FIRST SNOW OF 2018

We had our first snow of 2018 over the weekend! It actually started later Friday afternoon and went through the night off and on. We didn't get much, just about half an inch or so, but it shut schools down and freaked everyone out, of course.

I laughed as I was walking to my car on Thursday afternoon because it was literally almost 70 and they had already salted the walkways and put this sign up in preparation for the snow/ice that was coming the following day. 

 

We did not leave our house at all on Friday and Saturday and it was SO nice and much needed before Matthew's busy season starts up. We lounged around Saturday, binge watched Parenthood (we've started it over because it's just that good!!), laundry, meal prepped for the week, cleaned a little, and I made our favorite soup for lunch. We had talked about going to see a movie on Saturday afternoon, but we were both just enjoying being around the house that we decided against it. We have tickets for a movie, so I'm sure we'll go soon!

My parents got me this neat little gadget for the kitchen and I am OBSESSED. I have been wanting something like this, but never found anything in a set like this. It also all fits in the container for simple storage. 

Sunday we finally got out of the house and went to church and out to lunch with some friends after. There was definitely still ice on our driveway because we kept slipping while trying to get in the car to go, it was hilarious, but thankfully we didn't fall, ha!

They are calling for more snow on Tuesday, so I am crossing my finger it does!

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FIRST SNOW OF 2018

WEEKEND RECAP

We ended up having a three day weekend and it was THE best. I was pretty sad to see it go, but I'm looking forward to a new week.

All day Thursday there was talk of snow, actually a few schools went on and closed early Thursday in preparation for it lol. We definitely blew it off, not expecting to get anything other than a dusting and woke up and got ready like normal Friday morning. Right before I left the house it started snowing, but it didn't look like it was going to do anything so I went on and headed to work. The closer I got to work to worse the roads got/visibility. I decided I was that close to work that I would just keep going and work for a few hours to get a few things done and then leave to get home before it got dark, because I knew it was going to be in the low 20's all day so once the sun went down everything would refreeze. My office is on a very large hill, but I have been told that they always salt it because there are so many offices on that road. Well, I got to the bottom of the hill and it was completely covered. I was still going to try it until I saw a large truck sliding down sideways so I just got out of the turning lane and headed straight back home. I passed six wrecks on the way home and took a huge sigh of relief when I made it back to our driveway.

Our neighborhood is always bad and there are hills in it, so that was a little tricky!

 Matthew worked from home and we enjoyed our snow day with Reagan! Ethan and Rachel came over that afternoon and ended up staying the night because the roads did get worse after dark. We spent the day by the fire watching TV and Matthew and Ethan worked on a coffee table they had been building all week. Rachel and I did make it out to the store that afternoon to pick up some stuff for one of my favorite soups for dinner that night.

Reagan's first snow! She HATES the rain, but loved the snow! She kept going to the door as soon as we brought her in and whining to go back out...girl didn't even care that it was freezing out!

When I watched the Gilmore Girls revival, Matthew joined me, even though he had no idea what was going on lol. Well I somehow talked him into starting back over at season 1 and he actually is enjoying it....and I thought I could not love that man anymore and then he goes and likes Gilmore Girls ;) So we woke up Saturday morning and binged watched Gilmore Girls for a few hours. Ethan and Rachel had to leave for a few hours that morning but ended up coming back over Saturday afternoon and we went to dinner and shopping! We had a gift card to At Home that we actually got last Christmas that we just kept forgetting about. Since we are determined to get things up on our walls this year we went there to look around to see what we could find. We went to BurgerFi first and it was just as good as I remembered, then on to At Home. At Home has so much stuff, I love that store! We ended up finding a clock for our living room! In this post I mentioned looking for one similar to the one I found at Bed Bath & Beyond, and I am happy to say that we found it and it was about $20 cheaper, and I liked this one better! Here is a picture that I took that night right after we hung it up, I'll get a better one soon and share. It is massive, we actually had to take it out of the box to get it to fit in the trunk of our car lol.

