Hometown Post - Rwanda

Happy day after Labor Day all. I hope you had a great 3 day weekend. I have to admit I am feeling a bit sad that Labor Day signals the official end to summer 2012. However, a super cute wedding on Saturday that included a sushi food truck at the reception and a yummy dessert table filled with chocolate-covered cheesecake on a stick helped me get over the end of summer blues. Wedding post re-cap tomorrow :-)

Back when Tiff featured me on her blog, I mentioned my hometown series post and Elise contacted me about it. She is currently living in Rwanda, so grab your passport or apply for one now through the State Department. Enjoy reading about Rwanda through Elise's eyes included in the series, From My Hometown to Yours.

Hey there! My name is Elise and I blog over and Forever Changed. I’m a pretty ordinary girl, I have an amazing family, a best friend, a sweet dog, I run for fun (and yes, I rhymed on purpose), chocolate chip cookies are my weakness, I love Christmas, and I have a bucket list that I take pretty seriously. Despite all this ordinariness I have an extraordinary purpose, perfectly designed by God, that has led me to move to Rwanda to work in an orphanage with over 500 children that has forever changed my life.  Blogging is my way of documenting this crazy journey that is my life and I would like to invite you to land of a thousand hills, also known as Rwanda, also known as

my home. Before your trip you will need to prepare yourself for a lot of bus travel, breathtaking sights, and for your heart to break when you have to leave, because this place is just that powerful...

Our itinerary: 

Go to the Genocide Museum in Kigali and get a whole new perspective 

Have an adventure on a canopy walk in Nyungwe forest

Get our animal fix by going on a gorilla tour

Visit Noel Orphanage in Nyduo where I volunteer and love on some kids

Watch the kids football match

Ride jet skis on Lake Kivu 

Eat at the three decent American like restaurants and the one decent Rwandan restaurant 

Ride motos to town where we will eat the most delicious bananas and buy some souvenirs for family and friends  

Have a tearful goodbye at the airport 

I can't promise that you will get to see everything, I can't promise that the weather will cooperate, I can't promise that the food will be amazing but I can promise that you will fall in love with the people and country of Rwanda and you will leave changed for the better. 

Thank you so much Elise for this wonderful post. I seriously do wish I could fly over right now and visit you, I could hope on a plane, my passport is current.  It is awesome God placed the people of Rwanda on your heart and you are living out His will for you. 

If anyone else is interested in writing about your hometown to be included in this series, please contact me at megmouch(at)gmail(dot)com

Hometown Series - Me

Happy Monday! Hope you all had a wonderful weekend, yesterday was running 12 miles following a delicious reward of homemade cinnamon rolls. Don't worry I'll share the recipe.
I have asked a bunch of you to share with me and other bloggers about your hometown, writing from the perspective if I was coming to visit you what would you plan for the two of us. Now I want to share with you a few of the towns I have lived in. Being an Air Force brat, I don't have a particular a town I would call home. It is a clique but for me home is where the heart is but the fortunate thing for all of you, I have a few hometowns to share with you all :-)

Today I will be sharing with you Colorado Springs, Colorado. I lived there 1987-1990 which was kindergarten for me. We then moved to Lawrence, KS and then back to Colorado Spring from 4th grade until 1 month into 7th grade when we moved to Monterey, CA. We lived in the same house both times, my parents just rented the house out while were away. I went back to the same elementary school I went to for kindergarten and had some of the same friends.
If you came to visit me when I lived in Colorado Springs, I would first take you for a run in the beautiful Garden of the Gods. I always start my day with a run and Garden of the Gods is so breath-taking and I would point out the kissing camels.

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The beautiful white capped mountain in the background is Pikes Peak.
Here are the kissing camels.

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When living in Colorado Springs, we didn't live on the Air Force Academy even though my dad was teaching cadets there. We certainly spent a lot of time at the Academy especially Wednesday nights when I took ice-skating lessons on the rink.

I did ice-skating competitions, those cutesy little outfits, the fancy white skates, yup I did it all. I even got to meet Nicole Bobek when she was training there once. If you google her now, you would see she is known now for her drug issues rather than her ice skating abilities. Soo much for my role model when I was younger. 

