Goodbye Old Faithful

After ten years of faithful service, the Infiniti has been laid to rest at Landers Ford in Collierville, TN. She has served our family with over 220,000 miles.

Oh look...there she is on our wedding day driving us away.

oh no! Someone pulled a prank on us!

She's taken us to many concerts...Who are those skinny kids?

 She takes us to Orange Beach every summer

 Our son really enjoyed riding 

She will be replaced by a shiny new Ford Fusion hybrid. (no, the car doesn't actually fly as shown in the commercial--It does parallel park itself though. This is something that is frivolous and unnecessary, but growing up in town where parallel parking was never needed, our skills in this area are lacking. I personally prefer a flying car though.)

We tried to buy this car in November, and we just now got it. It was supposed to be in at the end of November. Is it possible to have a completely smooth car buying process? I don't understand how people buy cars every other year and don't go crazy with all this. Makes me want to pull my hair out.

Oh well...it's finally over, and it's nice to actually have a car that has modern features! And at 47 mpg, I'm excited to have a smaller gas budget now. Not excited about a car payment though.

Tour of Temple Square - Weeekends Update

My weekend hasn't been very eventful. Our plane was delayed getting back due to leaking hydraulic fluid, so I was very thankful we landed safely and were on a plane that actually stopped.

Then we met my family to pick up our son. I've missed him so much!

My sister with Tucker on their way to meet us

And we've also been trying to unpack and do laundry. I know you're jealous.

Since my weekend has been so chock full of excitement, I'll share our tour of Temple Square in Salt Lake City this past week.

Temple Square is over 35 acres in SLC belonging to the Mormon faith. We were given a tour by two girls serving on their mission. One of them was Sister Romney who is, in fact, related to Mitt.

It was extrememly convicting to see how passionate they are about their faith. They were so young yet so knowledgeable about their religion's history as well as the Bible. They spend at least 2 hours per day studying the Bible.

 I pray that I myself would be this passionate about the Lord so that all those around me see His light shining through me as I did with these two ladies.  

 

thousands of organ pipes 

Italian Marble Statue

Temple

 Me & the Temple

Rodney & the Temple

 

Blogger Book Swap Reveal

 

We just got back from Utah, and realized that we forgot to have someone get our mail while we were gone. We had four packages on our front porch, so I'm so thankful we live in a town/neighborhood where nobody would steal our stuff. Yay for coming home to presents!

Kimberly had the wonderful idea to do a blogger book swap. There's nothing I love more than getting non-bill related mail and reading a book, so this swap was perfect!

I was coupled with Stephanie over at Life, Actually, and she is such a sweetheart! We have similar taste in books, so it was super easy to decide what book to send her.

These are the two books she sent me. I have heard so many wonderful things about Kate Morton, so I can't wait to get to reading these books!

Thanks again Steph!! :)

How to Keep from Killing Your Husband

Reminder from yesterday: I now have a facebook page and I've officially set up my Bloglovin. Show me some love on Facebook & Bloglovin ya'll.

If you're reading this expecting to find out how to keep from killing your husband, you'll be disappointed. I'm actually hoping for your advice instead.

We're still in Salt Lake City for the Sundance film festival. The other night, we had two movies back to back, but there was plenty of time to make both of them. 

This is a 2.6 mile trip you're looking at here.

Small backstory: If you really knew me, you would know that I'm out of shape and I never work out. (Yeah..I seriously need to work on this, but these are the facts.) I get out of breath extremely easily.

Salt Lake is over 4,000 feet above sea level. Memphis is about 300 feet above sea level. We've honestly had a hard time breathing, so you can definitely tell a difference in the altitude.

We walked out of the first theater and didn't see a cab anywhere (apparently, they're all in Park City--none to be found in Salt Lake). Rodney was like..awww..we can walk it. We have time.

After spurts of jogging and mostly walking, we finally got to the second theater ten minutes before the movie was supposed to start. The tickets say you're supposed to be there fifteen minutes before, so we were five minutes late.

It is so frustrating to bust your booty to do something only to be told no when you arrive. There were 3 other ticketholders in front of us when we arrived that were also waiting to get into the theater. Somehow, they were already filled to capacity.

And did I mention that the movie we were rushing to see was Mud? With Matthew McConaughey?

You're telling me that I just jogged and walked in 7 degree weather to see this cutie and even though we're five minutes late and we have tickets, we can't get in because you've already filled the theater?? What's the point in even having a ticket?

Needless to say, I wasn't very happy. I told Mr. Hubs that we should have called a cab, but he was sooo sure that we could walk it in plenty of time. 

I never know how to react in these types of situations. I obviously was upset and frustrated, and so was Rodney. He starts getting mad then I get mad at him for getting mad. Such a vicious cycle. At this point, there was nothing we could do, so getting mad about it wouldn't help the situation. 

