We had a week where not much went as planned, but we got some much needed family time with our big girls! Leah was sick early in the week and then we road tripped Wednesday to Nashville to meet up with my childhood best friend.

Unfortunately, my best friend’s family ended up getting the stomach bug, and you guys know how much I despise the stomach bug, so they stayed put in Indiana and we saw Nashville on our own. Layne went to college at Belmont in Nashville, so I’d been before and was excited to go back.

The day before we left was a hard day with a sick Leah and I had a meltdown in the car. I sat in a parking lot and had an early lunch while crying. My new commute and where our childcare place isn’t great – I just have to make it through May and then we’re switching over my office and childcare to our local area out in the ‘burbs.

The next day we took Leah to my parents (she stayed with them, because there is no way I would be able to have a whining 20 month old in the car for hours) and the rest of us drove 6 hours to Conway, Arkansas to meet our new niece, Zoey! Jo and Ella have been wanting sleeping bags for a very long time and were pumped we finally got some. Cutie cousins trying out the sleeping bags…

Donut family date in the morning before saying bye and driving the next 6 hours to Nashville. I’ve been loving glazed old-fashioned donuts lately. Sleepy eyes for all.

For the roadtrip I found these seat pillows for the girls and they were a hit for making them feel cozy and for keeping them contained (a bit) and from hitting each other (not 100% effective, but I think it cut down on the fighting a smidge). It was funny to see, once Andrew pointed it out, that the girls would go in cycles of 1: ignoring each other, 2: fighting with one another (“don’t look at me!!”), 3: best friends playing a game with each other…and then repeat.

We had a lot of car snacks:

Frozen lemonade.

One day Ella really wanted pizza for lunch. We were in the middle of nowhere and all of the sudden a pizza place popped up on a highway sign, so we went and it was surprisingly good for gas station pizza!

Ella was so happy lol

Made it to Nashville! We took the girls to hear live music, but the singer was sick and didn’t show. Bummer! The girls were sad. I think they thought it was going to be Taylor Swift lol. We had dinner and dessert. I loved the light fixtures in this place and the pop of pink behind the bar.

The next morning we went and waited in line for…Pancake Pantry!

Jo doesn’t love every food, but she adores pancakes and hot chocolate! She was so happy here.

I got banana bread pancakes and they were fabulous.

After walking around the Country Music Hall of Fame, we went to Lucky Ladd Farm and the kids loved it.

We fed goats, fed birds, made nature wands, slid down huge slides, picked berries…it was a great afternoon. Here’s my favorite Girl Dad with said nature wands.

Burgers for lunch.

After resting (aka sitting in the hotel pool while the kids with unlimited energy swam), we went to California Pizza Kitchen for dinner and I was surprised how good it was. Pizza + Sangria. I wanna recreate their white wine sangria for summer – it was perfect.

The next day it was already time to head home, but we stopped at Honest Coffee Roasters and had the best coffee we’ve maybe ever had. IT WAS AMAZING.

Easily the best latte of my life. I got The First Lady, which was espresso + milk + house-made vanilla bean & almond syrup. There aren’t many places I visit that I feel like I could live, but I really liked Franklin, TN. For anyone local, we went to the Honest Coffee at The Factory. They had a Farmers Market I wish we could’ve hung around for, but we needed to get on the road.

Acai Bowl too.

Then we loaded up and headed home, with several food stops along the way.

This was our first time coming home after a trip to our new home. Felt good.