Reality Rally

So Saturday morning, when Tommy and Brandi's family all arrived, we had all the kids put on their Charity for Charity t'shirts I made. They looked SOOOO cute! Bran, Tommy and I had to leave... we had to be in Old Town early for the race. Dan, Beth and Dad had ALL the kiddos. Where was Alex? Sleeping... then getting the property ready for the party the next day. So we get down town and checked in. Thursday night, late, we had received an email for Gillian, the creator of Reality Rally, telling us who our Reality Star would be. Brandi called me at 11pm to talk about it. We were assigned Lane from Big Brother Season 12, so we Googled him. He was this big football playing looking cute guy, young and came in 3rd place for his season. We were stoked! He is known to be really competitive and fun! SO! Once we arrived and checked in, got our white "racer" t-shirts, we looked around looking for where we should go. It wasn't really clear, so we followed all the red shirts "Reality Stars" up into the City Hall room. We searched for our celebrity so we could meet him since we missed the night before "Meet and Greet". Lane... Lane... where's Lane???? We couldn't find him, but they did start serving chicken sandwhiches, so we got in line. It was a good idea to eat now, rather then at the end of the race at 4pm! While standing in line, I notice a gal that I recognized. I totally knew her... but why was she wearing a red shirt? You mean, not just our local reality stars, "dancing dad's" were here, but this gal too? Wonder what she was on? So I tap her shoulder and say, "I know you!" She smiled, covered her name badge and said, "I'm not telling you what show I was on"... she didn't refer to living here, seeing me at the restaurant, going to school with me... she strictly referred to the show. I starred blank for a split second and then it hit me! I yelled, "Apprentice!!!!" I remembered her from watching one of my FAVORITE reality show!!!!! Tiyana. She was a sweetheart! She talked to us for a bit, when this GINORMOUSE Dreadlocked black man walked up and says, "excuse me, I have to ask you to leave since you don't have a lineyard on. Ya, we got booted out!!!!! So, we took our sandwhiches and left the building. We still couldn't figure out what to do... there were only a couple other teams hanging around. Brandi then spotted the La Masters Motorhome!!! Leah!!! So we headed over to the motorhome and headed on in!! There was Leah, Caryann and Whitney SO adorable!!!! They had matching socks, had blinged out their shirts, cut them up and looked adorable! We did a touch of that with out gold and black ribbons and Charity for Charity hats. We were already sweating because it was the hottest day of the year to date, so we grabbed the scissors and took to our shirts. They definitely won best dressed (no official category) but we had to be second place!!! :) hahha! So, after hangin in the motorhome and cutting up our t's, it was time to gather at the steps of City Hall. Brandi decided she should use the potty before we were ready to start, so we headed up to the restrooms that were by the Reality Star "holding room". Tommy and I waited for Brandi and I we were, Chuck Washington, a friend of ours for years and our City Councilman and his wife Kathy see us. No sooner could I say Hi and give a hug, did Chuck grab my hand and start pulling me into the Reality Star holding room! I couldn't even tell him I just got kicked out cuz he was moving so fast. He heads right towards the front of the room where the podium is and I start freaking out! What is he DOING WITH ME????? He stops JUST before the podium and turns to a table of stars and says, "Ragan, THIS is Charity!". I'm thoroghly confused!!! Why does this reality star want to meet ME? And by the way... where is our guy, Lane??? So, Ragan and Chuck explain that Ragan is my team mate! Strange.... Ragan is opposite of Lane, which is the name we were given. Ragan is of small stature, would NEVER be caught DEAD playing football (if you know what I mean) and is a college professor!!! "Well, that's cool, but we were told we had Lane" I said. "No, Lane isn't here, I don't know what happened with him. BUT I'm the better of the 2 of us and I'm SUPER competitive!".. okay! Sounds good... I HOPE!!! We head on down to the starting pen and Aunt Becky (our Fed Ex lady from a few blog's ago), Uncle Gus and cousin Jackie showed up to cheer us on! Dad, Beth, Dan and the kids showed up shortly after and were SOOO cute and SUPER excited to cheer us on!!!!

