girl's weekend getaway birthday trip

That's a mouthful, but it's accurate.  My sister Trish had a milestone birthday this weekend, and like we did with Lisa when she turned 50, we made plans for a girl's trip.  Originally my mom and I were the only two going, because my nephew is getting married in less than two weeks, and we didn't think Lisa and Debi would be able to come twice, so close together.  But Debi was able to make it work right away, and Lisa decided she could too, but we didn't tell Trish.  The original plan was to stay one night, but with them, we stayed THREE. 

Mom, Trish and I left around four and headed that way.  Lisa and Debi flew into Nashville and we were meeting them at the hotel.  They ended up going to dinner, though, and instead of meeting them at the hotel, we picked them up from Puckett's Boat House, where they had just eaten.  (We ate on the way, at a yummy country cooking type place, and ran into my pastor, his wife, and another friend from our old church and her family.)  Debi got in the car, and right when we were all buckling back up, Lisa started banging on the window.  Trish jumped out and started bawling.  It was an awesome surprise. 

We went night swimming right away, until all the bugs kept landing in our hair, then we went back to our room and showered, and fell asleep (at a semi normal time).  The next morning we got up and had breakfast, then we headed into the downtown Nashville area.  We were going on a bus tour, and it was called The Music City Rolling Jamboree.  The bus picked us up at the bottom of the CMT building.

It was HILARIOUS and slightly scandalous, but we all had a blast.  Poor Trish was called up to the front for karaoke, on a song that nobody knew, except for the chorus. 

There's this building in Nashville that everyone calls the Batman building, and we were right across the street from it.  You can't see that it looks like something straight out of Gotham City, but oh well. 

On the bus tour, we learned all kinds of cool things about Music City, and it was really interesting.  We saw some pretty buildings, too, but I don't have pictures.

After the tour, we went to a nearby restaurant and had lunch.  It was so good.  Then we headed back to the hotel for a bit, before our evening plans.  We had made plans to go to a play while we were there, but without really knowing much about it.  The play was Steel Magnolia's, which is one of our favorite movies of all time, and I thought it just sounded really fun.  There was dinner you could attend beforehand, so we thought that sounded good too, and bought the tickets.  Imagine our surprise, when we pulled up to a senior citizen's center.  Which was fitting, I guess, since it was a 50th birthday celebration, but STILL.  The dinner was pretty good, and the play was really good, just not like we had expected.  I know we will laugh about it for years to come.  I wish I had pictures of all of us as we pulled in.

We MIGHT have been slightly overdressed, but we just owned it and had fun. 

We went back to the hotel after the dinner and dug in to this cake.

It was AMAZING.  Lisa found this place that caters to CMT's events, and ordered this cake last week.  The place was called Ivey Cakes.

I love this picture of Lisa!  The place was adorable.

The next morning, we got up and went back downtown for brunch.

It was called Louie's Wine Dive, but their brunch food was really good.

Debi took this picture, and it cracks me up!  This bottle was filled with cold water.

We went to a cute little shop that is run by one of Debi's best friend's daughter, called Nashville Roots, and it's in the old house that Randy Travis lived in.  I love things like that.  I took a picture, but it's not great.

Then we went to Franklin for some shopping.

For dinner that night, we splurged and went to Shogun.  We all love Japanese food.

And then, because we needed to walk off some of that food, we went to Walmart and just walked around.

Some of us behaved, some of us, not so much. 

We were going to swim again, but the pool was full of children, so we decided to just hang out in our room, instead.  We started packing so we could get out the door at a decent time the next morning.  We checked out and had breakfast, then took Lisa and Debi to the airport.  Then Trish, Mom, and I started heading back home. 

It was a great weekend, and one we will talk about for a long time to come.  I'm so glad all of us were able to be there to help celebrate Trish.  Our goal was to make her feel like a queen and I am pretty sure we all accomplished that goal.  She is dearly loved and treasured, and our time together was a blast.  I am so glad we had that time, because when everyone is here again in two weeks, it's going to be crazy busy and a whirlwind of a time because of the wedding.  It was good to have all the quality time together this weekend...we don't get that much at all! 

If you've made it to the end, good for you!  I wanted to write this all out so I would have it to look back on.  Love to all!