Sunday morning on the way to church it was absolutely FREEZING...8 degrees and sunny...I really only like 75 and sunny but oh well.

After church we decided to grab brunch at a new local place in town. It was really good and we're excited to go back for dinner there soon. We were back home and in our warm pjs by 11:00 Sunday morning with the fire going and Gilmore Girls playing lol. We may or may not have watched 6 hours of Gilmore Girls Sunday afternoon...no shame! I did get laundry done though lol.

Reagan enjoyed our cozy Sunday at home and took naps with us throughout the day!

At one point she kept whining for me to pick her up and once I did she stood on my shoulder like this for the longest time lol. No idea why, I guess this was comfortable for her!

 After church Sunday night we went to Blue Coast Burrito with Ethan and Rachel and then came back to our house and hung out for a little bit. 

So that was our weekend...see why I was sad to see it end? We have decided that snow days are even better when you're an adult! It'll be back up in the 60's by Wednesday so it looks like we won't be getting any snow days this week, sadly. 

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WEEKEND RECAP

WEEKEND RECAP: SNOW EDITION

Hope y'all aren't tired of all the snow posts, if you are, well then just skip right over this post ;)

Let's back up to last Monday...about 6:30 a.m. I dropped Matthew off with one of his coworkers and they headed up to Knoxville for the week. One of their big clients is up there and they had to spend the week up there working on them. I spent the week packing up our apartment and watching One Tree Hill. Fast forward to Thursday... all day Thursday there was talk of a "big snow storm" heading our way. I watched the weather all day and I'm positive it changed back and forth at least 3 times. At first they were forecasting the snow storm to hit early Friday morning, then they changed it hitting late Friday afternoon, and then changed it back to the morning. I talked to my boss and she told me that if it's going to do what they say it's going to do then they will close the office. I got off of work and did what any other sane person would do...I went to the grocery store....along with half of Nashville. I didn't get milk and bread though...just milk and other stuff for crockpot recipes. ;)

Thursday night I decided to take a night off from packing and spent it parked on the couch. I talked to Matthew for a little bit before he said he was going to bed, and then decided I was going to watch another episode of OTH before calling it a night. I got a call from Matthew five minutes later saying they were leaving in ten minutes and coming home. They were going to come home Friday mid day but decided it would probably be best to come home that night. So I cleaned up and then ran back to the grocery store to get breakfast sausage (the store I went to earlier was sold out- told you half of Nashville was there too) for breakfast in the morning and then headed to pick Matthew up. It may have been midnight but I was THRILLED!!!!!! We got back in a little after 1 that morning and went to bed.

We woke up Friday morning a little before 6 and this is what I saw outside our apartment! We are SO thankful they decided to come back Thursday night instead of Friday mid day! 

And that was the start to our snowy weekend! It snowed, and snowed, and snowed, and snowed, AND SNOWED all day Friday. Seriously, I don't remember it ever snowing that much and for that long. We watched it all day Friday and couldn't stop talking about how pretty it was. We decided (I talked Matthew into it) to go outside and walk around in it so I could get some pictures of it and a couple of us! Had to document our first married snow day, duh ;) And I am so glad we did! Everything was absolutely beautiful. I doubt he would admit it but I think Matthew enjoyed seeing it all, too!

The walking trail at our apartment

 So much snow on our roof!

We were sad the pond didn't completely freeze over lol oh well, still pretty!

We got 8 INCHES OF SNOW!

Our apartment did a great job of scraping/salting our parking lot. (This was the before picture lol)

We spent the whole day watching How I Met Your Mother and lounging around. It was perfect!

Saturday the snow was still around most of the day. We lounged around most of the day and then decided to try and drive over to our house. The roads were still somewhat messy but not terrible. Our neighborhood on the other hand was still really bad. We are SO thankful our moving day wasn't this past weekend and is this upcoming weekend! 

OUR HOUSE IN THE SNOW!!

