My 48 Hours In Nashville

This is my first full work week back in the office since the week of January 18th. To be perfectly honest, I'm ready for it. I desperately need some routine in my life. Just to recap, I've been traveling for both work and fun for the majority of January and February. I hit up Toronto for work and Denver for play in January (which I still need to tell y'all about) then headed to Miami for 10 days, followed by Nashville this past weekend. I still have a girl's trip to New Orleans planned in two weeks, followed by a romantic getaway to San Antonio with my man a couple of weekends after that. Plus, I found out I have a free hotel room that is going to expire on March 4th, a few of the girls and I are trying to figure out how to use that this weekend. 

Long story short, I believe I will spend the month of April in a solid detox. 

Seeing as I clearly have no desire to rush right into recapping the Denver trip, let's talk about Nashville this past weekend. My best friend Magen celebrated her 30th birthday in style, as we hit up some of the absolute best restaurants and bars I've ever been to. 

Friday my flight didn't arrive until 10pm, but luckily I was still able to meetup with everyone for a drink at Robert's Western World. Just like that vast majority of bars in Nashville, you will hear live music at Robert's, but it certainly has an older vibe to it as classic old school country fills the bar. We ventured to the bar upstairs and had a couple of PBR's (when in Nashville!) before calling it a night. 

The next morning, we walked a short couple of blocks to a super cute restaurant called Puckett's. Puckett's has quite the southern country vibe, with a big emphasis on MERICA! Their coffee and fried chicken were calling my name. 

Yes, I had fried chicken for breakfast... no, I did not lose weight on this trip. Oh also, no I didn't take a picture because that would make me a GOOD blogger. Instead, please refer to this picture I borrowed from their instagram page. Please substitute home fries for those grits because, duh.  Oh, and also, if you want to make yourself insanely hungry, check out said instagram page.  

After breakfast we walked back to our hotel to get ready for our pedal tour later that morning. On the way, we passed the cutest little flower shops and boutiques. Nashville has something adorable around every corner.

So, what is a pedal tour, you ask? It is basically a gigantic bike that 15 people can ride down Broadway while drinking beer. Your tour guide - also known as your driver and bartender - plays some fantastic tunes, steers your bike and generously refills your drink as needed. This was THE MOST FUN ever, and I'm already trying to get a group together to do this in Dallas. 

After working up an appetite, it was time for a late lunch (and of course a cocktail) at Merchants, an adorable little restaurant packed with charm and character located right on Broadway.  

As you can imagine, we carved out plenty of time that afternoon for a nap before hitting The Southern for dinner, followed by drinks at my personal favorite Nashville bar, The Stage. If you've seen the movie Country Strong, you'll remember this is the bar where Tim McGraw goes to listen to Leighton Meester's character sing. And well, if you've never seen Country Strong, you need to fix that ASAP. 

After a much needed morning of sleeping in, Helene and Michael came and picked me up for a day of food and exploring! We were twinning in our hats *insert sassy girl pushing one side of hair up here*

ALSO- may I please just clairify that I DID use an iron before I left the hotel!! #SMH

Helene took me to a restaurant called The Flipside, and dear lord was it miraculous. By miraculous I mean it was the most instagrammable restaurant I've ever seen. Natural light filled the entire space, subway tiles and white wood planks adorned the walls, everything was either white or a beautiful shade of baby blue.... Oh, and if you're into this kind of thing, the food was good too. LOLZZ! 

Y'all are going to DIE over Helene's bloody....

Oh. Em. Gee, right? Catch an ever more fab photo on her insta, here. 

We talked, we laughed, we bored Michael to death with blog stuff... although I assume he was fully prepared to deal with that. It was a perfect afternoon of catching up with my long lost Dallas pal.

After having just the most awesome weekend with fantastic friends, it was time to head home. Going home was certainly easier though, knowing I'd have my boyfriend's smiling face waiting to pick me up! 

On another note, thanks you guys for inviting me to be your friend on fitbit! I now have so many people to follow, and even accepted invites to a couple of challenges which is really cool. I'm going to end this day by setting some very specific goals for the week:

1. Track Weight Watchers every day this week
2. No booze allowed until Friday
3. Hit the gym 4 times this week
4. Cook all meals at home during the work week. 

So far, after making it through Monday, I'm 4 for 4 including avoiding National Margarita Day.... *Snaps for Sarah*