Ahhhhhh. Back.

We had such a good weekend away!  Ohmygoodness, it was relaxing and wonderful.

We made it to Asheville by dinnertime and went to Tupelo Honey Cafe to eat.  It was quaint, crowded, smelled yummy (southern comfort meets modern food), and tasted delish.  My only complaint was that they were out of their signature rosemary peach lemonade.  How dare they?!

We spent the evening explorng a little of downtown Asheville, where they had a bunch of Bohemian-like college kids and locals playing drums and guitars and anything else that would make a noise all gathered around Prichard Park.  It was way cool and a little weird :)  After that, Bryan kicked my butt at Rummy 500 several times, we sat in front of the fireplace, and I almost flooded the jacuzzi tub by putting too much bubble bath in.  Oops.

Saturday we slept in until ALMOST 10AM!!  The only downside was that someone upstairs from us did a lot of pacing or something and we kept hearing their footsteps above.  It was easier to ignore than a baby monitor, though.

We went back to Tupelo Honey Cafe for breakfast because a.) I wanted that darn lemonade and b.) the breakfast menu had looked yummy when we were there the night before.  We weren't disappointed-- another awesome meal and fun atmosphere.  And the lemonade was worth it.

After another quick game of Rummy (lost again), we went to the Biltmore Estate and toured the gigantic home for a couple hours.  If you've never been there, I would highly recommend it if you are in the mood to feel small and unimpressive.  We tasted some wines from their winery, and shopped some in the very breakable gift shop.

Since I dragged Bryan all around for cultural things that day, he got to choose the evening activity:  driving to the Cherokee reservation to the Harrah's casino.  We had fun losing money (well, I was up on the nickel and penny slots, but someone lost 60 bucks on a bad run on the pennies.)  They didn't have any craps, and there was a waiting list for the poker tables, so Bryan didn't get to lose money on any of the stuff that he really likes.  Oh, well.  We will just have to go back to Vegas sometime...

Sunday we slept in again (yay!) and went back to our favorite restuarant ever for brunch (and more lemonade) and sat outside afterwards to watch some fun freaks in Prichard Park doing some sort of circus-thing.  Then we took a drastic turn to the conservative and went back to the Biltmore to check out their farm.

And then we came home, to two happy boys (well, Chase was a little sick, but cuddly, and Ian couldn't have cared less that we were home, he was having so much fun playing hockey outside when we pulled in) and two tired grandparents (it's ok- we sent them home with a bottle of wine!).

We are well rested and refreshed.  And it was nice to be away, but strange, too- so I'm glad to be back.  Those kids kind of just burrow themselves right into your heart when you aren't looking :)