Tuesday, April 16, 2024

a weekend recap: girls trip edition

 


Happy Tuesday, friends! I'm linking up with Joanne today, which is appropriate, since she was one of the ones on my weekend girls trip that I'm about to talk about! There are lots of pictures, but I'll try to write as few words as possible. 


Back in January, I met up with Marilyn for dinner one night, and she dreamed up a plan to meet up with some other bloggers who were in similar life stages as us: with grown kids, who are or who are almost empty nesters. She reached out to Tanya, Joanne (linked above), Maria, and Amy. All of them were willing to meet up and were available to come, except for Amy who had events that same weekend to attend with her sons who are graduating from college soon. About two weeks ago, Maria had to back out due to an unexpected injury/surgery, so that's how it ended up being just the four of us. We had so much fun, but we missed the girls who couldn't join us! We met up in Nashville for the weekend and did some exploring. Tanya and Joanne flew in from their home states, and Marilyn and I drove to them. Here's a little recap...




Marilyn and I were excited to meet up with the girls! We picked them up from the Nashville airport. Please note the Twizzlers we're holding; they're a great road trip snack! 




I love the sign that Marilyn made for them in the car, even if she did almost get carsick. We had a good laugh over the stickers that wouldn't stick; note Joanne holding the E up with her hand. 🤣




Our house (duplex) was so cute! Marilyn did a great job with picking out this Air BNB. Her previous travel agent mode was on this entire weekend! She is very knowledgeable in lots of cities, and it was wonderful having her as a guide.





Friday night we ate dinner at this cool place in Franklin called The Factory. We ate Mexican food for dinner and ended the night with Jeni's ice cream (for the first time while on this trip).




I sat outside on the porch and talked to Todd Saturday morning.




And then we started the day in Franklin at Landmark Booksellers.






We walked around a lot of cute stores for most of the afternoon after having a great lunch at Merridee's Breadbasket (so good!!!), then we went back to our Air BNB for a little while. We made reservations for dinner at an Italian restaurant called Chrysalis, which was another amazing meal, then we went to Trader Joe's and ended the night at the house again. On Sunday we had a lazy morning, which was nice, then we left to eat lunch at Cava, moving on to the Belle Meade plantation in Nashville to explore the grounds and historic home. This was a great tour with a very knowledgeable young docent; but the grounds? They were stunning! 







This is a pretty decent picture taken by propping the phone up with a purse and using the self timer...




...followed by this much better picture of us all taken by teenage girls visiting from South Dakota for their senior trip!




Jeni's ice cream stop #2 of this trip! I'm addicted to the Gooey Butter Cake flavor! We drove around the downtown and 12 South areas of the city and stopped for some more pictures.





I got really good at these "us-sies"! 







We all kind of did our own thing for dinner that night; I got ramen from a place inside The Factory, and some of us snacked for dinner when back at the house. We stayed up semi-late again talking, then we went to bed for the night. We were out of the house the next morning by 7:30, and we ended our trip with a huge breakfast at Loveless Cafe. It was everything we hoped and dreamed, and more! I had fried pork chops with two eggs and the hashbrown casserole; we also enjoyed a plate of their famous biscuits, which were the best I've ever eaten. We dropped off Tanya and Joanne at the airport, and Marilyn and I headed home. 


We all kind of said the same thing about this weekend: it was a wonderful time of meeting and cultivating new friendships. It's nice to know that at each stage of life, we can still meet and enjoy new friends. It was a beautiful weekend in so many ways; I am not talking about the weather at all, though that was really nice as well. It's such a sweet gift from God to spend time with like-minded friends who are similar in personality and temperament, and who are just genuinely kind and caring people. We sincerely hope to do this same kind of thing again next year! I'd love to make it a yearly thing, honestly. Would it be appropriate to call it a blogger's retreat?? I think it would, because we did talk about some  technical things this weekend! Both Joanne and Tanya helped us with a couple of issues both Marilyn and I were having on our blogs, and we came home with new ideas and ideas of more blogs to follow. Maybe next year we'll travel with our laptops. 🤣🤣 Also, about the blogging community, I am so thankful that it's made such a huge comeback! We've all blogged for over a decade; between us we're at 20, 17, 15, and 12 (I think?) years of blogging. Can you even believe that?! I never would have thought that all of those years (17 for me) of writing here would bring about a weekend such as this. In the words of Sophie and Tanya, "Won't He do it??" IYKYK. I'm so grateful! 


