Lake Days

A number of years ago (I'm not even sure how many anymore), my family bought some lake property on Lake Hartwell.  Since then, it has been a favorite place for us to frequent.  Although we had the land for a while, my parents decided to hold out on building a house until the time was right.  FINALLY, a few years ago, we had a beautiful house on the lake to visit and spend a lot of memorable time together.

This past weekend, Will and I went to the lake with my family to prepare the boat for the summer days that are so close (it it would be sunny and warm for more than one day at a time!).

The weather was thankfully warm and sunny for one day, so we took advantage of being outside and got some sun!

 

 

THEN, one of the most exciting things happened (at least to us) :)...MY MOM CAUGHT A FISH!  Right in front of some fishermen that were fishing around our dock with their fancy boat.

 

 

Sunday was unfortunately cool and cloudy, so there was no outside time for us.  We ventured out to get some lunch at a local country club, then Will and I headed back to the ATL.  I love that the lake is so relaxing and such a wonderful place that is not too far away for a weekend getaway!

 



Favorite Restaurants

So far Will and I have been to several different restaurants in Atlanta.  I have been to a couple more than he has based on the fact that he works all week.

Some of my favorite restaurants so far have been:

The West Egg

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This restaurant is pretty much packed all the time.  Luckily, it is in an area called White Provisions that is within walking distance of our apartment.  My friend and I walked there the other morning for my first visit and I was very pleased!  They give you a ton of food for a pretty decent price.  The inside is very trendy and has an eating area, a coffee shop/dessert type area, and a bar area.  It also has a very nice patio, which we sat on since it was so nice that morning.  Service was great as well!

Park Tavern

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This patio says it all!! It is such a cozy, fun atmosphere.  We ate here last weekend and the weather was PERFECT!  It overlooks a lot of Piedmont Park as well as the buildings on Peachtree/W Peachtree Street.  The food was delicious and very reasonably priced.  Will got a very yummy burger and I had a grilled chicken salad.  I can't even tell you what the inside of the restaurant looked like because I didn't even bother to look.  It is a place where you definitely want to sit outside!

Front Page News

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Front Page News is another restaurant with an incredible patio (can you tell I enjoy eating outside when the weather is nice??).  The restaurant has a New Orleans/Mardi Gras theme so it has some great cajun food! The first time I went I had a greek chicken sandwich that was sooo good!  The last time I went last week with some friends, I had a muffalatta sandwich.  It was ok, but I probably wouldn't get it again.  Their menu is reasonably priced, slightly more expensive than the first two places but not terrible.

Yeah! Burger

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Yeah! Burger is such a neat place and we love it because it is in White Provisions (where West Egg is) so we can walk there as well.  The cool thing about it is that everything is all natural and organic.  So when you eat that juicy burger you feel a little less guilty about it. :)  And the prices are comparable to getting a burger at any major chain restaurant.    Will and I ate there one night with my dad and all 3 of us loved it!

Ormsby's

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We llovvveeee Ormsby's!  Not only is their food delicious, but they have bocce ball….inside the restaurant.  Along with board games, shuffleboard, and pool.  I have been there three times since we've lived here. Yes, 3. In two weeks. AND they are also located in White Provisions, so we can walk or there is free parking. SCORE! I have gotten the fish and chips both times.  It is such fried goodness!  One of the times we went to hang out with some friends and watch the opening day of the Braves, so Will and I ate before we went and just got a bucket of cajun spiced boiled peanuts. They were so good!  Their food is probably the most expensive of any other place we have gone, but it's worth it for a fun night of hanging out with friends and playing some bocce ball!

Well, that's all I have for now! I'm sure I will update again once we try more places.  I just love living in Midtown because it allows us to walk to some great restaurants.  I loved that the other night after dinner we were able to just walk down the street to Yoforia so grab some frozen yogurt.  I have always dreamed of living in a place where we could walk places, and it's finally coming true!  There are sooo many fun and cute places I would love to try, so we're planning on starting a list of restaurants to try.  If you are in Midtown anytime soon I would suggest trying any of these places!!

Our Weekend

We had our first visitors in our new home this weekend.  Will's sister, niece, and nephew came to visit us.  It was so fun having them...and I realized I am nowhere near ready to have children!

