Perfect Evenings

There are some evenings that, when all is done and complete, can be considered perfect.  A perfect evening for me is spending time at home after work, cleaning and getting things picked up and organized, eating a delicious supper with vegetables from our own garden, and relaxing with a glass of milk and my momma's zucchini bread. 

First Day Again

It's another first day of school. This might be the most excited they will all be to go to school (aka baby prison) this whole year.  

Kylie will be going into the 2nd grade with Mrs. Metcalf (who Kaden had in the 2nd grade) and will be in the same class as her best friend, Caitlyn, and her newest friend, Rylee. 

Kaden will be in the 4th grade with a new (and pretty) teacher, Mrs. Bartles. She told Kaden to expect candy and random dance parties this year. 

Kollin enters the big world of junior high school.  To be honest, I have a few nerves for him.  To learn when and where each of his classes are, and to have his own locker to come to between each class, will be new and fun for him.  After today, he will only have 5 more "first days" left of school.

Irish Luck

I found five four-leaf clovers by our garden yesterday.  Five.  However, that still doesn't hold a candle to the amount of four-leaf clovers my sister and I found as young children...as well as five-leaf, six-leaf, seven-leaf, eight-leaf, etc.  Our clover patch was so mutated that we found the most ridiculous clovers.  The funny thing is, I still find them.  I look for them often, and I find that I still have the Irish luck.  Keane is no longer impressed by the clovers I find. 

 

I'm a Dutch-Irish, German-Polock.  I have the Irish luck and sometimes my Polish shines through, like when I prepared brats and peppers for supper last night and left them on top of the stove instead of putting them in the stove to cook.

 

 

Lenox-Scape

 

 

High jumper.

Nashville, Day 4 of 4

As a fair warning, the longer our Nashville trip goes on, the worse our pictures get.  Why does drinking make for worse pictures? 

Anyway, on Saturday evening, I wasn't going to let our nap be quite as long, because this time, our friends were in town, and it was our last night in Nashville.  We slept until about 9:00 p.m. and got downtown around 10:00 p.m.  It was really hard to wake Keane up but he finally, using everything he had, got himself together, dressed, and into the cab. 

This cab driver would only take us a block away from downtown, so after walking a block to the strip of bars, we finally found our friends at Whisky Bent Saloon.

We danced and had a good time, and then we moved to The Second Fiddle.

Again, we danced, and drank, and took photos, and had a good time, and then we went to Legends.  Here we danced in big circles, sang songs loudly into each others' faces, had more beer, and more good times. 

Finally, I asked Keane if he was ready to go, and he thankfully said he was.  We all hung out together outside on the sidewalks taking more pictures and having more fun, and then Keane and I snuck away into a cab and told the cabbie to take us back to the hotel.

 

At some point, Keane and Michael switched shirts in the bar, right in the middle of the crowd, and Keane gave his white tee to a random girl.  I think she appreciated the free shirt.

One of my favorite parts of our vacation is what happened when we got back to the hotel.  We ordered delicious chicken ranchero pizza and garlic wings that was delivered with a cold Dr. Pepper soda from New York Café & Deli!  We pigged out, turned on the TV (I think), and then went to bed happy.

Our plan was to get up and leave around 8:00 or 9:00 a.m. on Sunday, but we didn't leave town until 11:30 a.m.  I ended up driving the whole way home, allowing Keane time to recoup.  We ate at Arby's and stopped for gasoline, heartburn medicine, and large bottles of water.

We made it home around 6:30 p.m. to happy pets, including one cat who had suffered separation anxiety.  My mom had checked on the pets while we were gone, but Lenox went potty, twice, in our living room, which he never does.  He has also slept in our bed at night since we've been home, and has been meowing a little more, and a little more loudly.  And he was in heaven laying in our dirty laundry.

It was quite a trip.  We even made it home with a cool keychain I found in a bag from the boot store.  We have no idea where it came from.  I'm pretending Keane bought it for me.  That sweet boy of mine.

Keep it real, Nashville.

Day 1 of 4
Day 2 of 4
Day 3 of 4

Nashville, Day 3 of 4

On Saturday morning, the alarm on my phone went off at 8:00 a.m., but I quickly turned it off and we slept until about 10:00 a.m.  We finally got up and ready, while Keane drank a couple beers, and went to Mellow Mushroom for lunch.

This is where we ate a couple years ago with the whole family, and we loved it and knew we had to go back.  It was just as good this time.  We ordered hummus for an appetizer and a small house special pizza.  By the time I thought about taking a picture of the food, it was all gone.  It was that good...or we were that hungry.  Keane tried a couple beers from local breweries and fell in love with the Mellow Mushroom beer glass. 

