Adventures Past the Mason Dixon

This past weekend, Ken, AJ and I had a much needed mini vacation! We traveled up to NJ for my friends Ria and Mark's wedding (AJ was the flowergirl) and got an invitation from my wonderful friend Ashley to stay at her family beach house in Ocean City! It was Ken and AJ's first time past the Mason Dixon line and we learned so much. We learned all kinds of things like: 1. there are bandit cabbies who will try to rip you off. 2. I sound southern. 3. Chaos is bound to ensue when all my friends get together and 4.we learned some new vocabulary. :) The first night was spent with Ashley at her family beach house - which was AWESOME! In the first hour that we arrived, we learned/ tried three new things. Ashley walked us down the boardwalk and we had some Magical Pizza at Mack and Manco's.
Tried Birch Beer. Which is like rootbeer- but better.. The waiter asked if we wanted White Spinach and Red Spinach on our pizza... Feigning confidence in our choice we just blindly chose one. After the waiter left Ashley kindly explained that white Spinach pizza doesnt have sauce and red Spinach does! For a second there we thought there were different types of Spinach up north. lol! After Pizza, we went to Shriver's candy store and got some yummy fudge and licorice laces. Then we headed down to the arcade/ amusement park.. We bought our tickets for the rides and whaddya know.. it started pouring and they closed the rides. We did get in one ride on the carousel though, thanks to Ashley charming the ride operator. :) We played in the arcade for a bit then headed back to the beach house- occasionally ducking into a shop or under an awning in a futile effort to avoid the downpour. We finally gave up and just walked in the rain which was fun for me since my parent never let me play in the rain. (I know, I know- I was deprived as a child. :) )
The next morning, we had some delicious breakfast at Brown's. On the menu- typical breakfast fare: doughnuts, eggs, bacon, sausage, scrapple, pork rolls.. I know, I know- SCRAPPLE?! Pork Rolls?! haha! Ken and I were intrigued. Scrapple- Also referred to as Pon Haus is basically leftover parts of pork combined with spices and cornmeal formed into a loaf, sliced and then fried. Ken ordered the scrapple which is actually pretty good. As for the Pork Rolls, Ashley let me try a bite of hers and that was REALLY good. Apparently in North Jersey, its referred to as Taylor Ham. For all of us southerners - its like fried balogna. YUM! YUM!

After we had brunch, we went for a walk on the beach. Alexis was playing in the waves lapping up on the shore when she lost her balance and face planted in the water. IN HER CLOTHES. It was so comical. Her foot sank into the sand and she lost her flipflop and as she was trying to right herself, she stumbled and in what seemed like slow motion, her face turned from a bright smile to a "oh no, oh no! I'm going down and I can't stop it" look.
We all couldn't stop laughing. After that, we decided to skip the boardwalk and let her play in the ocean in all of her clothes. An hour later we had to practically drag the child out of the ocean. She had so much fun playing and her shorts were absolutely soaked she had to hold them up to keep her undies from showing! After we cleaned up it was time to pack up and head to the resort for the wedding festivities.

Ria and Mark had an abbreviated version of the Indian Wedding Ceremony and it was beautiful. A bunch of my friends from High School made the trip as well and we had so much fun. Alexis made friends with a couple of girls at the reception and had a blast running around. Ken lost a game of ping pong to Marty now has to call him Uncle Marty.

Saturday morning, AJ went into Atlantic City with her new friends to walk on the beach and boardwalk and found a massive clam shell. In the meantime, Ken and I had lunch with Sarah's beaux Sean and watched some football. Not spelled with a U OR a W - Eli! :) Then it was wedding time! Here are some pictures of the beautiful flower girl.
The ceremony was great and the groom's mother sang Ave Maria so beautifully. The wedding and reception was held at the Carriage House and it was amazing -The food was awesome- I'm drooling thinking about the shrimp nachos they had- and the mashed potato bar was awesome. and I've got too many pics to post here so you'll have to check out my shutterfly site.

Congratulations Mark and Ria!!

Then Sunday came and it turned out to be a great down time day. We had a breakfast in the main dining hall and ran into a bunch of the late nighters.. 2 of which had YET to go to sleep and listened to stories of riding in Eli's Semi, Ginga and all the other craziness, lounged around the pool, then packed up and flew home. We had such an amazing time and we are looking forward to seeing everyone again soon!


To see more pics of the trip check out our shutterfly account. www.englandfamily.shutterfly.com

(fyi- Some of the pictures were taken by AJ- hence the weird angles and the finger in the pics :)


PS> Ken found SCRAPPLE at Publix yesterday! We didn't buy any - but its there! In the frozen meat section for any of you who'd like to try it! :)