For my birthday this year, I had the pleasure of visiting Greensboro, North Carolina for a long weekend. My friends Tony and David moved there last summer from Dallas land opened a gift/stationery store there called Party Chick and Paper. It’s a really cute shop with LOTS of fun products (believe me, after shopping “around town” for a few days, I can say they have the best selection in town). The entire weekend was chock full of good food and drinks, laughter, and fun new friends – and it was one of my favorite weekends in a long time. (As a bonus, David gifted me a first class airline ticket both ways… now THAT’s a good friend!)
This is a shot in Tony’s store – isn’t the invitation room fun? They call it the Personalization Porch – quite Southern.
The guys really wanted me to “soak it all in”, so we had a FULL schedule for the weekend, checking out the town. To start, on Saturday morning, Tony and I visited a local Farmer’s Market, which was quaint and interesting – lots of yummy looking produce and interesting handmade items.
And quail eggs. Which I bought just because I wanted to try them. (aren’t they pretty?)
Since it WAS my birthday, Tony thought we should stop by a local sweets hotspot, Maxie B’s. It was such a cute shop that offers cake by the slice – and offers to warm them up for you too!
Even though I’m NOT a sweets person (I know, I’m weird), this cake was DIVINE – Girl Scout Thin Mint. We only had a few bites because we were technically on our way to lunch, but we just had to get a little cake in to make the birthday official.
After our stroll through the Market and cake tasting, we went to Lindley Park Filling Station for lunch, which was really fun. It’s a tiny little place with amazing food – I had the Reuben sandwich with vegetable curry soup. I didn’t think I’d love the soup (I’m not a big curry fan), but it was deliciously addictive!
We also spent the afternoon touring Downtown Greensboro, checking out the local shops – quite charming.
LOVED this idea – might have to use it myself for when Lucy comes to the shop!
I was also introduced to this Gin (made near Greensboro) – even the ceramic jug is cool.
For my Birthday Dinner, David cooked for us at home – steak, baked potato, panko stuffed tomatoes and his famous roasted green beans with shallots. He even humored me and put a fried quail egg on top.
On Sunday morning, Tony and I decorated for St.Patrick’s Day. It’s one of our favorite holidays (and his birthday), so it’s fun to go through vintage “treasures” and set them up around the house. I especially loved this little “wishing well” in his collection.
After the hanging O’ the green, we went to brunch. For, you guessed it, more good food at 1618 Seafood Grille.
We both agreed that this is how every salad should start – wrapped in bacon. Ha! (fried oysters and “salad”)
The seared grouper on a cheese grit-stuffed bell pepper was amazing.
More shopping. More fun, especially meeting up with their friends – such a great group of friendly people!
Then the grand finale – dinner at Lucky 32 on Sunday night. David worked there in college, and his recommendation of the fried chicken (only available until it’s gone on Sunday night) perfectly hit the spot, served with collard greens and gravy of course.
After all of that, it’s no surprise that I had to ROLL onto the plane home… but it was such a nice, relaxing weekend. Thanks for having me fellas – Greensboro treated this Texas girl right!
