Festival Season Comes To An End

Next weekend is the Apple Festival in Paintsville, the next weekend is the Harvest Festival in Inez. Then everything moves indoors!

Summer aka festival season is busy crazy time for bt Media Group. This summer was no exception. It's long hours in the heat, and sometimes in the rain. We had a great crew working with us and it made working a lot easier and more fun!

Here are a few of things we were busy with;

We started the summer season with this Day of Prayer event.

July Jam in the Pikeville City Park

The Chamber dinner with 1964 a Tribute (Beatles tribute band). Ok, this one was inside. It's nice when things are indoors during the summer.

We did a couple of events at this church in Ohio at their outdoor pavilion.

We did several shows for Main Street Live again this summer. They always end up fun and we ended up having a great weather for the ones we were involved with.

We were also involved greatly with the Hatfiled Mcoy festival held for the first time in Pikeville this year. We did production for the Expo stage, the park stage, and had a Rodney Adkins concert thrown in. Here is a pic of some of my crew waiting backstage for Rodney Atkins to come off the stage so that we could load out. At this point I am laying on a road case. I had started the day at 7am. It was close to 11pm and I still had at least 3 hours of work ahead of me. So I was trying to get a little rest. Or at least the amount of rest one can get from laying on top of a road case. Which surprisingly I have gotten quite use to.

It was a good thing we had just had a vacation right before this...we needed to be all rested up for this long three day weekend!


We do work our tails off but we also have lots of laughs. Here we are loading out from Gingerbread Days.

A night that this jewel of picture was taken!

These are only a few of the things we were involved with this summer. Tony has also been very busy with installs, studio work and other shows.. I admit it's kinda nice that we have a business that changes like the seasons with the seasons. Keeps things from getting boring.

 Arena season will be picking up in the next month and I will be busy with shows, ballgames and all other kinds of events. I hope you decide to join me for the fall season as we head towards Christmas.

 OMG did I just say Christmas?


                                                                                                    The Boss Lady

A Relaxing Day at Sea

I am going to finish up my series on our latest cruise but giving you a little peak at our fun filled,relaxing day at sea.

Being that we had nowhere to be at any set time (except for dinner) it was just a fly by the seat of your pants kinda day. I started it by ordering room service breakfast and enjoying it on our wonderful balcony.

How's that for breakfast!!! I love sitting out here with the sea as my view.

Eventually Tony rose from his slumber and joined me.

After eating, I just propped up my feet and took in the view while reading my nook for a while.

I then decided to explore the ship some. I wanted to make sure I had not missed anything and grab some pictures of things that I had not taken yet. After a while I ran into Tony and we grabbed a Starbucks. Ahhh a Starbucks coffee at sea, what a happy place!

We found seats overlooking the ocean. We just chilled, drank our coffee and had another of our "taking over the world" conversations. These conversations have lead into us expanding our business, buying new box trucks, hiring people, firing people, and even buying new buildings. They can occur while we are traveling or even while we lay on floats in the pool at home. I am pretty sure no big decisions were made from this conversation. Our brains were stuck in vacation mode at this point.

At some point (because keeping track of time was non existent), we joined up with Tabor and Loren to play some cards.

We played cards in this location for a while. We moved because a trivia game started up in the Centrum. I was accused of not focusing and trying to play trivia. I didn't see it that way at all. I think I could have done well trying to do both. (I was losing miserably at rummy). So after moving to another area in which a trivia game also started, we ended up back in our room playing.

During our card playing, we took breaks to run up to the windjammer/foodcrammer/buffet for snacks. Or lunch. Or just the non stop meal that seemed to have begun when we stepped foot onto the ship. Whichever you choose to call it. After our intense card game ( I didnt win) We all four lapsed into naps/food comas.

BTW, We didn't see Shane or Brian until dinner. I found out later they were having their own food comas/naps in various locations of the ship. Awwww the beauty of falling asleep in a deck chair while the ocean wind blows. It doesn't get much better!!

I finally rose myself from the deep sleep of the seas and started getting ready for dinner. I loved the fact that the vanity was facing the windows. Every night I was able to enjoy getting ready with a view of the sea in the mirrors behind me.

Then it was time for us to go to our last dinner. We were sad. This had been the best dining experience I had ever had on a cruise. Valfino took care of us from day one and the food never disappointed us. Actually Valfino may have been too good. At some point during the cruise he decided to spoil us and bring out tons of extras. Tonight it was fried shrimp, my Achilles heel. I ate until I was sick. I ate so many I couldnt eat dessert. Oh how I would love to have some of those shrimp right now.


My "extra" plate of shrimp Valfino brought me.

Tonight after dinner was served the wait staff sung their goodbye song to us.

This is ALWAYS a very sad moment for me. This is the point you realize there is only a few more hours left of your vacation.

The rest of our evening consisted of watching the late night comedian, packing our bags to sit outside the door for the luggage guys, and exploring the ship one last time.

The next morning we were up early and on our way back to Pikeville. Back to where there was no Samy to make my bed. Back to no Valfino to bring me food. No more ocean views or breakfast on balconies. So I do what I always do so that I won't be so depressed that my cruise is over.....I start planning my next one!!!

Again, if you are interested in many more details about this cruise, ship or ports of call, I have a full review on Cruise Critic at this link  http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1912863. Or just ask me! I love helping people plan a cruise!

Thanks for traveling along with the Mullins Family. We had a blast and can't wait to cruise together again!


