10th Anniversary

 

As previously mentioned, Joel and I celebrated our 10th anniversary on January 1, 2011. We've been saving up for a few years so we could actually afford something besides a dinner and a movie. Since my husband is a student pharmacist and I'm a stay-at-home mom, staying two nights in the Opryland Hotel is extravagant for us!

Actually, we started off our little excursion with a couples massage at the Nurture Nook. Not only is it much more reasonably priced than Opryland's Relache Spa, we also have been there once before and had had a good experience then. Once again, we had wonderful massages which was a great way to start our relaxing weekend.

When we got to Opryland, they told us that they were very booked for the weekend- not exactly surprising since it was New Years weekend! They asked if we minded if they upgraded the view for our room. Not a problem! Instead of viewing the parking lot, this was the view from our room:



Here's the daytime view:


On New Years' Eve we wandered for awhile, but the Delta Island where the main free festivities were happening was so crowded that we headed back to our room well before midnight. We turned on Dick Clark's New years' Rockin' Eve to watch the ball drop, and since our room overlooked Delta Island, we were able to open our windows and listen for the countdown at the hotel, too. It was great!

On New Years' Day we slept in which was so nice since we're used to having kids wake us up as soon as the sun starts to shine! We took our time getting ready and then headed down and ate at Stax Burgers. They had no issues at all in dealing with my gluten intolerance. The receipt even had "Gluten Allergy-Change gloves" printed on it it large letters.

After that we left the hotel and toodled around Nashville for half the day. Unfortunately, very little was opened. I had hoped to go to the Frist, but it was even closed. We had planned to stay out until dinner, but we were bored so we headed back to the hotel where we wandered some more and also took naps/read. I got a Kindle for Christmas so I was set with reading material.

For dinner we ended up going to Findley's Irish Pub. I had done my research about restaurants before the weekend so I would know the best places to dine with gluten-free menus. I was excited because Findley's had several yummy-sounding options on their online GF menu. I was sorely disappointed when we got there only to find that their menu had completely changed. Thankfully our sever was knowledgeable about what was GF, but the options were VERY limited. I ended up getting a half of a roasted chicken which was very tasty but not exactly what I had planned to get. Oh well! The Irish Pub music was fun. It reminded me of the Irish drinking song game on Who's Line Is It Anyway?





After checking out on Sunday we had hoped to go to Fiddlecakes, but it ended up being closed for the weekend. We're thinking about going there for my birthday since it didn't work out for our anniversary. It'd be wonderful not to have to bake my own birthday cake!

Click here for more photos from the weekend.