Shopaholic in Alabama

It was the day after the 4th of July. I was the only one at my parent's island home who had to go to work. Everyone else played on the boat all day - here are the results!  My husband, father and brother in law went deep sea fishing, about 30 miles south of Dauphin Island, AL. These are trips I normally do not miss, so I was sad about that. However, we are planning to have a fish fry tonight so at least I'll be able to enjoy the fruits of their labor!                        Hubby with two nice Red Snapper he caught             My Father with a Cobia and Red Snapper he caught                Brother in Law with my nephews and their dog Last but not least, here is my favorite picture of the day. The husband insisted they wait to clean the fish until I came in from work, so I could "see them". HA! So we were on the dock taking pictures, an...

Happy Saturday, Shopaholics! Hope your week has been better than mine! Sorry about being absent for the past week - my laptop died and I have been working from a dinosaur desktop computer. It's been a form of torture.  I wanted to blog and show you guys these pictures last week for my Salt Water Saturday post - but I wasn't sure I'd be able to recover the photos. Thankfully --- this series of photos were intact.  There is absolutely nothing like leaving the dock before daylight, and already being on a fishing spot when the sun rises over the Gulf of Mexico... We had a very successful day of red snapper fishing. The new limits in our area are two fish per person, per day. I was fishing with the DH and my Father - and we had our six fish by 9am.  Dad caught a nice King Mackerel - however, it was catch and release on that baby because we don't eat them. Our rule: if you don't eat the fish, or we're not fishing in a tournament, we let them live. Then...

Happy Saturday! Welcome to my first "Salt Water Saturday" post. All summer I will be bringing you lots of fun posts about how we are entertaining ourselves here on the Alabama Gulf Coast. Today we are going deep sea fishing, approximately 20-30 miles offshore. As you know, our fishing was cut extremely short last summer due to the BP oil spill. We feel like we have a lot of making up to do and plan to get started on it today! :-) Last night we bait fished off the pier (live bait is always better than dead bait - although we have dead bait too), put gas in the boat (120 gallons - that hurt!), made lunches and iced down the drinks. We had a satisfying dinner of royal reds, boiled corn, new potatoes and cold beer. Can't go fishing on an empty stomach, after all... DH fishing for bait, Dauphin Island bridge in the background. He didn't even know I took this one! Even I fished for bait - rest assured though, I was the only person around here wearing full jew...

Happy Wednesday, Shopaholics! Please forgive me for the lack of posts here. As you know, I blogged about going to Dauphin Island over the weekend. Little did I know, the internet was out, and the backup internet was out! I was stuck for three days with no internet . No emails . No blogging . No online shopping . We returned home late Monday, and lucky me! Now I'm sick with a raging sinus infection. Today I got a 10 day round of antibiotics. I'm hoping they work quickly, because I'm a pretty miserable pup! While we were on the island, the boys spent a lot of time fishing off the pier. The DH, BIL and my two nephews all had a great time!  The nephews are 6 and 3.5 years old, and they are so much fun! I wanted to share some of the photos, hoping they would bring a smile to your face today! This heron wanted to get into the ice chest - which was where the boys were storing all their fish. Every time he got close to my beach bag, I would get a little concerned as I didn...

Happy Tuesday! Hope you've had a wonderful start to the new week! Yesterday was a little crazy, as evidenced by some of the comments received here...I've never had as many anonymous comments as I received Monday. I made the decision to leave them all up and not delete any; as I truly believe most folks will draw their own conclusions anyway. Additionally, I was very excited to receive dozens of supportive emails - both from readers and a few high level executives. Moving right along - I'm getting tired of the cold. I don't know how those of you who live in really cold climates like MA, MI, WI, etc make it through the winter. My town is packed with snowbirds that are down here to escape the bitter cold. I have a theory: the birds can fly down to the Alabama coast, rent a house or condo for $1500-2000 per month - and that is probably cheaper than their heating costs/utilities in many major metropolitan areas. What do you think? Join me in wishing for an early spring...

Hi Shopaholics! Hope you are doing great and getting ready for Turkey Day! I can't believe it's time for the holidays. I sit and wonder where did the year go? This past weekend, we made our last fishing trip of the season. Our special fall red snapper season is officially over. The boat is on the trailer. It's somewhat sad of course, but there's always next year! Here are a few photos I thought you might enjoy - especially the food! :-) DH caught an Amberjack - we were 35 miles out in the Gulf of Mexico. You can see where at some point, another fish or something much larger tried to take a bite out of this poor fellow. We brought him home, he was Monday Dinner at our house and my parents! Dad with a red snapper he caught...it's in the freezer for a family fish fry (coming soon). Please ignore my hair in this photo, it's a hot mess. DH and I with more red snapper for the freezer! We witnessed some of the most beautiful scenery on the ride ho...

TGIF, Shopaholics! Before I forget, THANK YOU so much to everyone who mailed a card to Nanny for her 85th birthday. She received a nice pile of them last Saturday, and called me to tell me all about it. I was in the stadium for the Alabama-Florida game, which was about to start...couldn't hear a word she was saying, but got the scoop the next day! Thanks again, you guys helped make Nanny's 85th birthday very special and I really appreciate it! The past two weeks have continued to be insane....DH's cushy BP gig is up, and he's taking a well deserved sabbatical before moving on to the next project. I know...you're thinking "how nice to have him at home", right? Well yes....but as you can imagine, my schedule is all out of whack and I'm not getting much done as a result! Last Friday, we were lucky enough to go red snapper fishing. Normally at this time of year, snapper season is over and has been for quite some time. However, because the oil spill n...