1985 hijacking of TWA Flight 847 and a series of kidnappings of Americans in Lebanon. He is believed to have met with bin Laden in Sudan in 1996 and was assassinated in a car bombing in Damascus, Syria, in February. No one has claimed responsibility.
It was the largest single-day loss of life for Marines since the World War II Battle of Iwo Jima.
Almost 26 years later and two wars with Iraq have dulled the public's memory of the Beirut attack. But, I won't ever forget my Dad's face that day.....pictures are on my facebook

Lost In A Corn Maze!

We are having fun discovering all the places to go and things to do here at our new duty station. Our destinations usually begin with Google, than venture over to mapquest, and then we find ourselves at another new place to discover. Today Ed found a corn maze on Google. Vicki wrote out directions from mapquest, and we made it to this cool farm. This nice guy, the owner of the farm, loaded us up into a wagon of hay and he pulled us with his tractor out to the maze. We divided into two teams, Ed took Thing One & Thing Two and I took Jorden and Vicki. As a team, we had to find 4 poker chips, one red, one white, one blue, and one green as well as find our way out with a perfectly undisturbed piece of corn. It was warm and Vicki was grumbling about the heat. I just kept hoping we wouldn’t run into a freaky scarecrow like from The Messengers movie, and Jorden was just being a good sport. We found three poker chips pretty quick….we also told Ed where we had found the chips. He didn’t let us know where the other chip was that they had found, so they won. They also had a better piece of corn than us. Vicki picked a midget corn. But we had fun and didn’t get terribly lost in the maze. We took the kids on something they had never done before, so mission was accomplished! The rest of the pictures are on my facebook in the album North Carolina