Scenes from the Weekend: Girls Only!

Is it just me or did this weekend fly by a little fast? Neil jetted out of town on Friday afternoon to host his brother’s bachelor party (getting married October 1), and Neil’s mom and a friend came up to spend the weekend with me and escape the ruckus of a a huge bonfire bachelor party at her house. I was so excited to spend the weekend at the very fun and yearly Roots and Blues Festival girls-only!

Early Saturday morning before they arrived, Clive and and I hit downtown to watch the start of the Roots and Blues 10k and half-marathon races. I chose not to run this year because I wanted to be 100% for Neil’s moms visit (running+endometriosis=exhaustion) and because the summer heat prevented a lot of the training I was hoping to do for the 10k. I also ended up signing up for a race this coming weekend with Rachel (her first!), so all in all it worked out. Even still, it was hard not to be jealous of all the runners.

We were cheering for a lot of friends. Here is Jen with an awesome shirt designed by Boone County Family Resources, an awesome organization that offers services and assistance to people with developmental disorders. They will soon have an awesome new website by two designers you might know.

Becky and Aurora. Becky was running her first half-marathon!

Everybody lining up. They staggered the 10k and half-marathon runners, but in reviewing my photos, it was hard to keep everyone straight.

Getting ready…

And GO!

Chad (in the bandana) was a coworker of mine from my old job.

I don’t know her, but I just loved her face. You can see Aurora and Becky behind her.

Off they go!

I also caught Neil’s coworker Jeremy in line. Hi!

Afterward, I headed to breakfast with my little brother at one of our favorite places, Cafe Berlin. I cashed in my cheat day with an awesome grilled swiss on sourdough. Grilled cheese, for whatever reason and however simple, is one of my favorite things in the entire world. I appreciate it so much more now that we’ve gone Paleo. First meal with cheese in two full weeks!

I then met up with Neil’s mom and her friend Sheri and headed back downtown.

Tons of great music and people-watching. Each stage venue was packed. People would wander around or camp out in one spot and hang out. The music was equally as diverse. We saw bands that were more classic rock, some country, some blue grass, and definitely blues.

I love watching random adults get their boogy on in the middle of a crowd, not caring who sees them. This year it was raining during several of the performances, so people were dancing with their umbrellas.

How cool is this!?

Neil’s mom and Sheri enjoyed the different wines they had for tasting.

I couldn’t get over the HUGE amounts of food this year vs. last year. Look at this huge smoker! We partook of some wood-fire pizza and a full rack of BBQ smoked ribs. My pizza fast lasted two weeks. Oh how I love free days.

They also had a great presence of local organic producers this year. By this point I was wishing for a bigger stomach. We were stuffed!

There were also tons of mini-stages this year, with smaller bands that were fun to watch. I loved all the hula-hoop girls randomly walking around downtown.

All in all we had such a great time, and we stayed up late into the night talking and laughing and watching movies. I really need to take these girls only time-outs more often!