This weekend started out on Wednesday night when Chris & I met Pete & Sarah at O’Garas in St Paul to play Bridge. Sarah played Bridge in college and has been teaching the rest of us how to play. We were surprised how busy the bar was, but I guess everyone else had decided to start the holiday early! It was fun & I think we’re getting better!

Thursday night we met up with our friend Bill at Buster’s. Bill, who moved to San Francisco earlier this year, is in town for the holidays and we were glad to have time to hang out with him! Tia & Nate met up with us too and along with one of Bill’s co-workers we all ended up back at Chris’s house playing Guitar Hero. It was a fun night.

Friday night Chris and I went to Kinh Do for dinner with TJ & Erica before going to the Holiday show at Brave New Workshop. Kinh Do is a favorite of Tj, Erica, and Chris but I had never eaten there. The food was good and the service was excellent. The holiday show at BNW was really funny. Chris & I have enjoyed seeing a few of their productions this year and we are never disappointed. If you’re interested in going, Chris found TC Tix which is a place you can find discount tickets. The only difference from ordering directly through BNW is that you get general admission seating & you have to pick the tickets up at a Macy’s store.

On Saturday I went up to meet my mom for lunch (we went to Mad Jack’s) before going downtown to see Minnesota Dance Theatre Presents Loyce Houlton’s “Nutcracker Fantasy”. We decided to leave the guys at home which was better for everyone I think! Mom & I enjoyed the ballet. The Nutcracker Suite is such a neat story watching the little girl’s dreams. Oh, to be a kid again!

I went to Nashville in early December for a class and Chris was able to fly out for a weekend of live music & tourism at it’s best. The class, Business Analyst Boot Camp, was fine and I have a couple books that I can read for further learning. The weekend, however, was FUN!

Chris flew into Nashville on Thursday evening. As soon as he got a rental car and arrived at the hotel we headed down to Lower Broadway for dinner & some music. We had dinner at Broadway Brewhouse (aka Mojo Grill) before heading up the street a ways to meet one of my classmates at Legends Corner. The band there was playing pretty good music and Jeff had secured a table so we hung out there for a while. The walls at Legends were covered with album covers (seriously, COVERED) and they had everyone from old country stars to current country stars to Michael Jackson & Kiss. I decided that there just had to be a Prince album cover up in the bar somewhere so I started looking all over. Unfortunately, I was wrong. No Prince! I can’t believe it! Anyway, around midnight we decided to check out one more bar before calling it a night. We walked down the street to The Stage on Broadway. The music at The Stage was more country than the first bar, but I enjoyed it. One drink later we were ready to call it a night so we headed back to the hotel. Chris was lucky enough to be able to sleep in, but I had to get up & go to class! Luckily, Friday was a partial day and actually I wasn’t too tired.

Friday night we met up with my cousin Matt & his wife Kelly. They met as students at Vanderbilt University and were married in August 2005. Matt & Kelly still live in Nashville and they were willing to entertain us for one of our nights in town. They recommended the Bluebird Cafe for some live music. We had dinner at the Yellow Porch which is a great restaurant in an area of town that maybe isn’t so great. The food was delish & it was so nice to catch up with Kelly & Matt. It had probably been 2 years since I had seen them (at my sister’s wedding)! The Bluebird Cafe was amazing. It is a place where songwriters meet to perform their songs. We saw In The Round with Thom Schuyler, Fred Knobloch, Don Schlitz and Jelly Roll Johnson. “In the Round” is a group of 4 songwriters sitting in a circle in the middle of the bar (surrounded very intimately by patrons of the bar). Each person takes a turn playing one of their songs. The most famous song we heard was The Gambler which was written by Don Schlitz & made famous by Kenny Rogers. Mr. Schlitz also wrote Kenny Roger’s The Greatest which is one of my favorite songs & we got to hear it! The other song I recognized immediately was Alison Krauss’sWhen You Say Nothing at All. We didn’t recognize a lot of the other songs, but all 3 songwriters (accompanied by Jelly Roll Johnson on harmonica) were fun to listen to.

Saturday morning we slept in & headed to Waffle House for breakfast. I swear, Waffle House must be the sign of the South, they are everywhere! Since it was raining out we decided to go to the Country Music Hall of Fame. There were pieces of clothing & instruments from the beginning of country/western music. We saw the fiddle used in Charlie Daniel’s Band’s The Devil Went Down to Georgia and cars owned by Webb Pierce & Elivs. The special exhibit at the HoF was Ray Charles which was neat to see too. After the museum we decided to head to Broadway & see what the live music scene was like at 3:30PM on a Saturday. We had one drink before taking off for our next destination…The Opryland Hotel. We had heard from Matt & Kelly as well as other friends that the holiday lights at the Opryland were great. In addition, I had found out about a holiday tradition in Nashville, ICE!, (a story told with ice sculptures) which I wanted to see. We ended up making it to the ICE! exhibit which was the Grinch story, but after fighting traffic to get there (it shared a parking lot with the Opry Mills shopping center) we decided to skip the hotel & instead get ready for a night on Broadway. For dinner on Saturday we went to Rippy’s and saw Townsend O’donnell play (they have a song on the radio…Cowboys’ Want it (Cowgirls Got It)). After dinner we went to Tootsies and rocked out with a band upstairs before listening to a song our two downstairs and moving on. Next we went to Second Fiddle. It seemed to be time for all the bands to be switching out but we hear d a couple songs before it was time to move on to another bar. We see a bunch of college students dressed up in “holiday sweater” type outfits at Second Fiddle which was funny. After Second Fiddle we went to Layla’s Bluegrass Inn which is where we finished off the night. The first group we saw was just wrapping up, but the lead singer was hanging from the ceiling at one point during the song. He gave a rave review for the next group so we decided to check them out. It was Heath Haynes and the Four Dollars playing and the had a fiddle player and an amazing lead guitar. We looked them up when we got home & Rich Gilbert is the lead guitar. He was so fun to watch & listen to! Anyway, we ended up staying there until we were ready to call it a night. Even though it was pouring rain off and on all night we definitely enjoyed ourselves!

