Day 5

Nashville

"Let's not merely say that we love each other; let us show the truth by our actions." 1 John 3:18

Ahhhh, yesterday. Woke up from 6 hrs of sleep at 7am and climbing into bed at midnight. No way was I blogging. So you get yesterday's post today. Here's all the wonderful that is why.

Hubs & I spent the first of our morning at Loveless Cafe with Mom & Dad. This Nashville treasure of all things breakfast was a must-eat-at.

Loveless Cafe

Afterwards, I had an date with my brilliantly talented aunt. I introduced you guys to Shannon when I gave you the run-down on a few family projects. She is witty, generous, gorgeous, and incredibly creative. And I get to learn from her and glean the fruits of her years of genealogy-gathering labor. She began working to preserve historical family memories in 1997 and has compiled a wealth of information that offers a rather thorough insight into history and generations of family fun facts. And I'm completely smitten. Whatever it is that makes her giddy for all things genealogy, I caught it. Hence, Family Projects. Also, hence, spending an hour downloading design and genealogy software programs, uploading flash drives of family information files, and chatting excitedly about how cool it all is. There seem to be few people that can hold this conversation with genuine interest, so I was in nerd heaven with my cool aunt.

I left there to pick up Hubs for a quick lunch with Kelcee & Ethan. We went to Copper Kettle, a cafeteria-style meat-and-three, right across the street from our old high school. I'm so glad we got to steal away a quick moment in between their work days (and steal playtime with the adorbs little man that Kelc was babysitting that day.)

We drove back to the Hopkins house to meet Dad & Momma for an afternoon hike. Jessie got to join us, and Hubs guided us around the Narrows of the Harpeth. Walking in woods, not ten minutes from residential neighborhoods, is one of my favorite things about Nashville. We went up to beautiful countryside views high above the river and back around to a quiet cascading waterfall into a small swimming hole. On the previous day's canoe ride, Jessie was quite reluctant about the water. But today, she went right in after a few sticks- partly because she adjusts pretty quickly to new things, but I think mostly because it was cool water on a hot day.

Enter, girl's night. My sister met us to get our nails done, followed by a four-lady dinner at Finezza's (a.k.a. Italian Heaven) with Hubs' mom Lea Anne, my dear sweet sunshine of a friend, Melanie, Momma, & me. I loved getting to catch up with Mel, our moms, and my chicken marsala with angel hair pasta in alfredo sauce. We topped it off with a rather adventurous dessert: Maple Bacon Cheesecake.

I love this beautiful friend so much.

Look how cute our moms are!

Girl's Night at Finezza

All this time, Dad & Andrew had a man-date. They ate Jim Nacho's at Cancun's in Bellevue before heading to the Lipscomb vs. Page high school football game. Mom & I met them there for the literal last minute of the game and the memorial tribute held for the family of Coach McCadams. We all left for a late-night (11pm is LATE for this girl) Donut Den snack with Kelc & Ethan before heading to the house for bed.

Sorry for pic overhaul. Such a busy, wonderful day!