We drove to Mississippi for our niece’s wedding with a stop along the way for my birthday dinner in Nashville.  Unlike our daughter’s wedding, all we needed to do was show up and enjoy the event.  

Our niece was married near the University of Mississippi, (where she met her husband) known as “Ole Miss.” I think the name is funny as our niece is no longer a “miss” and is certainly not “old” but I guess she is still an Ole Miss Alumni.

I was happy to learn that a rehearsal dinner could double as the reception for family and friends. The dinner was fun and all of the traditional speeches that normally accompany the wedding reception were made at that time. This made the speeches more intimate as most of us in attendance knew details about the speakers or the ones they were speaking about. I would like it if more weddings I attend in the future took up this tradition.

We appreciated that a bus was available for the wedding guests to take us to and from the hotel and the wedding venue. This was a great idea for all involved. I am not familiar with the area, and the guests were mainly from out of town. It also allowed us to focus on the wedding and reception and not to worry about how to get back to the hotel.

The wedding was in a pretty setting just outside of Oxford. The chapel was all white and well suited to the occasion. The couple was well organized.

We enjoyed the reception. It flowed with the introduction of the newlyweds right into dinner and dancing as all of the speaking was done the evening before. We could just chat with the other guests, dance, eat and celebrate with family and friends the newlywed couple.

Lessons learned

Combine things, like wedding speeches and rehearsal dinners when it makes sense.

The area has a lot of history, and we saw signs for some attractions on the road trip down, such as Shiloh National Military Park and Andrew Jackson’s house the Hermitage. We will need to plan for a bigger or separate travel to see some of these places.   

Other fun

We enjoyed our warm day stroll and did stop for ice cream after walking the Square in Oxford.

Our niece and now nephew provided us with a listing of their favorite places in Oxford. We really enjoyed walking around the square in Oxford and sampling their favorite spots. We appreciated their planning and enjoyed several of their selections.  

I went for a run on the Ole Miss campus. Apparently, it is a thing to run through campus, especially near the football stadium. It was a good morning for a run, prior to the wedding, and I ran past or with several other dedicated runners out for a morning run.

We were able to hang out with family and friends between events.

On the way to celebrate our niece’s wedding, we stopped in Nashville to celebrate my birthday. I had not really thought about going somewhere for the night to celebrate and now I think it was a fun treat. I may have to do that again.

We started our day at home as normal and took a drive that was halfway to Mississippi and ended in Nashville. I did manage to play 18 holes of disc golf and explore some of Nashville prior to enjoying a delicious dinner at Ruth Chris steak house in Nashville.

We were surprised to learn that the Parthenon is in Nashville; I always thought it was in Greece.

We had a nice time walking along the campus at Vanderbilt University while we were walking around Nashville.

Nashville is a fun town, but unfortunately, we were not able to spend the time to explore this town as much as we would have liked.

On our way home from the wedding, we were able to meet up with our oldest on his way to Ft. Knox for some training and eat dinner. Meeting in Elizabethtown (E-Town) was a nice treat for us at the end of our journey home from Mississippi.

No bike rides this trip—just here for the wedding.