Louisville Road Trip: Saturday

I always laugh when I think of that episode of How I Met Your Mother in which Lily and Marshall are trying desperately (and failing) to find other "couple friends" to hang out with. It really is harder when you're in a relationship to find friends you BOTH want to hang out with than it is to find friends when you're single.

Luckily, Frank and I have found a pretty amazing bunch of couples who we both love spending time with. From the couple at our church who described our first meeting as "couples' love at first sight" to the friends moving into our building later this month (CAN'T WAIT), we are spoiled with awesome couple friends. So this past weekend, we decided to do something a little crazy and went with two of our couple friends on a road trip to Louisville.

I had high expectations for the trip, and they were totally exceeded. We had so much fun. All three couples are new parents, so everyone was very understanding when someone had to stop for a diaper change mid-travel or take a break from sightseeing to breastfeed. It was the perfect group.

I took about a million photos so I'm breaking the trip into two posts, for the two days we were there. Here goes!

We drove there Friday night and checked into our Super 8 Motel. For a minute I was hesitant to tell you guys where we stayed (not the coolest place, right?) but then I realized that honestly, Frank and I love Super 8s. They have free wifi, free (and usually great) breakfast, AND they'll only cost you about $45/night. What's not to love?!

Saturday morning, after breakfast, we drove out to the Buffalo Trace Bourbon Distillery—the most award-winning distillery in the world.

We strapped on our babies for a day of adventure...

It was a bit rainy outside, but nothing could dampen our enthusiasm.

Man, that place was cool. It's been around since the 1800s and was one of the only distilleries allowed to keep operating during Prohibition.

The smell in this barrel room was UH-MAZ-ING:

Everyone who worked there was incredibly family-friendly. The gift-shop ladies gushed over our little ones, and the sweet tour guide offered me a private room when Frankie was being loud and I had to take him outside.

At the end, we got to sample a bunch of different kinds of bourbon.

My goal for the trip was to acquire a taste for bourbon ... and I utterly failed. I still can't stand the stuff. But I did discover this magical and amazing drink called "bourbon cream" that tastes like drinking a smooth, bourbon-y milkshake. Sadly it's only available in Kentucky, but we brought a bottle home with us. The best.

Next we headed to Frankfort, the state capitol, for lunch around 1. We decided to check out a pub we found on Yelp, but when we walked in, we found it completely packed with people—all of them wearing University of Kentucky blue—while the televisions blared the college basketball game. With our babies and lack of blue clothing, we really stuck out!

We started to leave but a friendly waitress encouraged us to stay. This was in keeping with the general theme—everyone we met in Louisville was SO FRIENDLY. I don't know if it's a Southern thing or what, but it was really nice!

So we sat down in the midst of the basketball frenzy with our babies on our laps, since the pub didn't have high chairs. We felt pretty awkward but all ended well since the place turned out to have fantastic pub burgers. And Frankie discovered his new favorite toy: a drinking straw.

Delicious.

Next we headed back to Louisville to visit the Frazier history museum. Like with the distillery, we were so impressed—the museum is beautifully put together and has an extensive weaponry collection, which the guys especially enjoyed.

The babies enjoyed socializing while their parents checked out the exhibits:

The weather had finally cleared up when we left the museum, so we decided to walk to a local brew pub called Bluegrass Brewery.

The stroller brigade on the way there:

We had talked about visiting Bardstown, home of Thomas Merton, but ultimately decided to save it for another trip. Still, it was cool to see a plaque in his honor downtown:

We passed by the Cathedral of the Assumption, the head church of the Louisville diocese. I was extremely excited to discover that the cathedral was founded by Father Stephen Badin—the same man who my college dorm was named after.

We enjoyed some fine beers at the brew pub until it started getting a little too cold for the babies.

So the stroller brigade (dads' turn this time) went back to the cars and then headed out for dinner at Smoketown USA.

Smoketown serves the best barbecue I've ever had in my entire life. I would highly, HIGHLY recommend it if you're ever in Louisville!

By the time dinner was over, the babies were pretty pooped. So we all headed back to the hotel to get some rest before our next day of adventure.