                                                                                                         The Boss Lady

My Bucket List Is A Little Bit Shorter

Our second stop on this cruise was Nassau, Bahamas. I did a lot of research on this port because not only was it a place I had never been but we were going to be there for a while. We would dock at 7am and not leave until midnight. I have always wanted to swim with the dolphins, Tony not so much. So I booked Loren and I at Atlantis for the dolphin encounter. Being in port for such a long time allowed us to do some shopping that morning before heading to Atlantis.

We grabbed a cab at the port and told the cab driver what we were doing.

Atlantis viewed from the bridge to Paradise Island.

He dropped us right at Dolphin Cay, the area of Atlantis where the encounter would be.

 We checked in and they had us wait on the beach area of Dolphin Cay until it was our turn.

I loved it! After a brief "class" they took us to the water where we met our dolphin for the day. My dolphin was a two year girl named Nahama. Her mom was with the group beside of us and was a rescue from New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina. She was great. We got to rub, hug, play and kiss her. It was such a wonderful experience and I am so glad I got the opportunity to do this.

After the dolphin swim we roamed around Atlantis and explored some.

I love getting to mark things off my bucket list!


Next up.. a day at sea!

                                                                                            The Boss Lady

The Mullins Family Spends a Little Time in Paradise.

The first morning of our cruise I wake up, head out to our balcony and find this....

Our own little island for the day. This island is called Coco Cay. It is owned by Royal Caribbean so it's private. Which means that the only people that would be there would be the people on our ship.

Shane and Brian left for the island ahead of us, and not long after we headed down to the tender to head to the island to join them.

A tender is a smaller ship that transports guests. It is needed when a ship can not dock somewhere because there is not a dock or the waters are to shallow.

I had reserved us a Cabana. We ended up with Cabana #1, which ended up perfect for us.

The Cabanas are a very good sized. We had six people in and out of this one all day and it worked out great.

Our view

The water was gorgeous. We ventured around the island trying to find a good place to swim and snorkel.

The only complaint I really had about the island is that we never found "deep" water. The water is shallow for a long ways out. Which was great to walk around in and play, but not for swimming. The beach area directly in front of our cabana seemed to be deeper but that is also where most of the people ended up.

Overall, we had a great beach day. The weather was perfect! My first taste of Bahamas was a success and I couldn't wait for more.


My next post will let you travel with me as I mark off an item from my bucket list!


                                                                                                               The Boss Lady

Our First Family Dinner at Sea

After sail away, some settling into our room and a nap thrown in for good measure it was time for dinner. You never know what to expect your first night. Is my waitstaff going to be terrible? Will they have given us a table for six? (Because they can't guarantee your request) Will the food be good?

At 8:30 we were shown to our table and introduced to our waiter Valfino. We did have a table of six. Which is good because I would have felt sorry for the poor souls that would have been forced to sit with us...lol.

There ended up not being any reason to worry. Dinner was perfect. Valfino was the best waiter I have ever had on a cruise and the food was great. On our Jewel cruise in May the food was just alright. The Enchantment's chef has them beat by far!

Here are a few dishes from out first night.

This was the Smoked Fish Rillettes.

It was a seafood spread of smoked salmon, mackerral, trout and sour cream garnished with a large tiger shrimp. It was out of this world. I had actually asked for a ceasar salad for my starter but the others at the table who had ordered it couldn't quit talking about it. So I asked Valfino to bring me one. (this being one of the perks of cruising..asking for as many additional items you want.) I am so glad I did!!

My entree that night, Seafood Spaghetti.

Tony and Shane ordered the Horseradish encrusted Salmon.

I am pretty sure Shane liked his.

The Slow Roasted Prime Rib

Tonight's dessert selections were;

Chocolate Sensation

Carrot Cake

Creme Brulee

And this is what happened to us after the meal.

We did managed to get up and go watch a movie out on the big screen at the pool deck.

Tabor did manage to squeeze in some late night pizza.

Next time we will join our cruisers on their beach day at a little slice of paradise.

Enchantment Cruise Part 2....The Part where we actually make it onto the ship.

When I left you, we had just taken our embarkation photo. Now it was matter of using our seapass card for the first time. There is nothing like that feeling when you hand the attendant your card and hear that ding. That ding always says to me, "Hey you are officially on vacation"

So we dinged in, had our picture taken for identification purposes, and were finally on the ship! After months of planning and waiting, we were finally standing on the deck of the Enchantment.

It was about 1:00 when we boarded the ship, and it was posted that rooms would not be ready until 1:30. So I herded the crew to the windjammer (the buffet) . Or the foodcrammer, as someone called it in one of their reviews and its now stuck in my head.  And it was CRAZY!! No tables to be found anywhere. I explain to everyone that this wasn't the norm, that it was just this crazy on embarkation day because everyone was waiting for the rooms to open. So we just wondered around until they called that the rooms were available. Which wasn't long at all. 

We had Grand Suite 8540 . I loved our Grand suite on the Jewel and went for it again on the Enchantment knowing we would want more room with kids being with us. I had asked for a roll away when I booked this cruise but when our room steward came by he acted like this was new to him. But he rebounded quickly and had it taken care of by the time we went to bed. We hung out on our awesome balcony and chilled until time for Muster.

The muster went really quick, thank goodness because it was HOT in Florida that day! So now its time to Sail Away!!! We headed to deck 10 all the way forward trying to get in a position so that family members back home could watch us on the Port Canaveral web cam.

Come sail away, come sail away, come sail away with me.......Sorry but the Styx song must always be sung at this point.

So the Mullins family is finally at sea. We spend the rest of the afternoon settling into the room. There might have been a small nap involved at some point since we were a little tired from the drive. Then it was time for dinner!

Join me next time as I tell you about our first dinner and evening at sea. But I will leave you with a hint....Perfect.

                                                                                                                        The Boss Lady