A Walk In Faith: We saw the QUEEN!

We saw the queen!

It started off as a really rough morning. Weekends are really hard for me because that is when I am headed either to Longview or Daingerfield to see our family. This weekend was my Mom's birthday weekend so it made it even harder to not be loaded up and on my way home to celebrate. I have learned that the best way for me to get my mind back on track is to say a pray and ask for help, plan fun events to fill up our weekends, and to find the perfect song on my MOPS cd to play while I get dressed. :)

So that is exactly what I did. I actually played two songs today to get me going. Stronger by Mandisa and Country Strong. We all made it a Country Strong kind of a day. :)

We all got dressed and ready to head out for our adventure for the weekend. It was going to be a 45 minute drive so we put in our TV's, found our music, and grabbed the camera. We were ready to make it a great day.

This weekend we had tickets to go to the Braemar Gathering. A Gathering has the same excitement here as a rodeo has for us in Texas. It has many ongoing activities that are so much fun to watch. We had ringside seats that were PERFECT! We could see all of the fun and had a STRAIGHT view to see the queen when she arrived. I'm pretty sure I was even more excited than the kids about seeing the queen.

I was really starting to get excited because we found out that all of our Aberdeen families would be at the games with us too. When we were all talking about where our seats were on the way we realized that they really did put us all in the same section. NO idea how they can do that and not so many other simple things, but VERY grateful that we would all share this experience together.

As we were waiting on Denman and Rusty to finish getting ready, I grabbed a quick picture of my very own princess. She got all dressed up today just in case she got to see the queen. I loved that she even found the bow from Bethany to put in her hair...AND it MATCHED!!!

The drive to get there was just beautiful. My camera was in the trunk so I missed some great pics but I'll get them next time. When we got there we realized "wellies" aka in the UK rain boots are a MUST even if the rain is shinning. I will remember that one next time too!

We had to walk a ways to get to where the action was going on so we put Denman on Rusty's back and headed up the hills.

Rusty and Denman were leading the way while me and Natalie kept stopping to take good pictures and look at the fun places to shop and eat. Rusty was getting a little inpatient..LOL

But check out the cute pics that I got.

This is a small church that we passed along the way. I am just amazed at how pretty all of the buildings are here.

This is a picture of the the Dee river from the Bridge. Natalie said that it sounded just like MiMi's waterfall that she has in the kitchen. I love how they remember the little things.

Rusty and Denman were starting to leave us so we had to stop the pictures and catch up..

Do you see them?

When we found our seats Emily and Jen were already there. We were right beside each other and we had seats. It was really fun. The kids were so excited to see each other.

This is Michael, Emily, Emma and Grace! We are soo glad that we have these guys here with us in Aberdeen. They were decked out in their LSU gear and ready to catch the game at midnight! Now that is true team spirit. :)

This is Jennifer, Lauren, and Aaron. Jennifer is the one who told us about the games and that the queen might be there. THANK YOU JENNIFER! So many memories that we are getting to share together.

This is Renee, Keeley, Kaitlyn, and Sammy. Natalie calls Kaitlyn and Keeley our Aberdeen cousins. They all play so well together and are soo sweet! We are so blessed to have them here to help us take this walk.

The first thing we saw when we got there was the Hill Race. It was a race where they ran up this HUGE what I call a MOUNTAIN, and then back down again all in about 45 minutes. It was CRAZY. Can you see the little dots. That would be the runners.

I didn't get a good picture of the whole mountain, but I did get one of the group of runners.

The next event that Natalie noticed was the Highland dancers. This dance is alot like ballet but your hands stay in positions. Natalie started taking lessons at her school this week, and she LOVES it. All of the girls in Second Grade are in her class. I love the smile she has on her face when I pick her up.

They also have a tug of war contest that was really fun to watch. Denman always wanted to know what color we were cheering for when they started. He picked one color and Natalie picked the other.

This was the Hammer Throwing picture Rusty took. It reminded me of the disk throwing in the Olympics, but this thing looked WAY harder!

This one is called Throwing the Heavy over the Bar. I really like that they keep the names of things so simple and obvious. It makes me laugh ALL the time! We sat right in front of this event and saw many "heavy" hit the stick and break. Denman cheered when they broke. He thought that was really neat. THANKFULLY these guys wore something under their kilts because I hear most of them don't!!!

This is a relay team getting ready for their next race. They had a ton of races through out the day but we never knew really how long they all were. It was fun to watch the crowd get into the race.

I think my favorite part as we wait for the Queen to come would have to be all of the bands that played during the day. Every band had a group of bagpipes leading the way. It was really cool! I had to fight back tears during one of the bands because it reminded me soo much of watching Aggie Band at a football game. They take as much pride in their bands as we do with the Aggie Band. It was a GREAT experience!

This is a smaller band that played during the games.

This is the band that marched around the ring before the Queen arrived and before she left. It was beautiful. I will think of this moment every time that I hear bagpipes played. So moving.

It was getting close to Queen time so Rusty ran to grab some lunch for us while we waited for her entrance.

Natalie wanted to eat fast so she wouldn't miss the Queen.

After a few minutes you hear them announce... and now entering the Braemar Gathering... Her Majesty the Queen and her Royal Family. Now that feeling was just like the one you have when you wake up on Christmas morning. We are all on the edge of our seats binoculars in hand. :)

Here she comes!!

The Queen got out first and then Phillip, then Charles, and then Camilla! I can't believe they were all there. I really wanted to see William and Kate, but maybe we will see them another day. :)

She talked for a bit and then headed to her seat.

The Queen went to her seat first.

Then, we all stood and sang, well they sang their National Anthem. It was really neat!

Three of the Highland dancers then presented the Queen with flowers.

Then they gave her a shield but not sure what that meant. They give a few trophies, but mostly they receive shields when they win an event.

Natalie was so excited that we could see the Queen. Her smile that day was priceless!

The Royal Family was all in place so back to the games!

I think the next event was Denman and Rusty's favorite. It was the log tossing. They picked up this HUGE log and then tossed it to see if they could flip over. It was crazy. We saw four people actually make it flip.

I even got two videos of the log flipping over. Denman watched it over and over when it finally happened. He was really into the games while this event was going on.

We kept checking on the Queen during the games with our binoculars and we are SURE that they were looking at us too with their binoculars. Can you see who is looking at us?

Natalie held on to the binoculars so she could see what the Queen thought of all of the events. We know that she looked right at us and smiled!

Can't you see her grinning at us. :)

LOOK! She even started pointing at us...LOL Just kidding she LOVED watching the kids do the sack race! We couldn't talk any of our kiddos into going down there to do it so we all watched the Royal Family as it took place. The Queen had a ball watching all the kids race to the finish line.

After a few hours, it was time for the games to end so the Queen headed out first.

She loaded up in her car first.

Then they drove around the ring again before they left.

She drove right in front of us and I just missed her smiling and waving, but that is her in the back of the car. It was really neat.

I don't know who these people are, but they were also part of the Royal Family.

We then found an ice cream truck that brought out the biggest smile EVER on Denman. He was ready for the AGGIE game...LOL

We had to bundle up again because the sun was hiding behind a cloud. It is true when they say you have all four seasons in one day here in Aberdeen! It is all about layers... SO when you come to visit... keep that in mind. :)

As we finished our ice cream, another band began to play and lead the way out.

I can't even explain to you how detailed their uniforms were.

They even had kids playing bagpipes. Denman LOVED this part. We got to follow the band back to our car. Denman wanted to stand right beside the bagpipes and kept telling Rusty to keep up with them.