We're home! Vacation Part I

Wow, what a great trip! I popped in here and there while on our trip but didn't have a lot of time to do actual updating of the blog. We just got back from our anniversary trip to Asheville, NC! What a great trip! I may have to split it up into several posts, otherwise I may lose you partway through lol.

Friday:
We both got off work and met up at home where J ran around like a maniac packing his suitcase and backpack, and I stood back, packed the snacks, drinks, and odds and ends for the both of us. We do not travel light:

Our goal was to leave by 7pm...we ended up leaving closer to 7:30....we drove for about 45 minutes and stopped at Dairy Queen (as J says, where our 'courtship' began...which really means, is where we stopped for dinner with my Dad the first time I brought him home) :) So the nostalgia started up right away. And were back on the road by 8:30pm. We drove to Knoxville and stayed with J's friend D, his wife, and their baby boy B overnight. So great to see them that we stayed up til almost 2am talking and playing with the baby! I even changed his diaper and was so proud at my speed :)

Saturday:
We aimed to be on the road by 6am since we had a good 3ish more hours to drive to get to Asheville and wanted to get as much of the day in as possible. Reality: we were tired, and we ended up on the road closer to 8am..which in my opinion was fine, it was our vacation, we can be leisurely and in fact, those leisurely times were my favorites of the whole trip.

Anywho, we got into Asheville around 10:30am, and stumbled upon...a Farmer's Market!!! We LOVE Farmer's Markets and they had SO much cool stuff! Different tomatoes, squash, onions, cupcakes..yes...cupcakes...and yes, we split a mini one at 10:45am and it was DELICIOUS! Such light fluffy icing! Then we puttered around the Grove Arcade, which is like an area of shops/restaurants...and found...a used bookstore (shocker) :) J was lost in there for a while and I enjoyed it as well but wandered around the block. Then we went into another part of town for lunch...J, being the foodie that he is, had researched many restaurants...and Asheville is a real foodie area so you can get a lot of great food at a decent price...so we tried Luella's which is a lil BBQ joint (can't go away w/out bbq at some point) :)

Mom, you would have loved it, they had hula hoops and bean bag games at the front outside waiting area!
And I had my standard pulled chicken sandwich, with a side of collard greens and a small dollop of pimento cheese (warmed) which is typically an appetizer but I didn't want the whole thing so the waitress gave me a lil taste which was OUTSTANDING! If you know me, you know my long love of all things cheese and warmed pimento cheese was to-die-for! I ate it so fast I didn't get a pic!

J had his usual pulled pork and mac n' cheese....and a deviled egg..but I didn't even try it because my Grandma makes the BEST deviled eggs so I won't entertain any others lol :)

Then after lunch we went to Ultimate Ice Cream which is a well known ice cream chain in the area...they had a maple bacon ice cream..which J tried, but ended up with peach and me with vanilla.

Then we went to check into our awesome bed and breakfast....next post...

PS if you've kept with me for this long kudos and thank you :)