It's Playtime in Memphis

I said in my last blog that playtime options are limited due to the winter weather here in Memphis. If you have checked the forecast, it will be warmer this coming week but spring is hardly here, despite what groundhogs and their shadows have said.
I believe the bulk of the blog readership is sans children but here's a little something for those that are parents. And to my kid-free friends, let me know if you'd like to join reed & I on any of these adventures :)

Here are some things you and your kiddos can do:

Children's Museum of Memphis.

The whole museum is a blast for kids toddlers-preteens but there is a new exhibit this month that Reed & I will undoubtedly be trying out. It's called Out On A Limb and it's open from now until May 15th for kids ages 10 and under. The Children's Museum website describes it as a "whimsical place for unstructured play" but really it's a bunch of indoor tree houses for kids to play in. Basically, it's awesome.

The Peabody Hotel Duck Procession
Okay, it sounds weird and I wouldn't drive all the way downtown just for this but if you're out and about in the west end of town, it's worth a stop-in. Every week day at 11am the ducks are processed downstairs to the Grand Lobby and then at 5pm the reverse is done as they are marched back up to the roof. If you have a toddler-aged child, such as reed, they are likely to be fascinated. Bonus- it's free!

Story Time at the Public Library's
depending on your neighborhood, they are on varying days but tend to be in the mid-late afternoon. Check the Memphis Library website for days and times in your neighborhood library. If you are a midtowner or an east memphis-er, definitely hit up the Main library on Poplar over the Highland or other branches; the kids area is much larger and they don't care if your child runs around in circles.

And to all Memphians, don't forget that Muddy's Bake Shop is open today for a special Valentine's Day treat. I always want Muddy's on Sundays & Mondays when they are traditionally closed so take advantage of the rare opportunity.

Happy Valentine's Day to all but to my love & husband Adam in particular. Thank you for asking me to be your wife one year ago today. I love you :)

You've Got a Friend in Me

Two posts in one day! How impressive. Well, I'm impressed anyways.

When I was a young lass, I fancied myself as a guy's girl. And while I can still hang with the boys with the best of them, after six years of all-girls school, three years in my sorority and four years of working at a female dominated tanning salon, I have realized that I am indeed a girl's girl.
And while I often mention my lady loves, we are all incredibly busy and it's a treat when I get to see any of them.

I manage to see my dear Robyn the most out of my fabulous group of girlfriends lately, due to a similarity in scheduling and also since reed is marginally obsessed with her and always wants to go see her. Sadly, her little sister and my best friend Elspeth & I sometimes don't get together unless our resident party planner Molly plans an event. Despite our penchant for talking on the phone pretty much daily, I miss her.

So today before school kicks off, we decided to have an Ellie & Raquel (& Reed) day. 

 We kicked off our day with an adventure to Collierville to show Ellie where her Television & Culture class is since they hide that campus from you for some reason (and for those attentive readers, yes I did take the same class from the same teacher in Collierville last semester. She's ridiculous). Afterwards, we had lunch at the Germantown Chili's due to the random chance that Ellie had a gift card.


But the true excitement of our BFF date was once we got back to my apartment. Reed went down for a nap, Adam retired to our bedroom to play a video game and Ellie and I turned into 17 year old girls.


In the midst of getting our impurities out via face mask.

I should preface this with the fact that elspeth & I are a teensy bit obsessed with face masks because they are so heavenly. if you can't see the bottle, this one was Alba and it felt fabulous, hence the excitement on our faces.


the after shot.
We took this picture ourselves because Adam is not a photographer and his turned out even worse. but trust me, our faces felt great, especially after the help of a little Proactive Green Tea moisturizer. And look how pretty Ellie is with no make-up!

It was a wonderful way to end winter break.

Ladies, go call all your best girlfriends and tell them you love them. Personally, I'm too lazy to pick up the phone so Ronni Jupson, Robyn Haire, Ellie Haire, Megan Wilson, Molly Foreman, Heather Pennel, Amanda Drescher & Lori Tenney: I love you all very much :)

It's Splitsville Time in Tinsletown

Tragedy has once again struck the collective of celebrity romances and it's time for me to write about it.

Just a week before Christmas, People Magazine's Current Sexiest Man Alive and the GQ Babe of the Year announced that they were splitting up. I assume there was simply too much vanity & hair products in this relationship but supposedly, it was simply that they never spent time with each other due to work. If that's the reason for your marriage ending, you are pretty much saying "Hey, I love my career more than I love you. But it's been fun." 