The manager of the store asked us how our food was, and Keane asked if he could buy the glass.  The manager said he wasn't sure.  Keane offered $5.00 and the guy said he'd have to see how many they had, and make a "button."  Using my context clues, I think he meant he had to have a selection in their computer system to sell a glass.  He successfully made such "button" and sold the glass to Keane! 

Four of our friends, Ashton, Michael, John, and Nancy, left home at 5:00 a.m. on Saturday to come to Nashville for the day.  They were in town, so we went back to Bootleggers Inn to meet up with them, and so Keane could have a jalapeno moonshine bloody Mary.  I forgot to mention that Bootleggers Inn makes their very own moonshine in all kinds of flavors.

I had a blue raspberry moonshine lemonade.  Mmmm.  We heard more great singers, Nick and Amanda.  Amanda Emerson asked us where we were from and said that we were a beautiful couple.  She got an extra tip from us for that.

Our friends left to go to their hotel and meet up with another crew who were stopping in Nashville for the evening on their way back from a vacation in Florida.  This crew consisted of Jon, Stephanie, Tom, Michelle, Keith, Jessie, Matt, Lindsey, and Ronnie.  Keane and I weren't ready for our second day nap yet, so we decided to find another bar.  We made our way to Honkey Tonk Central, a three-story bar!  We stayed in the first story though, had a few beers, and ran into a group of friends who were there for a bachelor party. 

From there, we went to Blue Moon Saloon.  I was intrigued by the singer instantly when he was singing I've Been Everywhere flawlessly at a very fast pace.  This was my second favorite bar.  

It was a dark, hole-in-the-wall bar and the music made me tap my feet.  I asked the singer, Austin Phillips, if they would play Lynyrd Skynyrd's Ballad of Curtis Lowe.  Then I asked if he would like a co-singer (Keane).  This was just too much fun.  He did so great.  He said when the band started playing, it took his breath away.  While Keane was singing, two different girls in the bar told me he was doing good. 

We paid our tab and were getting ready to leave when two more beers arrived.  We asked the bartender who they were from, and she pointed to a couple in the bar.  We sat with them and we made quick friends.  They are from Illinois and their names are Aaron and Katie.  Katie and Keane even had a mutual friend -- it's a small world we live in.  We finally decided it was time to switch into our evening wear and we offered Katie and Aaron a ride to their hotel, and then made it back to ours.  Keane's comment when he saw this picture of us was, "Who let the kid in the picture?"  I was likely even on my tippy toes.

We drove by Nashville's new convention center that has only been opened since May.  It is six city blocks big, ten stories down, and can hold four airliners!!

To be continued, one more time...

Nashville, Day 2 of 4

We checked into our hotel at about 7:00 p.m. and set the alarm clock for 9:00 p.m.  The alarm clock, might I add, was all the way across our hotel room.  When the alarm went off at 9:00 p.m. and I was still sleepy, I literally got up every nine minutes for an hour and a half until I finally woke up enough to wake Keane up at 10:30 p.m. to get ready to go back downtown.

I call this Day 2 even though it was still Friday, the same day as Day 1, because after a nap and a change of clothes, it felt like an entirely different day.

We took a cab downtown and hit the strip of popular bars, which were full of people.

We went to Layla's first, and probably should have stayed there the rest of the night because it was the best bar out of the four we made it to that night.  The band playing was a "hillbilly" band, but to me they seemed more like a rock band.  They had greasy hair, danced around with the microphone, and screamed some great songs.  We went there because Brandon from Bootleggers had told us about this band and their mohawks, so we wanted to check it out.

We then went to The Stage.  When we came to Nashville two years prior, we attempted to go to The Stage but could not find an open table.  This place was still extremely packed, this time from the stage to the back.  I assume at least, because I couldn't see that far back.  We were shoulder to shoulder, face to face with everyone, and after the smell of vomit and my claustrophobia kicked it, I was ready to get out and find another bar. 

We hurried out of there and went back to Whisky Bent Saloon, where the fiddler from earlier in the day was long gone. We hung out in the back and enjoyed the atmosphere and a little more breathing room.

We made our way across the street to Wanna B's, a karaoke bar.  As soon as we got there, we signed Keane up to sing Zac Brown Band's Colder Weather.  After listening to karaoke singers sing for about an hour, Keane wanted to change his song to Bon Jovi's Wanted Dead or Alive.  Believe it or not, when I told the girl that Keane wanted to change his song, she said that she didn't even have him on the list...the list of like 6 people!  He would have sang so long ago had his name not been forgotten, or lost, or deleted.  I put him on the list and after a long 6 more songs, he finally sang!  I loved it, he wished he hadn't changed his mind on songs, and then we left.

By this time it was 2:30 a.m. and the bars had already called "last call" and the bands were done for the night.  Because all the bars were closing at 3:00 a.m., we got a cab and headed back to the hotel.

To be continued...