There wasn't too much information given to us prior to the race, but we were given envelopes that couldn't be opened until the race had started. So the gun? bell? buzzer? I don't even remember.... something went off to tell us we could start and everyone started running! No one knew where they were running to at first... so we stopped and read the info. We had 2 choices... find home stuff at Farmers Market or nombs in the windows of stores in front street. We chose front street because I thought it would be easy for me and I thought Farmers Market would be PACKED and hard to get around. Well, BAD CHOICE!!! Old Town Front Street is a little less then a mile long!!!! When you have to RUN trying to find answers to clues or nombs in windows and they are not all along the street... it's EXHAUSTING!! "We were JUST there" seemed to be the most common thing said between us all. We were so tired and it was SOOOO hot! Did I REALLY say I wanted to try out for Amazing Race? REALLY!!???? RIGHT!!! After going crazy up and down front street for an hour, we finally got our clues to the next leg and headed for the trolly's. And from there, it was a hopeless feat. We didn't know so at the time... Ragan WAS very competitive and took control of the next challenge selection. The trolly showed up, and we boarded after 20 minutes of waiting. It was a slow ride to Mt. Palomar Winery, where the next challenge was. We chose the "luck" challenge out of the 3 choices. This challenge turned out to be poker. Every player sits down and the winner of each hand, gets up and throws bean bags into the holes of the cards in their best hand. I ended up with 3 5's, a J and a K. I have a very good aim.. USUALLY!!!! I don't know what happened!!! I'd aim at 5 and make it in 6, I'd aim at J and make it in 10, I'm aim for K and make it in Q!!!!! I was SOOOOO frustrated!!!!!!!! We all had to do the same thing.... it wasn't nearly as exhausting as the Old Town Challenge, but more frustrating for me FOR SURE!!!! Right when we were finished and running back to catch the next trolly, our whole family showed up!!! It was so cute! they missed the competition, but it was great for a photo opp as you can see above!! So we wait for a trolly that finally shows and it's not our "color" but it's going to the right place... the Mall!!! So we board!! A whole trolly of teams headed to the mall, but on the Red line instead of the Brown line! Oh well... first year, a little confusing, we were headed in the right direction! AND I knew the driver! So we pull out from Mt. Palomar onto Rancho Califronia Rd. and no sooner do we straighten out.. the trolly engine dies! He tries starting it up several times, but it's a NO GO! We are broke down on Rancho... miles away from the mall!!! What do we do??? It's "illegal" or disqualifying to take "unmarked" transportaion... but Alex is right up the road!!! He called right then and asked where we were. He hadn't seen us all day! So I told him to come with his truck and we would load as many people as we could. OOPS! Cancel honey... another trolley cruised down the road and pulled over. We all ran and piled in... "no, we can't take you... we have a route we are on and it's not going to the mall." SO off the trolly we go.... do I call Alex again or do we wait.... what now??? We have no chance of redemption now!!! After almost an hour, the "working" trolly gets the okay to take us to the mall. Alex pulled up as we took off, so he followed us all the way there. We got off the trolly and thought Alex was parking, but he never showed up. We went and did our "fashion" challenge at the mall where a team member (brandi) had to get dressed into an outfit from a photo on the table (we had to search for each piece on a rack) and then model it for a pagent pro. We were down Ragan because there were 2 ladies waiting at the mall for Ragan to show up! Yes, they were his BIGGEST Fans!!!! hahaha!!! So funny! He jumped in before the modeling and got our stamp of completion! Off we ran to the trolly stop and waited again. This time for over an hour!!! We visited with several reality stars there .. Annie from Ragan's season of Big Brother, Laura from Survivor Somoa and Elvis... from... uh.. I forget... but some car racing reality show! Elvis was a teddy bear in disguise! He is an ecsentric character with a long hair mohawk and skulls and skeletons ALL over him, inlcuding braided into his 3 foot long goateeeee!!!!! (In the photo above)... so after meeting him and talking to him for a while, I look him up and down and say, "You would go perfect in my son's bathroom!" You know the saying, "out of the mouth's of babes????? well, there's another one when you know me! "Out of the mouth of Charity". As Michelle says, "there is NO filter"... but not in a foul way... in a way where the majority of people think but don't say... I think and say before I think again!!! I thought he was going to die! He didn't know how to take that! He didn't know me to know better! There was a reality television show filming and he started filming Elvis, when Elvis pulled me into the shot and asked me to share my comment!!! It was hysterical! See.... at least the whole time we were waiting, we were entertained or entertaining!!! hahahha! FINALLY... the Grapeline shows up and loads us up.. "to Big Horse please" we all ask... "it's over you guys" was her exact words!!!! "The race is over, the first place team has been back for at least an hour!!!" GREAT>>>>> darn it! We wanted to finish the race!!! Ya, she wasn't going for it!! Back to Old Town we went... got off the bus... people were packing up... we checked in as team #29!!! WOW! I think Ragan was SUPER excited to be done with the race and us!! he was fizzled out after the broken down trolly ordeal. We make the best of everything... guess he plays his game a little differently :(. Oh well... thanks for playin Ragan! We said goodbye and we'll see ya at the pit party and we headed out. We stopped by to see Leah and see how they did... Aubrey and Stan said they got 6th and were celebrating at Public House. So we headed off to have a victory toast with them. At that point, I realized that I had not confirmed a sitter for the night! Shoot! I had asked Cousin Wes a couple weeks ago, but there was some communication break downs and he made other plans. He asked if I could call someone else, so I did.... Karisa thought she could cover it, but wouldn't know until the morning of the race, when she texted me that she couldn't do it. I texted Wes before the race, but when I checked after the race... there was no reply!!!! I started to panic... I texted and called everyone I knew who had a kid between the ages of 12 and 25 to babysit all 7 of our kids under age 9!!!!!! yah.... good luck you say????? That didn't help! It was so nice of everyone to respond... unfortunately they were all.... NO!!! CRUD!!!! Well, we minds well go have a toast with Leah and the girls since we may not make it to the after party!!!!!! It was fun to share stories with Leah and the girls and their great star Shaz (Survivor). Time was ticking though... at least that is if we had to get ready for the pit party.... but still no word from Wes.....

