Greetings from Tennessee

I'm blogging today from Ryan's house in Tennessee. Aren't computers wonderful? We are having such a great time. Yesterday we got up at six to meet Ginger at the Cracker Barrel for breakfast. Then we traveled two hours over to Ashville, North Carolina to visit the Biltmore Estate. It is the former home of George Vanderbilt, heir of railroad money, who built this home modeled after the French chateaus when he was a bachelor at 27. It is the size of a castle and each room was decorated for Christmas with multiple trees and period toys. My favorite room is the conservatory with it's high glass ceiling, tropical plants, and pots of white poinsettias. It took us two hours to go through the house with its four floors of rooms plus a basement with a swimming pool, bowling alley, cook's quarters, kitchens, pantries, and even two rooms for floral decorating. Afterwards we went to the estate winery where we had lunch at the Bistro there. Our appetizers were artichoke dip with crositini and brie with cranberry chutney, green apple slices, and pecans. We ate mufalleta sandwiches and various kinds of pizzas. Then we shopped a little at Biltmore villiage. On the way home the weather got worse and we drove in the rain most of the way. Today it is threatening snow and nasty. I think we will stay inside most of the day.