If you came to visit me in Colorado Springs, I would probably take you ice-skating at that rink or if we would see an Air Force Academy hockey game and listen for the announcer to say " LET'S PLAY HOCKEY!!"
While at the Air Force Academy, I would take you to the gorgeous chapel they have, which has 4 worship areas, a Christian, Catholic, Jewish and all faiths.

Source: google.com via Cynthia on Pinterest

After the chapel visit, we would probably check out the rest of the Academy because it is such a beautiful campus.
After the Air Force Academy, I would take you to the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo and we would feed the giraffes some wheat crackers you can buy.

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Following the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo for dinner we would head to Phantom Canyon Brewing Co. It is a microbrewery and they make their own root beer too. When we were children living in Colorado Springs, we would order a root beer but not drink it until dessert when we ordered vanilla ice cream and had a root beef float. My favorite dish I would highly recommend you order would be the beef pot roast with mashed potatoes. It is beyond amazing!

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If you didn't get enough dessert with the root beer float and also because two desserts on vacation is totally acceptable, then we will head over to Josh and John's Ice Cream, which is so freaking amazing and naturally produced without hormones.

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These old fashioned ice cream churners are in the store.

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That would be how I would show you one of the hometowns I lived in growing up as a child. Colorado Springs was a wonderful city to live in and I have wonderful memories from there. Hope I have enticed you enough to check out the city if you ever get a chance to visit it. I'll be sharing a few more of the different cities I lived in growing up in the next couple of weeks, keep your eyes open for more hometown series Meg Henning edition!

Hometown Series - Kristie of Kristie Was here

Uber-excited about this hometown series post today, first because the blogger is super cool and second because I love this city she will be sharing with you. Seriously check her blog out, I just want to say it again, an uber-cool blog! 

Kristie is taking over my blog today and sharing her hometown with you, take a read!

San Jose: Cool By Association

I'm a newbie to my hometown but I can tell you that I love it. It's sunny, there's an Egyptian museum, and it's the capitol of the Silicon Valley. Yep, pretty much heaven. It's the third largest city in California and the tenth-largest in the US.

But that's not it. Oh, no! {insert your incredibly surprised face}

What else makes San Jose awesome?

So glad you asked...

1) It's close to San Francisco... and other cities you should visit.

You know that one friend who has other awesome friends? Yea, that's San Jose. My town is within driving distance to some major California sites, namely, San Francisco, but also Napa Valley, Sausalito, Los Gatos, and Santa Cruz. I took pictures so you could see my city's bffs.

2) San Jose has Bill's Cafe

There's some great food around here. My favorite? Bill's Cafe--hands down. It's the quintessential diner with great food, a fun staff, and huge mimosas. I've become a regular at a brunch place. All the cool kids (over 65) are doing it. Here is me waiting for my food. I'm a happy camper.

3) There is sunshine.

A recent transplant from Seattle, San Jose has this thing I call the sun. I'd almost forgotten what it looked like. According to wikipedia, San Jose gets 300+ days of sunshine a year. This is the difference between coffee hangovers and tan lines. Definitely worth noting.

4) I'm here.

Not sure if I'm really worth the trip? Well, come on over to my blog stalk me. I will seduce you with my awkwardness.

Thanks Kristie and next time I am up in San Jose to visit my cousin we might have to plan a blogger meet-up because I really really want to meet you because you are oh-so cool and you will have to officially introduce me to Bill's Cafe. 

Hometown Series - Nikki of the Pink Growl

I don't have a fancy intro except I am a little sad that the Jayhawks lost last night. I don't know how much I have mentioned the different places I lived growing up but Lawrence, Kansas was one of them. I lived there for 1st through 3rd grade and my dad did attend the University of Kansas to get his PhD so we went to several basketball games and definitely Jayhawks fan. 

I have just a few more posts for this hometown series before I take a bit of break to concentrate on other topics but I will resurrect the series at a later date.

Seriously you all who have contributed to this series, you have blown me away with your posts, the quality has been amazing and to provide people a look into your hometown and I have had several bloggers mention they use the series and your suggestion when they are visiting any of the cities written about. Today we have another city I would love to visit one day, well the state in general, Tennessee.

If you have been following the series, you know the premise of the post, but if you are new then welcome. For this hometown series, I asked bloggers to write the post from the perspective that if I was coming to visit them, what would the blogger plan for us, where would we do, what would we do, see and eat.

Take it away Nikki!

