Tuesday, September 23, 2014

10 Reasons Why I Could Move to Nashville

1. The Food.
This place has seriously the best pancakes ever. The Sugar and Spice pancakes with the cinnamon cream syrup are dream worthy & big enough so we could split it. I was hoping to see some country celebs (since they love it) there but no such luck. We actually got it to go and sat on a perfect little shaded bench across the way. I found tons of places I wanted to eat at so I guess its a good thing we don't live there because I would be as big as a house. 
2. The live music.

I guess this goes along with the food category too because oh my gosh, the chicken and waffles at Pucketts...SO. GOOD. I wanted the chicken recipe bad. Inside it was just as charming as outside with its rustic urban feel. More lights went through the restaurant and it was packed. We lucked out with one of the tables closest to the stage and got a perfect view of the showcase going on. All the artists were amazing. I could totally see us doing that every week. P.S.-Can you find where my man Luke B signed that guitar?! It was one of the many guitars with country celebs autographs.
3. Everyone is a dog person.
Everyone stopped to meet Murphy, or compliment Murphy or something along those lines. When we were wandering the most perfect boutiques the store owners all told us that everyone was dog friendly and the dogs were allowed in the stores as well. Well thats a first...I could totally get used to having Murphy as my shopping bud. Here's a picture of Murphy at the park there and if you can't tell by the picture, he was having the time of his life.
4. It's picturesque. 
The first picture is from one of the side roads near downtown and the second is at a park we stopped at but everywhere we went it was just gorgeous. The first day we arrived I was kinda like "this is it?"when I saw downtown but when we started wandering all around I fell in love. It helped that the weather was nothing short of perfect either. 
5. The Parthenon
Nashville has a full scale replica of the Parthenon in Athens...who does that? SO COOL. It was just in the middle of this park and it was beautiful.
6. "You're the only 10 I see"
Ever since I can remember I have wanted to go to Nashville. My best friend Heather and I would picture ourselves sippin lemonade and all the cowboys would come up to us and say "Are you from Tennessee? Because you're the only 10 I see" She texted Lyle to tell him to say it to me while we were there and it was hilarious. If we lived here Lyle could most definitely throw that pickup line at me everyday and I wouldn't even complain. I also really wanted to reenact my whole Footloose dream where I go looking like Julianne Hough did but we will have to save that for another day...
7. Country Music Hall of Fame
Caitlin Fun Fact: Alan Jackson was the first concert I ever went to. I was in Elementary school & I stood on my chair and sang every single word to every single song and surprisingly I still can see him singing on the stage and thinking we had some pretty sweet seats. Great memory, which is why I'm posting this not the most flattering picture of myself for your viewing. You're welcome.
Lyles said this made the whole tour worth it haha.
In general there was a lot of stuff to do in Nashville. A lot of it pertaining to one of my favorite things of all time, country music. The Hall of Fame was pretty cool and I loved learning more about it. I really could sum up this point with I love having a city all about it and knowing most people there like it just as much as I do. 
8. LB lives here
Yes, I did just make this my number 8. 
9. Jenis Splendid Icecream
To say that my husband simply likes icecream would be a huge understatement. I would go as far as to say he is an icecream fanatic. When discussing treat options he without fail suggests icecream first every single time, so after stumbling upon this icecream shop with TONS of unique and fun flavors I knew Lyle would be all for it. And he was. He got a peach pie flavor and a blackberry cobbler...or something similar to those and he even was kind enough to share! SO good. 
10. Nashvilles got it
New York is my favorite city so far. I could visit it all the time and never get sick of it but I don't think I could ever live there. Weird statement for a girl who loves a place so much right? Nashville isn't overcrowded, its absolutely beautiful, the people are great and the music/food scene is on point. I no longer want to move there to "get discovered" as I used to sometimes say but now I could move there with my little family and be perfectly content in. Something about the Southern states always pulls me in...could be the accents, the slower pace of life or that I just dream of having little southern belle babies. I can't wait to go back and see a show at the Opry aka Ryman auditorium, take a backstage tour, try the Cupcake Collection, eat at the Loveless Cafe, roadtrip to Dollyworld...the possibilities are endless but I guess I'll have a lot to tell ya about once we move there ;)

Love, Cait

Thursday, September 18, 2014

Hello Goodbye Utah

We got to take a trip to Utah for a couple days this week & I'm missing it so much already. I LOVE Utah. Recently Heather reminded me how much I did not want to "get stuck" in Utah when I first moved out here & now I hate to leave it. I would love to build a southern style dream home with beautiful mountains as our backdrop here. Heres a picture overload from our short & sweet trip.

 We got to see lots of Lyles family, from Great Grandparents to Aunt Janet to Grandparents and more. It was so fun catching up with all of them after almost 5 months! We went because we had a lot of loose ends to tie up but we did lots of exploring, which is my favorite. I love hiking, being outdoors and going on adventures with my favorite person. I have a huge list of all the fun things we have to do in Utah and I'm glad we got to cross some things off.  I wanted to fit in some last minute Summer activities because the next time we are back in Utah it will be mid November and probably snowy. So we went up a bunch of canyons this trip...starting with AF canyon anddd it was beautiful
the lighting is off here but I still love this picture
We got to go play in Spanish Fork canyon with my in laws too & it was a blast. We went 4 wheeling up the canyon and had a mini picnic- it was seriously so fun
Rob photobombing us
I love this picture of Lyle w/ his cute parents!
Then Rob & Stace pointed out this little swing & we had to try it out. I'm feeling a little like Julia Roberts in Runaway Bride here.
Then we went to see one of Lyles closest friends new baby! Meet baby Elsie, only 10 days old!
She is absolute perfection. I just stared at her the whole time. And I know I say this everytime I post a picture of Lyle holding a baby, but he looks 10x hotter. Oh my goshhhh
Then we met up with my beautiful cousin who just started her first semester at BYU! I am so excited to have her so close to us because we absolutely love her! I've loved having a cousin so close to me growing up, we have so many similar interests and she's tons of fun. Our initial plan was the Cocoa Bean which is one of my favorite cupcake places but they ran out of cupcakes! What?! So Lyle took us to one of his favorite crepe places and it was super yummy!
Then the next morning we explored Payson canyon & hiked up to the Grotto. It was just a little hike but it was pretty cool!
Then we went and took our one year anniversary photos and I am seriously so excited to get them back!! I am dying of anticipation over here. After that we celebrated with an early anniversary dinner at the Tree Room up at Sundance. It was amazinggg. SUPER expensive so it's gonna be for extremely special occasions but it was such a perfect atmosphere. They took care of our dessert and the staff was the best that I have ever had. 
I miss home so much. I loved being back in my own bed and the perfect view from our window but I feel so blessed to have so many opportunities and such great family and friends around us. I wish we could have stayed a couple more days to fit in all the things we wanted to do and all the people we wanted to see but I am excited for whats next! This time next week we will be in Italy!! I will probably be posting lots with all thats coming up for us...esp some lovey pictures since its our one year and all coming up. Oh and heres one of Murphy because I missed him so!
Love, Cait