Bloom Where You Are Planted: Feel'n Southern

I've decided I can officially say "Y'all" anytime I want now that I've been to Nashville for the first time ever. So, y'all here is my rundown of a weekend stay in Nashville. I'm just going to put this out there...I'm not a country music buff, nor am I a Nashville buff. Not even a little.

The Crew

We (my sister, two aunts, and I) hit the road on a Friday mid afternoon and arrived in Nashville around super time. Thanks to a fantastic deal found online we were able to stay at the Opryland Hotel. OH MY GOODNESS! First of all, I've never stayed anywhere where the staff unload your luggage from your car and take it all the way to your room for you. Ok I lied, once on a cruise...but that's different. And secondly I've never stayed in a hotel large enough to house not just one gorgeous atrium but three!

(Did you know the plural form of atrium is atria.Yeah me neither. I looked it up. I may have rewritten that above sentence five times just to not have to use the plural form. )

As soon as we hit the hotel lobby we were greeted with the sounds of live country music and enthusiastic hotel guests singing along. After checking in, the bellhop started us off on our journey to our room. Yes journey. The hotel is huge! We wound our way through the first atrium (atria??), through hallways, up an elevator, and then ventured through a couple more hallways finally reaching our room. There isn't much to say about the room. It was nice, clean, and had comfy beds. A lovely picture of the lavender flower, one of my favorite plants, adorned the wall.

The hotel had it's own map and app to help you get around!

After a quick freshening up it was time to hit the road for dinner. Thanks to my sister's researching we had decided to go to one of two festivals happening downtown. A Watermelon Festival or an Italian Festival. We opted for the Watermelon festival that was being held at a farmers market. We wandered around a bit to get an idea of what all there was being offered from the multiple food trucks. Deciding to keep it southern I opted for a chicken and waffle meal. It did not disappoint!

Farmers Market lit up at night. Photo courtesy of Kendrah

While checking out the farmer's market booths we noticed that there was something going on in the park next to the Watermelon festival (speaking of, there was basically one big booth serving watermelon and having seed spitting contests. Not much else). We then noticed there was Italian music streaming our way. Little did we know we were right next to the Italian festival! It turned out to be your average festival done Italian style. Options included grape stomping, wine tasting, canolies, etc. The live Italian music was a nice touch while walking under hung Christmas lights and eating dark chocolate gelato.

By the time we made it back to the hotel it was getting late but I was ready to explore! Seriously y'all, I could have spent the entire weekend just walking around the hotel admiring the flowers and plants! I don't even know the names of all of the flowers but I took enough pictures to fill a picture book! They even had orchids attached to and growing out of the side of trees! Not to mention the waterfalls, streams, ponds, and river! Any free moment I had at the hotel was spent exploring or relaxing on the many park benches while people watching.--or getting lost trying to find our room! To sum it up, I absolutely loved the atmosphere. If you've ever been to the San Antonia river walk, I'd say the feel was reminiscent of that. Seriously I could go on and on....

Ok, so Saturday morning started early with a trip down to the lobby coffee shop and more exploring. The plan was to hit up the city and eat at Pucket's for breakfast. The plan was executed precisely and we all left stuffed and satisfied. I was the only one to not have the brisket hash meal (which looked delicious), and opted for the country style eggs benedict served with a substitute of cheesy grits... It's a good thing we walked a lot all weekend!

Since we were already in the city and had paid to park the car, we took off walking. This is where I must confess I don't know much about Nashville or it's history, aside from a few basics. So walking around was educational and I probably missed some important things not knowing what to look for. I'll also confess that I did not love the "main strip." It was totally different from what I had envisioned by a huge margin. But that's ok! I enjoyed walking around the Ryman, watching Hatch Prints do their thing and admiring their work, and popping in some of the shops. My one purchase was a children's book with illustrations to John Denver's song Sunshine. The song is now stuck in my head.