Hi y'all! My name is Nikki and I blog over at The Pink Growl.

I currently live in Knoxville, TN. However, I grew up in Clinton, TN - a small town about 30 minutes north of Knoxville. I wasn't sure if I should display my tiny hometown or my beautiful Knoxville. I decided to take the road less traveled. Knoxville is a major city in TN, and home to the University of TN, so I assumed that more people would be familiar with it.

I want to take this opportunity to tell you all about my precious hometown, which I'm positive you've probably never heard of. It's your typical Southern small town where everybody's mama knows everbody's business. Population of Clinton is about 9500 people.

Picture of Downtown Clinton

The first place that we would go is to a little drug store diner downtown, Hoskins Drug Store. It might not look like much, but their food is AMAZING! It's very retro style, with a soda fountain and a diner counter. We could grab some breakfast here to start our day off the right way! This is a family owned restaurant and you will definitely get a dose of Southern Hospitality.

Hoskins diner counter

 Once we were sufficiently stuffed, we could take a stroll down Main & Market Streets and do some window shopping in the cute boutiques and antique shops. If you like antiques at all, downtown Clinton is the place to find some real steals. Hopefully we won't end up here during the Antique Fesitval or else we would run into quite a crowd.

Downtown Clinton during Antique Festival

Once we were tired from walking around window shopping, we would probably need to rest our poor feet. I would recommend that we take ourselves right back up beside Hoskins and maybe catch a matinee at the historic Ritz Theatre. Back in the day, the Ritz theatre was and actual theatre for live plays and was home to many protests surrounding the Clinton 12 and the desegregation of the local high school in 1956. Nowadays, the Ritz has been turned into one screen movie theatre and they show the newest movies for only $3. We could pop in here and watch the new Hunger Games movie!



Ritz Theatre picture from Life Magazine - Protest for the Clinton 12 being integrated into Clinton High School.





Current day Ritz Theatre - the inside has been renovated and it looks much nicer than this!

 I bet after all this talk about the Ritz Theatre being all involved in the Clinton 12 incidents, you might be curious to learn more about my hometown's historic past. Clinton High School was the very first state supported school in the South to allow the integration of black & white students. It was a huge deal in a small town - they had to bring in the National Guard because of all the threats. The high school actually ended up being bombed. We could take a very short drive up the hill to the fairly new Green McAdoo Cultural Center - near the location of the old Clinton High School site that was bombed - so you could spend a few moments taking a walk down memory lane.

Whew - enough with the serious business! Let's get back to some fun time! After I have enriched your Clinton experience by involving you in the some of the culture that makes this town unique, I want to show you some of the reasons that I love to call this place home. First off, we would take a 10-15 minute drive to Norris Dam. Norris Dam was built as part of the TVA projects during World War II. I grew up on Norris Lake and it's the second cleanest lake in the state. To me, it's the ideal picture of beauty and relaxation. This is where I gladly spend all my free time in the summer! We could take a quick boat ride if we had time.

Norris Dam

Norris Lake - view from the back of my boat

By now, it would be getting later and we would have to be making our way towards the final stop. I would choose the Museum of Appalchia. And despite the name, it's much more than just a museum. Coming to visit here, is like taking a literal step back in time. It's a gorgeous estate that has preserved life in the Clinch River Valley just like it was before the area was flooded to create the Norris Dam area. I know again, with the history lesson, but this area is so rich in heritage that you can't avoid it! Plus, there are so many cute animals we could look at, and even peacocks walking around that we could get our pictures taken with. Then we could mosey on into the main house area and grab our dinner, which I'm sure would be the perfect example of a Southern meal.

Clinton might not be much, but it's where I call home. It's an interesting experience to grow up in a small town, but sometimes you just need to get away - which is why I moved! :) When I lived there, they didn't even have a Wal-Mart.

Oh yeah and on your drive home you must drive back through town and pass over the infamous green bridge. It's a Clinton landmark and one of the two ways out of town and back towards civilization!

You can't really tell here, but this bridge is GREEN and it sits strong over the Clinch River.

Thanks for visiting and don't forget to come back and see us again real soon! Take care!

XOXO,

Nikki @ The Pink Growl

Oh that antique fair, I am so in Nikki and so glad you planned that for the trip and I love the side trips you mentioned too, seeing the dam and that museum. It sounds great.