Our Week with Tinsley-Day One and Day Two

Saturday afternoon after Jameson's party, Josh and I drove down to New Orleans so we could go to the Garth Brooks concert. Back in June when the tickets went on sale, I was at my computer at the designated time trying to get good tickets to the show. Everyone else in the world apparently was doing the same thing because I wasn't able to get tickets to the show I wanted, the Saturday show at 7 o'clock. That show ended up selling out but lucky for us they added a show that started at 10:30 that night. Yeah, 10:30, at night. Now I'm a night owl, but Josh normally goes to bed when Eli does at 8:00 every night. We knew that it was going to be a stretch for him, but I'm happy to say he made it and so did I. The concert was amazing! Garth Brooks did all of his old stuff and it was so much fun to sing along back like we did during the 90's. It made me miss the good ole days when country music was still truly country. Now I sound like I'm ancient :) The concert started at 11:00 and we didn't leave the arena until 2:00 that morning. Garth Brooks sang and played his heart out for 3 solid hours and it was worth every minute of it (and don't forget he did a show before ours!). We drove back to our hotel and crashed!

Pretty fun night with Garth Brooks at the Smoothie Center in New Orleans.

The next morning we had a late brunch at IHOP and then we headed back to my mom and dad's house. Josh went on back home because he had to be at work the next day, but Eli and I stayed at my parent's house for a couple more days because Tinsley was going to stay with us for the week! Josh and Andrea were leaving for the Dominican Republic to celebrate their 5th wedding anniversary so I agreed to keep Tinsley for a week. Jameson went to stay with Andrea's parents. We had lots of fun having little missy prissy around and honestly, I hope I can get her to come stay at least once every summer from now on. It's fun having another girl in the house :)

We started our fun week with Tinsley by going to see the Minions movie with Grammy and Pop Sunday night. It was completely ridiculous and didn't make any sense but Eli cackled with laughter the entire time so I guess it's safe to say he enjoyed it. 

The next morning Grammy and Pop went to work so Eli, Tinsley, and I made plans to go to the splash park that morning. Both of the kids had lots of fun splashing and playing at the park!

We grabbed some Chick-fil-A after the splash park and they got to play on the playground a little after their lunch.

After lunch we went to Josh and Andrea's house so Tinsley could nap in her own bed and so I could check on their fur babies, Brody Jack and Tinkerbell. Caleb, my youngest brother, was going to stay at Josh and Andrea's house while they were gone to watch the dogs, but he wasn't going to get home for lunch to let them out on this particular day so I volunteered. As you can see Brody wasn't worried about where his parents were at all. While Tinsley napped, Eli and I had some down time as well and we all got some much needed rest. 

We had plans to meet my mom at the zoo after she got off work that day, but when we drove out there we found out we'd looked at the wrong time and they were closing up. UGH! We made a quick change in plans and let the kids ride the carousel before going back to Grammy and Pop's house. 

After Pop got off work, we had supper at Izzo's since it was kids night! Whoop! Whoop! They had a balloon artist there making balloons for the kids, so Eli and Tinsley both picked out a cool balloon for the man to create. 

After supper, we went back to Grammy and Pop's house to watch the movie, "The Shakiest Gun in the West." My brothers and I LOVED that movie as kids so I was happy to see that Eli loved it as well. Tinsley was just there for the popcorn :) The movie ended and we all crashed. It had been a long and busy day and it was going to be lots of fun tomorrow!

Graceland

Since our race was canceled, we decided to make the most of our mini-vacation to Memphis. The town of Memphis worked with the race officials for St. Jude and offered LOTS of discounts to touristy-type events for all the runners that had traveled to the city for the St. Jude race. I thought that was incredibly nice of them to take care of us like that! One of the places that runners could get a discount was Graceland, so we all loaded up and went to visit the place Elvis once called home. 

I had actually been to Graceland before when I was a baby, but I have ZERO recollection of it (obviously). It was neat to see where this mega super star once lived and worked.

Living room

This was the part of the house that was closed off to visitors. The audio guide said that Elvis always greeted his guests on the stairs and they were never allowed upstairs where his bedroom was. He wanted to keep part of his life private. Poor guy probably never got a moments peace. 

Priscilla and Lisa Marie

Dining room

Kitchen

Media room

Billard room

Jungle room

This was called the Hall of Gold.

Racquetball room that was converted to his trophy room after he died.

The entire Presley family is buried on the grounds. 

It wasn't how we intended for our race weekend to go, but we still had fun! After this we left and had some AMAZING Memphis barbecue at Central BBQ. Oh my word. It was DELICIOUS! We'll definitely go to that place again! The rest of our weekend was spent relaxing, shopping, and having fun. We can't wait to go back to Memphis again next year, but this time it'll be to run the half-marathon! Fingers crossed starting now for no bad weather!!