We headed back to the hotel, ate some greasy oversized pieces of pizza, then cleaned up for the highlight of the trip; going to the Grand Ole Opry! Another confession...I had no idea what to expect again! It was different then I'd imagined, but completely entertaining. I had only heard of two people scheduled to play; Vince Gill (!!!) and Crystal Gayle. Brownie points to Gayle for singing Don't it Make my Brown Eyes Blue (do you know how few songs there are written about brown eyed girls? I can think of two).

A pre-show photo not far from the stage before the pews started filling up.

Y'all I can't say enough about the atmosphere and chills I got while attending the Opry. The intimate feel that was created by guests sitting on church pews next to complete strangers was oddly satisfying. Watching other attendees enthusiasm and pure enjoyment made me smile with renewed appreciation for what music can do for the soul. There are very few places left in this world where people can speak openly and genuinely about their faith in God and share the message of Jesus while in front of a huge secular crowd. I'm not naive to think that other crazy songs and sinnin' (southern y'all) doesn't happen on the same stage, but it was completely refreshing to go to a show that made you feel like the world wasn't such a crazy place after all--unless you spend some time in the gift shop before the show--talk about intimate!

One last thing about the Opry. You can take a shuttle from the hotel to the show and back. We laughed on the way because it literally took less than 2 minutes to get there. It was so close that Kendrah and I chose to walk back to the hotel in an attempt to beat the shuttle. Even if we hadn't of power walked part of the way we still would have beat it!

Returning back to the hotel we were all hungry and decided to have a late night snack at one of the hotel's fifteen million restaurants. I did a little more exploring/unwinding from the day and then it was off to bed.


A sampling of the 100 layer doughnuts

Sunday mornings agenda included one thing...then it progressed to two. But first let's talk about the original plan: Eat at Five Daughters Bakery. We may have done some of our own sinnin' with the amount of doughnuts we purchased and devoured. The entire time we were there the line never died down. It'd be easier if you just checked out their website ( www.fivedaughtersbakery.com ) for a description of the tasty treats. I ordered a maple glazed 100 layer doughnut and a regular chocolate glazed doughnut with a side of milk to drink. I don't know how I managed to drive the entire way home because I'm pretty sure I was close to hitting a sugar coma, carb ready nap. So worth it!

The second thing added to the agenda for Sunday was to find my aunt an Eclipse shirt. Did I mention that we went the weekend of the eclipse and they were promoting it everywhere! My aunt remembered seeing an outdoor pop-up shop selling shirts in the city so we headed that way. Our first mistake was not thinking through the logistics of how not to have to pay to park just to get a t-shirt (paying to park everywhere was not something I planned for. So be prepared if you go). So we hopped in the car with my aunt driving into the city when it dawned on me...I should be driving so she can hop out and get the shirt while I drive around the block... "Ok!" I heard...I said that outloud?? So we proceeded to do a quick Chinese fire drill while pulled over on pretty much the sidewalk. She got her shirt. I drove for the second time in the big city (I was driving my aunt's very nice vehicle so the nerves were a little high).

After finding the shirt, as the designated (semi-awake) driver I pointed the car home and hit the road. Two out of four stayed awake. One out of four snored the entire way home. Overall I loved Nashville and want to go back for some more out of the city exploring and another trip to the Grand Ol' Opry.

That's my take on Nashville, y'all. Below y'all can find some pictures. I didn't take too many aside from the flower pictures.

OH! I forgot about our visit to McKay's Bookstore! Why do we not have one closer to home?! I bought three books, two of which were like brand new for a total of nine bucks! It was only that much because I bought a leather bound NIV (1984) Study Bible that I've been searching for (I'm kind prone to the NIV 1984 like that guy was to his KJV who ended a very short relationship with me because I didn't use the KJV...true story for another probably never time).

I got a little lazy trying to get the pictures in some sort of order while still working on figuring out how to easily format this blog.