Thanks for reading my blog today, and following along! I know this was long, but this isn't even close to all the pictures I took. I'm going to post some to Instagram in a day or two, and I'll share more on Friday, most likely. Love to all! 


26 comments:

  1. Oh this makes my heart so happy!! So glad you girls got to connect- this community is such a blessing :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Those were my exact thoughts, Holly! It was such a fun weekend, but also a treat to meet up with ladies that I already felt like I knew really well. That's the thing about blogging- everything is out there on our blogs, and most of us are exactly who we portray ourselves to be online. That's so rare, I think! I agree wholeheartedly, though.

      Delete
  2. Loved reading about your trip! So sorry I couldn´t make it but I am encouraged that you had such a good time and are hoping to meet up again. Have a great Tuesday!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Maria, we really did miss you and talked about you several times! Maybe you can join up with us on the next trip. I do really hope that we make this a yearly tradition!

      Delete
  3. Great recap! It was all the details I wanted! I love hearing about the restaurants and the meals. I think four was a great number and so glad you did this!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you! I always struggle with these kinds of posts; I personally prefer a quick recap with lots of pictures and just a few words of description on travel posts, with it all being in just one post for shorter trips like this. That type is easier for me to both write and read! I start losing interest pretty quickly if it doesn't move along too fast. Thanks for stopping by!

      Delete
  4. It was the best weekend and it came and went so fast! So thankful for all of you! And girl, look at you replying! :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It really was, and you're right; it flew by. Look at me replying! 🤣🤣

      Delete
  5. All morning I have been Googling how to *like* something through messages and thought to myself that I should have asked at our little tech night! LOL. It was so much fun and look at you all prompt with your re-cap!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. We should have talked about that during that tech night! I wish I'd gotten a picture of us doing that. I know! I wanted to write about it while it was all fresh. What a fun weekend! I already miss all of you!

      Delete
  6. Oh my goodness! I love this - a meet up of some of my favorite bloggers!

    ReplyDelete
  7. It really was the BEST time! I'm sure my family is tired of my raving about how nice you all are and what a wonderful time it was. I can just say that it is just what I needed in my life right now! Way to go getting that recap up before you forget all the details! You took some great photos. And love the replies on the comments!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It was! I feel like Todd could say the same. I think it was something that we all needed! Thanks for that, my friend.

      Delete
  8. Well this sounds like so much fun! I have met several blog friends in real life and it's always a great time and instant connection. When I lived outside NYC two blog friends I'd never met came and stayed at my house for a couple days, then we spent the night in NY. Such a great time. So glad you all had fun and made it happen!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. That's so cool! It was like that with us: an instant connection. I love that! That sounds like so much fun; I would love going to NYC for a trip like this!

      Delete
  9. Sounds like you all had a wonderful time. Love photos.

    ReplyDelete
  10. What a wonderful trip! I am still "friends" with ladies I met through blogging when we all started around 2008. We have watched each other's kids grow up, get married and have kids. It sounds like y'all had a great time together :) Besides...it's Franklin! And the Loveless Cafe! I mean, the food and scenery alone is enough to write home about :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I love that! The Loveless Cafe was everything I dreamed and more. Those biscuits were AMAZING!

      Delete
  11. It's just great that all of you blogging friends were able to get together for a girls trip. I enjoyed hearing all about your time together. Hopefully you can all make this an annual girls trip.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks, Julie! I do hope that we follow through with that. I know we all want to do that!

      Delete
  12. What a great time! How fun to get together in real life, I love blogging and meeting new people this way!

    ReplyDelete

Thank you for taking the time to comment on my blog!

Friday Favorites, 12.6.2024.

  Happy Friday, friends! I'm linking up with  Andrea  and  Erika  for today's blog post. I hope you've had a good week! Mine has...