Scarlett & Ryan in happier times.

Zac Efron & Vanessa Hudgens.
 I'm not particularly upset about this one, though the Disney Darlings were fairly adorable together. It's still sad to see a years-long relationship end, whether I have an abnormal attachment to this particular couple or not, but I'm actually still surprised they survived the Vanessa Naked Picture scandal.

This is the one I'm truly upset about lately. 

Macaulay Culkin & Mila Kunis
These two went their separate ways after 8 years of dating, which always blows my mind that people can spend that amount of time together and then just throw it away. For celebrity couples, these two were pretty low key without being obsessive about privacy and just utterly adorable. In some pictures, they look a bit like a lesbian couple since they're both so tiny and pretty. I will miss them. 

If only I wasn't so enthralled with the goings-on of certain celebrities, I wouldn't be so upset when they had real life problems. Currently, I'm also pretty obsessed with Seth MacFarlane (the creator of Family Guy & American Dad) and trying to find out what he does besides a lot of voices and sing Dean Martin & Frank Sinatra. It's my new project, at least until school starts back up.

Stay Tuned.

it's the worst kind of heartache

tonight's blog is going to be about something very important to me.
it's a highly emotional topic and it's one that often I'm too upset to speak of so this is a special occasion.
i'm speaking, of course, of Celebrity Break-Ups.

there's been a string of them recently, some more devastating than others, and really, I needed to take to the blog to let out my feelings about this.
hey, it's cheaper than therapy.

let's go back to the genesis of when the celebrity break-up's really started to wound me. there were a few that tugged at my heart strings in the beginning;
riding to school freshman year of high school and hearing on the radio about Tom & Nicole (remember they were married before he kidnapped Joey from Dawson's Creek) was slightly disheartening but not truly upsetting.
No, the big one for me was also the big one for America:
the beloved Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston.

Brad & Jen
I have to admit, I'm still not over this. Despite their six kids, I still think Angelina Jolie is a homewrecker and I would rock those "Team Aniston" shirts from back in 2005 (that I totally would have bought if I'd been old enough to posses a credit card and online shop back then). The couple formerly known as Mr. and Mrs. Pitt are heartbreaking but not all that recent (tell that to OK! Magazine though, they are still running weekly stories about this drama).

Last year, the collective of Celebrity Relationships received another blow.

Tim Robbins & Susan Sarandon Split after 23 years.

This was pretty devastating. If you're not familiar with this particular coupling, despite their years together and two children, they were not married. At the time of their separation, Adam & I weren't engaged, much less married, and their supposed success without a marriage license gave me hope. After they broke up, all I had was Goldie Hawn & Kurt Russel.

It seems like in the last year we've had a lot of celebrity break-ups. The Tiger Woods and Sandra Bullock respective serial cheating sagas both ended in divorce. Bristol Palin got re-engaged and then re-broke up with her PlayGirl babydaddy all in the time that it took 2 US Weekly's to come out (publicity stunt?) And the final nail in the relationship coffin of The Notebook couple Ryan Gosling & Rachel McAdams was hit with a hammer (I'd like them to get back together, please) and Christina Aguilera filed for divorce a few weeks ago, despite telling the world that there Ain't No Other Man like her hubby.

But if there was one couple in La La Land who I thought would actually make it, it was Jen's BFF and her manchild husband.

Courteney Cox & David Arquette
Granted, the Arquette’s haven't filed for divorce and the lady of the family herself has said that this is a separation, not a divorce. However, David has gone all over the Howard Stern Show and Twitter about the girls he's screwed since their split and how his wife is tired of being his mommy. I smell divorce attorneys any second now.

If Celebrity Break-Up's don't break your heart, then probably you find me and this blog utterly ridiculous right about now. And that's okay, I understand. There are lots of things that upset other people that don't upset me. I can only hope that by some miracle of God or Perez Hilton one of these celebrities mentioned will be pouring through google posts of their name, come across my blog and realize they HAVE to get back together with their lost love.

that might happen, right?

happy tuesday, blog loves. if you're in Memphis, I hope you voted and I hope you remembered your rain boots. I only remembered to vote and I was cold all day.
Au Revoir.

What It's Like to Be a Wife: Day One

the wedding is over. check my facebook for pictures.

