Sundays

More often than not the girls and I go out to eat after church on Sundays. (Russ too, if he's home of course!) Now that is definitely not the type of Sunday dinner I grew up with. Mom apparently didn't think feeding 6 kids every day was enough, so on Sundays she always invited a bunch of other people over, too. We would have pot roast, or fried chicken with steaming platters of vegetables... classic Southern Sunday fare.

New generation, new tradition. These days we often eat at the Sombrero, the little mom and pop Mexican food place up the hill from our church. We call it 'The Hat', as in, "Wanna hit the Hat for lunch on the way home?" We each have our favorites; Madi likes the chimichanga, I always get a tamale with a side of guacamole, and Charlotte gets a side of Spanish rice with a large order of queso dip which she proceeds to pour over the rice and calls it lunch. That child has never met a white food she doesn't like. After a steady Sunday diet of The Hat, we kind of burned out on it (no pun intended-- it's actually really good food!) and switched over to a Mongolian stir-fry place a couple of blocks away. Healthier probably, though Charlo still managed to pair (white) chicken with (white) noodles only, until I started placing pieces of broccoli in her bowl accompanied by one of my patented stern sideways glances. Yeah, the girls don't buy those looks from me either but they pretend to, bless them.

A few weeks ago I suddenly remembered that the reason the main thoroughfare by our church is called Nolensville Road is because about 10 minutes down that road there is one of those great little Southern towns I love to visit-- Nolensville, TN. Back in the day (B.K.-- 'before kids') I used to occasionally drive out to a charming little local coffee place there and then go poke around in some of the shops, but it's been a few years since I've done that. The town is so small it doesn't have a town square, just a handful of stores on either side of the main street but I had recently heard they now had a fabulous barbeque restaurant that people SWORE was the best ever, so I thought we ought to maybe check it out. We Southerners take our barbeque verrrrrry seriously, and the comparative merits of the many different varieties of 'que  available in each town can be very hotly contested-- churches and families have split down the middle over these kinds of things, folks. So I figured Martins Barbeque Joint definitely merited a visit. We started with take-out, which was indeed REALLY GOOD, and a couple of days later Madi and I headed back to Nolensville by ourselves and discovered some darling shops:  Three French Hens,  Village Antiques, The Roost and a great Amish country store called The Feed Mill. We were in heaven, this is totally our cuppa tea-- the prices were so reasonable and there was so much to look at that we were able to take our time wandering around and found all kinds of little treasures that didn't break the bank. Then at the first of this month Russ actually had a rare weekend off, so after church we invited our pastors Danny and Jill Chambers and their very cool offspring Sydni, Isaac and darling Destiny to join us at Martins where we proceeded to get down and greasy with a 'que feast. It was so much fun that this Sunday after church the girls and I got in the car, took one look at each other and chorused, "Martins!" And away we went.

Now you should know that for all of my talking about 'antiquing with the girls,' that usually just means Madi and I (or Madi, my sisters and I when we're in Arkansas.) Charlotte... not so much. I mean, she occasionally goes with us, and she's been raised right so she doesn't complain the whole time but to be fair it's never really been her thing. Until, possibly, NOW. I think she may have hit that magic age where putzing around antique shops sounds like something to do instead of something to endure-- either that or