And our backyard! I can already tell we are going to love having a backyard! And yes, that's a trampoline in our backyard lol the sellers left it.

Friday morning I made our favorite sausage roll ups for breakfast and I made crockpot sausage tortelloni for a late lunch/early dinner, along with cheesy-garlic pull apart rolls. 

 Saturday we had cheese biscuits for breakfast and a stuffed crust DiGiorno pizza for lunch...we love them but try to eat them only every now and then so I figured a snow day was the perfect time for one! For dinner I made crockpot chicken tacos (one of Matthew's favorites) and Mexican rice.

I put our crockpot to good use this weekend! I'll be sharing both of those crockpot recipes this week.

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WEEKEND RECAP: SNOW EDITION

Zumba + Smoothie King

Tuesday night we had our SOC girls night and it was so fun!!  My old roommate became a certified Zumba instructor over Christmas break and offered to instruct a class for us for a girls night. So Zumba class it was!
Surprisingly, this was my first Zumba class. I definitely feel like I got a workout and really enjoyed it!! Bri had great songs and moves and kept us going the whole class!!

After some of us went to Smoothie King. I had never been there either so I wanted to try it. It took me about 5 minutes to order because I had no idea what I wanted or what I would like. Here lately I have been on a pineapple kick so I went with the Pineapple Surf. Seriously one of the best drinks I have ever had. I saw they have 32oz for $5 on Fridays so I am going back tomorrow to grab one for lunch! 

Last night we walked out of church and the snow was coming down and everything was starting to turn white. We decided to still have our late night singing. Everyone headed over to the SOC house and we had yet another incredible singing. After the singing we all went outside and everything was completely white. Absolutely beautiful. There ended up being a snowball fight and of course pictures that needed to be taken ;)

This snow is definitely the kind of snow everyone wants. Perfect to build a snowman and snowballs, but you can still drive on it!

My drive to work this morning. 

As ready as I am for summer and warmer weather, you just can't help but realize how beautiful this is. I left early this morning in case the roads were bad but they were just slushy. I was able to take my time and not rush. It was a very peaceful drive with a pretty great view. 

