This past weekend, my sister came down for CMA fest.   We missed my cousins who weren’t able to come, but there’s always next year!  Eugene and I pinky-promised that we would make attending CMA fest a tradition.

Here we are in the upper level at LP Field at CMA fest.  Of course, the first thing I had to have a picture of was this beautiful sunset.

Here is the Nashville skyline, silhouette style.

I can’t help myself.  I just love a beautiful sky.

Eugene and I tried our best to look appropriate for this event.  There are many fine lines between too country/trying too hard/too dressed up/ too casual/uncomfortable for walking/sweating to death that we had to consider.

We were both wearing cowboy boots.  I think we pulled it off.

Let’s get this party started.

Barbara Jean from Reba hosted.  I don’t know her name in real life.  She will forever be Barbara Jean in my mind.

All of the performers were great on Friday night.  My favs were The Band Perry and Carrie Underwood.

For breakfast the next morning, I decided to make cowboy hat biscuits in honor of CMA fest.

I always have a little nub biscuit because there is never exactly enough dough for my biscuit cutters and I can’t stand to throw it away.  Granny and Grandmother always have one of these, too.  Perfect for a little snack.

Until I enlightened Eugene about my cowboy hat shaped cookie cutter, she thought I had taken the time to handcraft each of my cowboy hat biscuits.

I have not the time nor the patience for that, dear sister.

Biscuits are ready!

I still haven’t perfected the whole biscuit thing.  These were a little doughy on the inside and a little bit hard.  I think I need more baking powder and less Crisco.

At least they were festive.

My sausage finally put off some grease to make gravy.  Victory!

Feast your eyes on that beautiful stuff.   Not as good as Granny’s, but I did receive the ultimate compliment from Eugene as I was cooking.  She told me that my apartment smelled like mornings at Granny’s and Grandmother’s houses.

That made my day.

I still don’t have any barstools for my large desk that I also intend to use as my dining table.  Despite this minor detail, I decided this breakfast spread was worthy of a table dining experience and used my trusty green plastic storage bins as seats.  I am really getting my money’s worth out of these considering they were just recently relieved from their coffee table duty after I brought back a truck from Grandmother’s house to use as a permanent and much more attractive coffee table solution.

The only problem with my new “chairs” was that they were about 8” too short so my sister and I could barely reach the tabletop to enjoy our meal.  We found this wildly amusing and Eugene took several pictures.  I was still wearing my pajamas and clearly had not looked in the mirror before I allowed my sister to capture my adorable look.

Whatever.  We were having a good time.

The second night of CMA fest was just as fun.  Some of my favorites were Little Big Town, Faith Hill, and Luke Bryan.  I especially loved when the artists performed covers of classic songs.   These people can really saaang.

I think my absolute favorite was Luke Bryan’s version of Justin Bieber’s song “If I was your boyfriend.”

And the event staff gave us little flashlights on the way in so the stadium would sparkle.

I would say it was a very successful weekend.

Yee-haw!

Sugarlump