The best picture I could get with them

They got here Thursday evening, and about 30 minutes after they got here, Will was ready to be picked up from work.  We all piled in the car and ended up in horrible Final Four traffic. It usually takes me about 7 minutes to drop Will off in the mornings about about 10-15 minutes to pick him up in the evening.  Thursday it took us about 30 minutes to get to him and about 45 minutes to get home.  It was the craziest traffic I have seen since being in Atlanta.

Trying to have fun in the traffic :)

Friday morning we ventured into the middle of the Final Four traffic downtown to try to take them to the children's museum.  The lady informed us before we paid to go in that it was really made for children 6 and under, so we left and decided to go to the aquarium instead.  We stood in line for a while and finally got close enough to see the prices and decided we would pass at the aquarium too.  haha So, we just did a bunch of site seeing and ended up going to a restaurant out of the madness closer to my apartment. They have board games you can play, as well as bocce ball and some other games you can play.  The kids had fun!

 

 

 

 



That evening, we took the kids to their first Braves game!  They loved getting fun Braves tattoos to put on their faces and wear their new Braves shirts!
We also got to see some of our friends from Valdosta that were at the game.  It was so fun getting to see them!

Love this man!!

Sweet :)

Pretty night at Turner Field

Will & John David walking to the game!

Saturday morning we woke up and went to have lunch at Piedmont Park.  I HIGHLY recommend eating at Park Tavern.  The food and the atmosphere were wonderful! It was sunny and beautiful, so we ate out on the patio that overlooked the city. SO FUN!

 

John David modeling and our view from our table!

We spent around 4 hours at Piedmont Park, but it was such a beautiful day it was hard to leave!
There was a lot of frisbee throwing, people/dog watching, and laying on the blanket going on.  It was so nice.



 

 

We went to Fillini's to get a pizza afterwards and we all went to bed pretty early that night.  The sun wore us out!

The morning we woke up early and all got ready and went to Passion City Church.  It was amazing!  We all loved it.  Kathryn and the kids left after we got back from church.  Then we went to lunch with our Valdosta friends before they were heading back.

It was such a fun and busy weekend!!  We are loving living in Atlanta and having new experiences. 

 



The Big Move!

Well....where to start?  Will & I are living in Atlanta now!  It all literally happened so quickly that there was no time to update about this.  Basically, two weeks yesterday, Will was offered a job with AT&T in Atlanta.  BUT, they wanted him to start April 1st. That's right, two weeks later.  So we jumped on the decision to move to Atlanta and began packing and apartment searching. 

Sunday and Monday before we were supposed to move were spent searching around the Midtown area for an apartment that was nice and safe.  We found our perfect match, which just so happens to be where Will lived when he went to Georgia State. 

We got back Monday night and had a surprise birthday party for Will's mom. Monday night, in the middle of the night, Will was sick allllll night long.  He caught the gross stomach bug that had been going around like crazy.  So all day Tuesday (two days before Will is supposed to move our stuff to Atlanta) he was laying in bed while me, his mom, his dad, and his sister worked like crazy to get all of our stuff in boxes.  Packing for one person was always bad enough, but packing for two people was crazy! I had no idea how much stuff we had!! 

Will left Thursday morning with his brother and one of our friends to bring all the stuff to our new apartment.  I had to finish out my week at both of my jobs, so I came up Friday night (after sitting in 4 1/2 hours of Spring Break traffic).  When I finally got here at 9:30 Friday night, Will took me out to my favorite pizza place, Fellini's, for dinner.  It was great!

We've spent hours and hours unpacking, cleaning, organizing, etc.  We FINALLY have our apartment how we want it, just still missing a few things on the walls and our built in bookshelf.  But here it is folks:



//Walking in our front door//

//Kitchen//
 



//Kitchen//



//Dining Area//





//Built in Bookshelf//
 (Not Completed)



//Living Room//

(Horrible IPhone pic)

 

//Our view: King Plow Arts Center//

//Our Bedroom//
(Not Completed)

//Bathroom//
(It's SO big!!)



 

So there it is! Our new home.  It's a work in progress, but we LOVE it so far!! I'll update soon about what we've done since we moved in! 

 

 

xoxo,

 

Jenna