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Zumba + Smoothie King

State of emergency in pictures

I'm back! I didn't intend to take a week off from blogging but last week I was just in a funk! We got hit pretty hard with an ice/snow storm and it ended up putting me out of work most of the week. I was out of work and stuck at my apartment Monday-Thursday. Thursday I was off due to some Dr. appts and then finally went in to work on Friday and ended up having to stay in Cookeville until Saturday due to more bad weather. I always tell Matthew how I would just love a day or two to myself at my apartment to relax and catch up on stuff. Well I got my wish and to be honest I completely had an awful attitude about it. I was bored out of my mind. I watched SEVEN movies on Netflix on Monday and by Wednesday I was almost finished with season 1 of Parenthood. I didn't go to the store before the weather hit so I didn't have much and what I did have I was so tired of eating it by Wednesday. I didn't get to meet Matthew for our weekly dinner because it wasn't safe for either of us.  I whined to Matthew a lot, I complained about the food I had in my refrigerator, I complained about not being able to drive anywhere, about not being able to go to the gym, about not being able to see Matthew and even about not being able to go to work.  Early Monday morning is when the first round of weather came in. I got up and was determined that I was going to work, even with 1/4 of ice covering my car. I started my car 30 mins early to help melt it and continued getting ready for work. I packed a lunch because I knew we still had more ice/snow coming and that I probably wouldn't be able to leave and grab a salad at lunch. I went back out to my car to leave and tried to scrape the ice off. Nothing. It was going anywhere, even after the 30 minutes of defrost. I finally was able to break through some and make a hole big enough that I could see to drive. My apartment parking lot was a complete sheet of ice. I slid trying to get out of my apartment parking lot and made it two mins down the road and slid a lot already. I then realized it's not worth it and decided to turn around and drive back to my apartment and call in for the day. The roads were just a solid sheet of ice and it was STILL coming down. I made it back to my apartment and called it a day. I parked it on the couch for majority of the day. The weather continued ALL day and eventually turned into snow. Tuesday wasn't any better. Everything was still frozen solid. I cleaned and got together stuff that I need to sell/donate. Tuesday night we got 4 more inches of snow on top of all the ice from Monday. I was planning on going home on Wednesday afternoon as soon as I got off but that didn't happen. Everything was closing. The university ended up closing ALL week, that hasn't happened in over 100 years. Wal-Mart closed, Kroger closed, McDonald's closed, everything.  I went home Thursday mid day after it warmed up a few degrees. The roads were still a mess, even the main roads. The interstate was slushy and had multiple icy spots, but I made it to my Dr appts. I went home to see my family for a little bit before I headed back to Cookeville. I got back right before dark because I knew all the slushy stuff was going to freeze over again.  Friday the ice arrived around noon. It would snow and then turn to ice and then back to snow. When I got off my drive was awful. I can make it to work in 10 minutes and it took me almost 40 minutes to get home with the traffic and just having to take the main roads and driving extremely slow.  I woke up Saturday with no electricity and by time I left Saturday around 11 I still didn't have any. I was finally able to meet Matthew for lunch in Lebanon! He had a hair appt around 2 and I had a bridesmaid appt to pick out my girls dresses at 5 so that was all we got to see of each other on Saturday.  Even through all of that I didn't realize how lucky I was. I complained because I was bored, even though I had power and TV, I complained because I was eating the same thing for three days straight, I complained because I wanted to just get out of my apartment, I complained because I couldn't see Matthew. I didn't realize how lucky I was until I started seeing people on Facebook sharing pictures of what it was like at their house. And then it was like a slap in the face and I felt awful for complaining. I was sick to my stomach for these people. I found these pictures off of Putnam County E-911's facebook page

Tennessee was under a state of emergency after Tuesday, I think. Multiple crashes were happening EVERYWHERE. A tragic story of a mother and her son trying to help someone on the side of the interstate when a semi struck them and killed both, I think the total is up to 22 deaths due to weather related wrecks, and then the state of emergency was raised to a level two for the northern counties that were hit so hard (the above pictures). Thousands are still without power. They have opened churches and some schools for shelters because people can't stay in their homes without power and with it still being in the teens.

I have been watching the news non-stop and reading people's updates on facebook and it's just gut-wrenching. 

So today I am thankful. 

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State of emergency in pictures

5 on Friday (an early surprise)

{ONE}  it.is.freezing.  and I am done with winter!!!! It breaks my heart knowing there are people without homes and a warm bed to sleep in. I am so ready for spring to get here! Here are some pictures from this past week This is what it looked like when I got off on Tuesday...I spent about 15 minutes scraping ice and snow off my car.

Tuesday night on campus!

{TWO} I am doing the hour photo challenge today, it's pretty exciting and I can't wait to share with y'all next week when I link up with Stephanie and Meg !!! You have until next Thursday so pick a day that you want to and do it too!     {THREE} Tonight the SOC is having an all nighter...I'm not sure how long I will be able to stay up but I'm pretty excited about it since I wasn't able to make it last year. They had planned to do an amazing race on campus but since it's going to be in the single digits and a chance of snow they decided to do something inside...thank goodness.   {FOUR} I have been dying to make some Valentine's Day crafts. There is so much on Pinterest that I want to try to make but so little time, ha! Here are some things I am thinking about making... This banner is ADORABLE and I would love to hang it somewhere in our apt!

 

 I have about 2 dozen mason jars just sitting under our sink that I pull out for different occasions but this would be so cute to do and fill with candy!

  {FIVE} I saved my favorite for last. Matthew surprised me with a new Bible with my name engraved on it last night.

It is absolutely BEAUTIFUL and I was so surprised.

Oh and this is my Valentine's Day Present...but you'll get the FULL story on Monday about that!

 

 

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5 on Friday (an early surprise)