I obviously didn't want to actually kill him (for those gullies that actually think I was begin serious), but I wasn't very chipper about the situation. How do you react when things like this happen?

 Instagram picture from the mishap

This whole story is the crappie. Not to mention I now have blisters on my feet.

The happie is that now, we're taking cabs everywhere. Yay for no walking in the freezing cold high altitude! Also, this movie was a premiere, so it will be out in theaters for sure at some point. It's not like we've missed it and will never be able to watch. Oh and I got a good workout also.

Worst Gift Evahh -- First V-log Evahh

Ok..just try not to make fun of my accent --- mmmkay?

I now have a facebook page and I've officially set up my Bloglovin. Show me some love on Facebook & Bloglovin ya'll.

Professional Skier Y'all!

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Before you watch this video, allow me to leave a disclaimer. I have a very thick Southern accent, so be warned. :)

This shows you a little what our ski level is. I have a difficult time not laughing at Rodney's expense, so I thought you might want a laugh as well.

Our ski instructor couldn't get Rodney's name right. He kept calling him Ralph instead which I thought was hilarious. Rodney didn't think it was as funny. That's why I kept calling him Ralph in the video.

Hope this brings you a good chuckle as well. 

Park City v. 1

Just because I'm on vacation doesn't mean I can miss a weekend update, right? 

I'm just doing a quick and dirty version today. I'll be back to blog a full recap after we return to good ole Mississippi.

Please excuse the grainy iphone pics. I'm just too lazy to plug my camera up until later. Being lazy is what vacation's for, right? :)

For those that don't know, we're in Park City, UT for a few days to ski, and then we're headed to Salt Lake City to watch movies at the Sundance Film Festival.

Now on to a little photo dump...

 View from our condo balcony

 haha!!

 

There are munchkins everywhere to make you feel inadequate as a skier

  Night out in downtown Park City

 Ski lift! -- Yes, Rodney's face now looks like a tomato (this is what happens when you don't listen to your wife)

Follow me on instagram at reepps for up to the minute pictures. :)

Literary Junkies

It's time for another literary junkies linkup!

Here are this month's questions:

1. Which book could you read over and over? Why?

I don't really like to re-read books, but I guess I would choose the Harry Potter series. I have a problem when I read where I get sooo excited to find out what happens that I read at a supersonic pace. I'm so impatient! I have to know what's going to happen! There are so many intricacies to the HP books, I'm sure I would discover a lot that I missed the first time around. (oops!)

2. If you could be any character from any book you've read, who would you be?

Rebecca Bloomwood from the Shopaholic series. She's got a hottie husband and shops all the time. Sounds wonderful, right? :)

3. Do you ever put a book down because you just can't get into it? Or do you stick it out to the bitter end? Any examples?

It just depends on the book.  I started reading Girls in White Dresses by Jennifer Close, and it was terrible. I would never make my worst enemy read this book. This is one I didn't finish.

I actually finished The Casual Vacancy even though it was terrible. I wish I had put it down instead of wasting my time, but you can never tell if a book will turn around or not. Rowling had already proved herself as an author, so I thought she could redeem herself. It didn't happen.

  

4. Show us your book shelves! Do you have one designated spot in your house for all your books? Do you scatter them around? 

Most of my books are now kindle books, but the majority of my "real" books are still at home with my parents. Here are the only books we have in my home. 

Most of them are Rodney's books. You can see this is a work in progress since half these picture frames are empty. ha!

Got to get back to my Bachelor watching! :) Hope everyone is having a great week!

Wonderful Weekend Update

We've had a busy weekend!

Friday

After work, we had an office social at the Grizzlies game! It was my first NBA game, and it was so much fun! 

They were playing the Spurs. A three point shot by Tony Parker (Eva Longoria's ex--the only way I would have known who he was) at the buzzer forced the game into overtime. Grizz won!!

Some of the girls after the game. My hair had inflated from the damp weather.

Saturday

My family came up from home to visit. Rodney got a toolbox for Christmas, so we had to make use of their SUV to transport it up here. 

We just ran a few errands, did a little shopping, and some eating. The perfect combination. :)

After they left town, Rodney & I watched The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel and paused the movie a whole lot so I could make Pioneer Woman's homemade cinnamon rolls. 

We have breakfast at Sunday School once a month, so it's fun to pull a recipe from pinterest to try out. 

They turned out amazing..these are seriously so delicious! They're sooo rich though. You can't eat very many without having your sweet tooth fall out.

Sunday

Church Sunday morning followed by the traditional Sunday lunch. After lunch, we went to watch Zero Dark Thirty.

 It was really good! I would definitely recommend it!

I'm now going to grind through this week so we can be on our trip to Utah! I can't wait!!