We just returned home to Atlanta after a really fun weekend in Nashville. It started off terribly, but improved significantly once we actually made it to Nashville.  We left Friday afternoon around 5:30, which meant rush hour… in Atlanta… on Good Friday.  That was a pretty bad choice.  We were stuck in traffic basically the entire time and the 3.5 hour drive ended up taking 5.5 hours.  It was awful and made us stressed and frazzled and we nearly turned around twice.  Riley picked up on our mood, too, so he cried quite a bit at the beginning of the journey (which made us even more frazzled and stressed).  Plus, he experienced the unfortunate phenomenon one of my books calls the “45 minute intruder”: after taking a full feeding, 45 minutes later he’s hungry again (very hungry) and takes another full feeding, despite being acclimated to an every-three-hour feeding schedule.  We stopped once we passed the worst of the traffic, fed the baby, fed ourselves, and took a few minutes to just breathe.  After that the drive progressed much more smoothly, though we still faced quite a bit of traffic.  Nevertheless, we did eventually make it and let Riley play with George and Linda, as they were leaving early the next morning to go to Gatlinburg.  Riley stayed up way too late and it completely disrupted his sleep schedule that night, but he had a good time seeing his grandparents and smiled a lot.  He is a big fan of George’s mustache.

Our weekend was packed with visits with friends, including some we hadn’t seen in years.  Andy had a mini-reunion of sorts with several of his friends from high school, where we all got to sit, hang out, and catch up.  Many of us are at the point in our lives where we’re reaching important milestones – getting married, finishing up graduate school, buying homes, and having children.  For example, WaiYin and Andy are both a year away from being called “doctor,” while Chris isn’t far behind them (though each of them will have different degrees – MD, DDS, and PhD, respectively).  WaiYin (and Jan) and Andrew (and Tanya) were both recently engaged and are now involved in the wedding planning process, while Lisa was recently married.  And of course, we just had Riley.  They’re exciting times for all of us, so being able to come together despite our busy schedules was a lot of fun.

The main reason we went to Nashville for the weekend, though, was for Rishab and Suruchi’s wedding reception, which was Saturday night.  Andy and Rishab have been friends since they were six years old (last time we hung out they spent about ten minutes trying to count back that far).  There are very few stories Andy has from being a kid that don’t involve Rishab, so when we found out he was getting married we desperately wanted to go to his wedding (especially since it’s an Indian wedding and they are SO much fun!).  The only problem was they were getting married February 20th in Thailand.  My due date was February 14th, so there was no way a trip to Thailand would be in the cards under any circumstances for us.  Thankfully, they were having a reception in Nashville afterward for those who could not attend.  We were glad we could go and were more than willing to make the drive up to Nashville for it.  Thank goodness we didn’t turn around after that awful drive up because we had a wonderful time at the reception.  We enjoyed cocktails and appetizers, a great buffet of Indian food, conversation with old friends, sweet toasts and beautiful cultural dances.  Riley slept through the vast majority of the party, but did wake up enough to enjoy a turn around the dance floor with his mom and dad.  He was ENTRANCED by Suruchi’s dress, which was honestly the most beautiful sari I have EVER seen.  There were sparkles everywhere and his eyes stayed focused on her dress, practically without blinking.  Riley was a big hit at the reception, being the youngest one there.  Around 11:00, we realized that Riley’s sleep schedule would be thrown off even more if we stayed out any later, so we (somewhat grudgingly) returned home and did not end up dancing the night away (as we might have in our “younger days”).

The next morning was Easter Sunday and before I extrapolate on our holiday plans I need to take a moment to talk about the frustrations of finding clothes that fit.  After being mistaken for a pregnant women half a dozen times now, I’m petrified any time I leave the house and know I’ll be interacting with people.  Though I know looks aren’t everything, it still totally sucks when someone pretty much calls you fat.  With a wedding reception and Easter brunch looming, I had to find something, anything, that would work.  I tried on every skirt, dress, and dressy outfit in my closet, both maternity and pre-pregnancy.  Nothing looked appropriate for the outside world.  A few weeks ago we picked up a black dress (for Andy’s birthday dinner) that I decided would have to work for the reception.  It’s the only thing that fits and didn’t ‘t make me look like a cow, but black is so not appropriate for Easter.  That meant I still had to find something else to wear to brunch today so it wouldn’t look like I’m in mourning.  I may have lost 35 pounds now, but that also means I’m still carrying another twenty which have got to go, so dress shopping is still dreadfully depressing.  I often look in the mirror and start feeling good about how I look – then I see the pictures that have been taken recently and realize that our mirrors at home must just be very flattering.  Sure enough, I found a dress that I figured would work and bought it without trying it on, hoping for the best.  The reason I opted not to try it on was twofold: first, there was a huge line for the dressing rooms and I wasn’t in the mood to wait.  Second, for the first time I was able to button my pre-pregnancy jeans (though I had to eventually unbutton them and use a belly band, as my tummy then flopped over my waistband, but it was still a mini-triumph to get the darn things to button).  I was afraid lightning wouldn’t strike twice and if I took the jeans off, they wouldn’t come back on.  When I finally tried the dress on this morning I was thrilled to find out that not only did it fit, but it also looked nice.

Once I was dressed, we headed over to the Opryland Hotel.  Our plans were simple – brunch and pictures with the Easter bunny.  I love, love, love Sunday brunch (it’s always been my favorite dining experience) and Opryland’s is quite good, plus they had the Easter bunny available for photos.  I had two major revelations while at brunch today.  The first was that brunch buffets are the best places to take nursing babies.  I was able to grab a plate of food and eat it all, then took a break to feed Riley, then hopped right back in the buffet lines.  It was so nice knowing my food would not get cold while I fed my son (and if it did, I could just get more), as it so often does when his feeding schedule fails to coincide with my meal times.  The second revelation was less of a revelation and more of a creation of a dress code.  For holiday brunches, it is really not appropriate to wear cutoff camo cargo shorts, a dirty, untucked t-shirt, and flip flops.  Andy and I felt that the minimum should be khakis; also, if you’re a man, the shirt must be tucked in.  Frankly, the little kids were dressed better than the adults in most cases.  Don’t show up to family buffets looking like you’re going fishing, like you’re going to a punk concert, or like you’re going to go mow the lawn.  It just isn’t acceptable.  You would be surprised at some of the outfits we saw parading around the Opryland Hotel.  Moving on… the food was great and Riley scored a pretty decent picture with the Easter bunny which I can hopefully scan in and add to the blog.

This week promises to be quite a bit quieter than last, though my birthday is coming up at the end of the week.  I’m not sure what we’ll be doing (or if I’m even excited about it), but I know Andy wants me to really celebrate since I spend so much of my time taking care of my two men and not a lot of time taking care of myself.  While I ruminate on birthday plans, enjoy these pictures from our weekend – most notably the ones of Riley in his amazing Easter outfit, courtesy of the store Janie and Jack. The smiles are frequent now and I am finally starting to capture them on film.