NYE in NOLA

Happy 2012!!!

Lee and I started out the new year with a awesome trip to New Orleans with Jocelyn and Eric! Lee and I have spent the last 3 New Year's Eves at our house eating rotel, playing uno or the wii, and falling asleep by 11:30. (If we made it that late). Of course, 2 out of those 3, I was pregnant, but not this year!!!!! 

Lee took it upon himself to plan a surprise trip to New Orleans, so there was no way I could say no!

We had a GREAT time and celebrated in style! Thanks Lee for planning it and thanks to our friends for putting up with us and making it a great trip, even if we did nab the last room in New Orleans and had to bunk up together for 2 days! Lol

Time to hit the town! New Orleans...watch out!

We stayed at a beautiful historic hotel in the Business District called the Wyndham Whitney, which used to be an old bank. There is still an actual bank in part of it, but they left an old vault open as a conference room and we took pictures in front of the vault door.

We then headed to the French Quarter for our dinner reservations at a creole French restaurant called Broussard's. They had a New Year's Eve menu with lots of good stuff to choose from! Yum!

Then it was time to hit Bourbon St. and beyond!

Jocelyn got her first beads...but don't worry, she earned them honestly...with just a smile!

Look at the crowd!

As it got closer to midnight...we found us some celebratory headgear!

On the walk to Jackson Square for the fireworks, we found this awesome photographic moment!

Midnight Kiss! 

Blurry and actually taken at 11:00, but who cares...it was New Years somewhere!

Here is the Fleur-De-Lis before it was dropped at midnight on top of the Jax Beer Building.

And a New Years Baby decked out in nothing but Saints gear...of course!

It's Midnight...time for the fleur de lis drop...

and Fireworks over the Mississippi!

It's 2012!!!

Lots of great memories were made that night, but we still had the whole next day to take in New Orleans!

Here are some photographs that I enjoyed taking!

View from our hotel room...that's a Zatarain's ad on the side of the building across the street...what else?

We took a ride on the St. Charles Streetcar all the way down to the end of the line to enjoy the sights!

Jocelyn found her a seat next to Napoleon Dynamite...

View from the back of the streetcar

And view from within

I caught this picture while hanging my head out the side of the streetcar...thought it was cool that it happened to be this cross street.

Still decorated for Christmas!

Very good picture!

I love taking pictures of railroad tracks...don't know why, but I do!

Another good picture of the Bundys! Lee was glad to be let off the hook from being my subject in pictures that weekend!

Besides taking in New Orleans' sights, we took in a whole lot of food...not to mention a few hand grenades!! We ate creole, seafood, po-boys...you name it. We came home quite full. We tried to get beignets, but the line was extremely long (as expected), and we were ready to get on the road so we skipped it. We did however find a little donut shop outside of NOLA and devoured quite a few pastries!

And did you notice for most of the pictures, we are in short sleeves and no jackets? What perfect 65-70 degree weather for December 31st! It was quite unusual and wonderful!

All in all, awesome trip! 2012 is off to a great start!!