GARTH!

Over the years, I've done my best to surround myself with people that possess the abilities that I don't. One of those such abilities is being the social planner...and one of my favorite social friends is none other than my roommate from Atlanta, Christen.

We share a love for many of the same things, she's just the one that typically finds about the activities and signs us up.

About 6 weeks ago, she sent a brief message: Garth is going to Nashville in December. Wanna go? I quickly responded yes and before I could even get my calendar up to write it down, she had the tickets purchased and the hotel room booked.

Our birthdays are about a month apart, so we decided that it would be the perfect gift to each other. Little did we know when we set out for Nashville that Thursday afternoon how perfect it would end up being.

We usually ride up together, but since we didn't really have the time to meet up before hand, we decided to just meet in Nashville this time. We arrived just in time for dinner...Cantina Loredo. Hands down, best guacamole in town!

After dinner, we headed over to check in and take a brief nap before the late night concert. Garth Brooks performed a series of 9 concerts in a matter of a few days. Due to the number of concerts, many were back to back. Ours was the 10 o'clock concert, and when we got to the arena they were still cleaning up from the previous concert.

We somehow squeezed our way to the front of the pack and were able to get to our seats...behind the stage in the upper section...relatively easily. Since Garth hasn't had a concert tour in ages, we decided a trip to the merchandise table was necessary. Then, Christen had the bright idea to try to go and take a picture so that we could get the stage behind us. It would mean someone would have to let us in a different portal, but we were hopeful.

We found who we thought to be a security guard and asked if we could go in and get a closer look at the stage. He asked went on to ask a series of questions...do you like country music, are you big fans, are you from here. We answered the first two with resounding yes's and then explained how we come to Nashville often for concerts, but are from out of state. As we explained, he reached into his pocket and pulled out two tickets with the words "these should help you get a good view of the stage."

At first, I didn't know what was happening...and then when I looked at the tickets and saw that they were for row one, I thought it must be a joke. Seriously, Christen and I just stood there too excited to even scream. We found the nearest worker and he assured us that the tickets were in fact real and that our seats were on the FLOOR!!! We made our way down to the seats only to find out that not only were they on the floor...they were FRONT AND CENTER!

The concert was incredible. Garth sang all of the good ones...and his wife Trisha Yearwood even made an appearance.

We finished the trip off with breakfast at Pancake Pantry the following morning...followed by a little shopping at some of our favorite Nashville places. It was definitely a trip I'll never forget. Next year's birthday celebration has A LOT to live up to!