Adam & I are now married.
He is my husband, I am his wife. I am Mrs. Hinson.
I assumed, since literally nothing of our daily life would change, that being married wouldn't really feel any different. Granted, I'm only about 22 hours into this, but it does, in fact, feel different.
But what is more interesting, to me, is the wedded bliss thing that has, however momentarily, clouded our usual line of thinking. (the same thing happened after we got engaged- we didn't have a single fight for about 6 weeks)

Exhibit A
"Honey, wherever you want to eat tonight is totally fine. You put all the work into the wedding and this is your treat."
Okay, Adam can totally be the sweetest guy in the world but the man has strong opinions about food. Not only did he suggest sushi (I love it, he's not a fan so I don't eat it that often) but he asked our sister-in-law for a recommendation to a nicer place than usual.
It was his wedding night too but he made sure dinner was a treat for me :)

Exhibit B
I woke up this morning at 6 am and couldn't go back to sleep. I reached over to Adam's bedside table for the remote to catch up on our DVR'd shows. Adam stirred and I asked him if he wanted me to watch television in the living room: "Nope, I'm not going to ask my wife to watch television without the warm blankets we have in her"
Yeah, a week ago my ass would have been on the couch.

Exhibit C
At 9 am, I was bored and hungry (not bored enough, however, to get up and cook something for breakfast) so I woke Adam up and asked him to go get breakfast with me.
Normally, this is a sin against nature. Adam wakes up at 4 am nearly every morning so if happens to be capable of sleeping in, he really isn't to be woken.
Married Adam, however, rolled over and told me he'd love to as soon as he brushed his teeth.

It seems like I'm making unmarried Adam out to be a jackass (which he wasn't) but it's funny, marriage didn't seem to be a big deal to Adam. It seemed like he figured we were more or less married, but we should probably make it official for reed.

However, it seems as though Adam is pretty pleased to be a married man, and honestly, I couldn't be happier that the wedding is over and that I am his wife.

Now we get to go pick sweet little reed up from school. And yay, no more wedding blogs :)

reed's second birthday :)

Okay, I know. I said yesterday (which would have been Monday) and it's definitely Thursday. But before all my blog friends are mad at me, Reed's school has been closed for the last week and will be closed for another week so Mama Mondays came to a halt and left all the chores, errands and coffee/blogging dates to after Reed is sleeping. 

Onwards to Reed's Second Birthday :)

Reed's m&m birthday pancakes. Thanks Daddy :)

 Fireman Reed!

Daddy & Reed on the Police Motorcycle.

Climbing out of the tree trunk. Silly boy :)

Helping Daddy fly the plane :)

Playing with his presents from Aunt Nicole & Uncle Andrew.

Adam reading the leapfrog book to Andrew.

Uncle Andrew helping Reed dunk :)

Reed's Elmo Birthday Cake.

Reed's Memphis Jersey from Uncle Andrew & Aunt Nicole!

So Happy Birthday Reed! Mama loves you so much :)

And for anyone that's interested, here is mine & Adam's wedding website. Check it out, sign the guest book! 

Police Women of Memphis here I come :)

starting something new

hello all.

i'm starting this blog with the low expectations that not many people will end up reading it. not out of being self deprecating but because who has the time? especially when there are tons of blogs out there telling people what insane thing some cracked out celebrity is doing. i use that as an example because that stuff is a guilty pleasure of mine.

but anyways, about me. well there's the under 1200 character synopsis in my profile section and the title clues you in to at least two things. I'm a mother and I live in Memphis (Tennessee). I'm also a college student, returning to majoring in journalism and public relations. and no, I don't know what i'm going to do with that degree but I do enjoy the school work. My fiance Adam is wonderful. He works his butt off to bring home the bacon so I can go to school and take care of little man reed. i have great girlfriends, my little guy has lots of aunts that love him tons. but enough words about all
these fab people. after all, a picture is worth a thousand of them, right?


my little love :)

Adam. LOVE him.

my dearest elspeth. (we're thugs for life, apparently)

my lady loves (minus ronni, sadly). Memphis Sex & the City
Alison, my soul mate :)

my life is can be pretty hectic with school, baby reed, attempting to be a housewife, still having some sanity for myself and i've added being an amateur wedding planner to the list in the last few months. but i'm a pretty lucky lady in this young life and I hope you enjoy my ramblings :)