We get in the car and start heading home when we get the text... "I cancelled my plans, I'll be there at 5:45" -Wes. WHOOOOOOOOOO HOOOOOOOOO!!!!!! He pulled through!!! WE LOVE YOU WES!!!!! THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!!!

SO we got home, showered, got ready for the night.

Headed down to Temeku Hills and checked in. Food, Drinks, music, reality stars and local familiar faces!! Story telling about each teams experience about the race and laughs. Michelle and Brian and Jen joined us too! We reunited with a few of the stars we met that we liked (inlcuding Laura and Elvis) and met some new ones! Dad was the live auctioneer... poor thing! There were 4 items, less then half of the people paying attention and not a lot of money for each item. But HE did a great job.. as always! I was the 2nd to bid on a condo in Cancun... my bid was $750... I outbid bidder of $500... going once, going twice, SOLD to ME!!!! My Dad was worried I didn't mean to bid... but I did!! My brother in law walks up and says, "You OUT BID MEEEEEE"!!! What?!?!!? Hahhaha! I had NO idea!! hahaha! That is SO ME!! Bummer thing is that the event person wouldn't let the vacation house go for less then $2500, so I was bummed! Oh well, it was fun to win in the moment and added to a funny story of out bidding my own family!!!

We were done at that point, hungry for a meal... so we decided to say farwell to a fun event and head down to the best restaurant in town Gourmet Italia!

We arrived ready to order steak, fish, chicken, pasta... all we could eat... but a second to late... the kitchen was closed. BUT! My hubby didn't let us down. He sat us to a table of appetizers and salads. An enjoyable end to a great day! Now it's time for a good night sleep... big family reunion tomorrow!!!