Sunday we slept in again, but were ready to check out of the hotel by about 11. We went and had lunch at B.B. Kings downtown before heading out to tour President Andrew Jackson’s home, The Hermitage. It was interesting to learn about his life, his wife, the slaves that worked on the huge plantation, and the fact that Mr. Jackson preferred to be called General even after being President. He and his wife were buried on the grounds in her garden and even on his headstone it read “General Andrew Jackson”

I’d recommend a trip to Nashville for anyone who enjoys live music or country music or live country music! I really think everyone could enjoy their time in the Music City. If you want to see more pictures, you can click here.

So, getting a house ready to put on the market is a lot of work! I’m lucky enough to be moving in with Chris so I can de-clutter by moving some of my stuff over to his place. In addition we have both been cleaning things out & taking stuff over to Savers and getting rid of it. There are still duplicates of things but I think we can fit all of the stuff we want to keep into the house he owns!

In addition to cleaning out, we decided to take the wallpaper off in the bathroom. Ugh. I am very, VERY lucky that Chris has been an amazing help. He actually took almost all of the wallpaper off by himself while I was doing some of the packing. This Sunday we finally began with priming and painting. We choose a neutral color so hopefully anyone who’s looking at my place will see a room that they can do whatever they want with. Our trip to Nashville has put a temporary hold on the project but when we get home the final coat will be put on the walls & then everything can be put back into place.

I am meeting with a Realtor next Tuesday and will possibly have an appointment with another Realtor that week. I’m hoping to list my condo shortly after New Years. If you know of anyone who’s interested in a 1BR Condo in Burnsville, let me know!

I was lucky enough to be offered free tickets to a second Vikings game this past Sunday. As people who likes to keep busy & do different things (plus we’re cheap and free = awesome!), Chris & I jumped on the chance to see another game. We figured that the first game we saw this year (my first game ever) we didn’t get to see the Vikes new star, Adrian Peterson, and this game was key as it was against our rival, the Detroit Lions so we knew it would be fun.

My friend Nicole works for Boys & Girls Club and they had been given so many tickets they couldn’t find club kids to use them all so she sent a message out to a group of her friends. We were sitting in section 220, almost exactly opposite of our seats from the other game so we had a little bit different view. This was another Vikings WIN so I guess that makes me a good luck charm, but unfortunately for the Vikings I don’t plan to go to any more games. Although, if I’m offered more free tickets I may consider it…I always thought that live football wouldn’t be as good as it can be on TV, but I’ve changed my mind. It’s a different kind of game to watch. For example, we would have liked to have seen instant replay from every angle for an interception the Vikes made, but it didn’t ruin the game that we couldn’t see it. The fact that you’re on your own for catching all of the plays gives the game a different element of fun too. So…Thanks Nicole!

VIKINGS WIN 42-10!

Has anyone heard of this Twitter craze? There are quite a few people with Raw Foods blogs that have signed up and say it’s really fun. Thoughts? If you have an account, look me up: nikkilynn. I’m not sure how it all works yet, or if I’ll even use it but you never know until you try, right?!

According to the email they sent me when I signed up…

The New York Times calls Twitter “one of the fastest-growing phenomena on the Internet.” TIME Magazine says, “Twitter is on its way to becoming the next killer app,” and Newsweek noted that “Suddenly, it seems as though all the world’s a-twitter.”

If you’re not signed up yet but want to keep in touch with brief updates periodically I think you should create an account and we can see if it’s fun or not!

My mom sent me information about a Yahoo powered search site that donates $.01 per search to a good cause. The search site is www.GoodSearch.com and my mom was wondering if it was legit. I did a search on the Better Business Bureau site & it looks like it’s real to me. Has anyone heard of this before? I would be interested in hearing if anyone has had an experience with this site or any like it before.

I think about the number of searches I do in the Google box that appears in FireFox next to the address bar and I believe that I could easily raise $50 a year for the school if that was an option there. I have decided to keep a link to the search page and use it when I think of it, but I know it won’t be for ALL my searches.

If anyone is interested in supporting an Elementary school in a northwest suburb of Minneapolis, click here and type ‘Birch Grove’ in the Who Do You GoodSearch For box before clicking verify.