Louisville Rocks

Why Louisville Should be Your Next Home

Louisville, Kentucky is a great place to visit, but an even greater place to live. Whether you are a single person looking for a place to start the best years of your life, or a married couple looking for an established and wonderful place to raise your kids, Louisville definitely fits the bill. He when you think of calling Louisville home.

The Louisville Zoo

You don’t have to be a kid to enjoy seeing the different animals at the zoo. There is no greater attraction than nature and seeing the animals in their habitats. The Louisville Zoo has won multiple awards over the years, and is conveniently, yet remotely nestled on 135 acres. It is close to I-264 (the Watterson Expressway) and the Poplar Level area in Louisville. The zoo is open to the public 362 days a year, and is also referred to as the Louisville Zoological Gardens. There are always multiple exciting exhibits to check out while you are there, including the award winning, amazing Glacier Run;...

Louisville Apps


The common form of communication in today’s day and age is far more than a simple device to relay messages. The modern telephone is not only a tool for making phone calls but is a computer, television, camera, and complete link to the World’s information. “Smart Phones” as they are called, give owners the opportunity to gain information anywhere at anytime.

Aside from the internet, applications, or apps as they are better know, provide the owner the most specialized and greatest wealth of information. There are apps for everything available, but my favorite apps are the ones personal to my hometown. Believe it or not, there are over one-hundred apps, varying in sub-topic, and most of them are free. These apps give travelers an easy way to gain inside local knowledge on their own, and give locals unlimited access to every view of their city. I tested several different types of free Louisville apps, some I have found to be helpful, others not so much....

Louisville Free Public Libraries are not just for Reading Anymore

Louisville is filled with excellent resources for families and community members that are often taken for granted. I myself, am guilty of not taking advantage of some of Louisville’s greatest amenities.

Just one block from my street is Mid City Mall, which houses one of the Louisville Free Public Library branches. It is not the biggest, newest, or most beautiful library in Louisville, but like the other LFPL branches, it offers tremendous value to the neighborhood. The library offers extensive resources for families with children varying from infancy to high-school age. My toddler and pre-schooler love the free story time and the occasional musical guest that follows.

There are eighteen Louisville Free Public Library locations scattered throughout the city, each offering wonderful learning opportunities to it’s members. For young library members, the library has put together several programs to help parents and kids enjoy reading together. Each branch puts on...

Louisville Parks’ Best Sledding Hills

Every time the snow starts to fall outside I turn into a young child again and get excited about playing in the impending winter wonderland. Some of my best childhood memories were made after waking up in the early morning for school only to find out it was a snow day. After climbing back into my warm bed and getting a few extra hours of sleep, I was always eager to get outside and spend the day in the snow. Dressing up in countless layers of snow gear, building igloos in my front yard, and warming my freezing hands with a cup of hot cocoa after hours dredging through knee deep snow are some of my fondest memories of Winter. Above all my favorite snow day rituals however, is getting together with my best friends and spending hours sledding down some of Louisville’s best hills.

No matter what your age, sledding is always a good time. For the beginner sledder a simple slide down a hill is enough to stir up a day of giggles, but the more experienced sledder may turn things up a notch with...

Louisville is a friendly city but hard to make friends

I am one of Louisville’s biggest fans and rarely have anything to complain about when it comes to my hometown. There is however one thing about this city that frustrates many new residents. Whenever you have an extreme positive, like the tight knit community that makes Louisville so unique, there is often a negative that comes along with it. Many new residents that I have spoken to have all had similar complaints; that it is difficult to make new friends. Louisvillians are not unwelcoming people, in fact they are some of the most welcoming people I have encountered. Friends are hard to make in this city because social groups are loyal and circles hold on to each other for a long time.

I myself have experienced this problem even as a native Louisvillian. After moving back home after college, I found myself alone in the city that used to be filled with familiar faces. All of my friends had decided to stay in their college towns or move away to other cities. I was back in Louisville by...

Is Louisville a 'Big City'

For those of us who have grown up in Louisville, it is hard to think of our hometown as a “big city.” Louisville has always been our secret treasure; a town filled with diversity, culture, and a close sense of community; a town where everyone somehow is linked to one another. Within the past several years, with the growth of Downtown Louisville and the reincarnation of many of Louisville’s neighborhoods, Louisville has quickly become a popular place and dare I say it...”big.” 

When I say “big” I'm not referring to the population or the number of high-rise buildings in our downtown area, but I'm basing my judgment on national popularity, corporate interest, and travel statistics. In the last year, Louisville has been recognized in several top rankings, being called things such as “The Most Livable City In America” by the U.S Conference of Mayors, “The Best Place to Retire” by U.S News and...

Bootlegging Still Exists...And Right At My Back Door

Last night, while spending some much needed down time at my neighborhood bar, the Back Door, I was surprised to find a table full of folks that looked a little out of place. Upon further review and because of the whispers around the bar, I learned that excitement was brewing in the bar over a reality star in the building. Tim Smith, a moonshining legend and star of the Discovery Channel’s hit reality show Moonshiners was sitting right in the middle of our humble Back Door. Complete with overalls and his signature khaki hat, Tim was just as lively and passionate about ‘shining in person as he appears on the show. In town for two days on a promotional tour for the show’s new season, Tim came to the Back Door to watch the new episode of Moonshiners among friends and fellow distillers. 
Moonshine is part of our American heritage. Although it is considered illegal, in many parts of Appalachia, there are those that choose to distill their own...

Bourbon Makes Me Feel Like Home

Over the holiday season, I was lucky enough to reconnect with several of my friends that currently live all over the World. Home for the holidays, and often away from the warmth and comfort of the things that remind them of home, most of my friends were eager to jump back into their old habits and looked to me to show them the way. Not surprisingly, bourbon was at the top of many of their lists. Bourbon is relatively easy to find in most places, but good bourbon and several varieties of bourbon are only found here at home. Of course, being a bourbon lover myself, I was happy to lead my friends around to some of my favorite new spots.
  
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'Happy Birthday' has Louisville Roots

One of my favorite go-to gifts to give my close family and friends is a personalized calendar complete with meaningful photographs and reminders of special events. My family in particular is so large that before my calendars no one could remember each other’s birthdays. Embarrassing belated birthday calls had become the norm for my family, and it was becoming a problem. Now, every New Year, my family members look forward to receiving the newest edition of my calendar because without it they would be lost.  

These calendars are not only excellent gifts to give someone else, but make personal organization beautiful enough to hang on the wall. There are several websites that make creating calendars like mine, very simple and inexpensive. My favorite website is Shutterfly.com. All you need to know before starting your calendar are the special dates you want to include and what photos you would like to feature in your calendar. Shutterfly will walk you through step...

Why Are There Fleurs-De-Lis Everywhere Anyway

Everywhere you look in Louisville, whether it be in our local boutiques, at our various art fairs, or throughout our historic architecture, a similar theme can be noted; the fleur-de-lis. The fleur-de-lis is the city of Louisville’s official seal and more importantly, has become our cultural icon for Louisville’s close knit community. 

Most Louisvillians know the importance of the fleur-de-lis to Louisville, but may not necessary know why. In the United States, the fleur-de-lis is most famous for being the official seal of New Orleans. Following Hurricane Katrina, the fleur-de-lis took on another job as promoting grassroots support to the recovery. So how did the fleur-de-lis become the official seal of Louisville then?  The fleur-de-lis is a french symbol with it’s earliest uses in the French Monarchy. It’s questionable whether or not the fleur-de-lis is modeled after an iris, a lily, or it could be a holy trinity. The fleur-de-lis became the official seal after...