Month: February 2009

  • Edition 52: Fashion Friday

    Yesterday morning Caroline decided to wear this cute pink camo outfit that I bought for her at the end of last summer. Since she’s grown about five inches in the last four months, the pants are no longer pants, but rather more of a capri. I was just thrilled that she wanted to wear something other than jeans.

    She put the whole outfit on and I asked her if she wanted to wear her tennis shoes. No, no she did not. She wanted to wear her Barbie mirrored platform dress-up shoes, which she would have been completely allowed to wear over my cold, dead body.

    When I told her no, I caused her to “have a lot of tears” and then she headed back to her closet to find a more suitable alternative. She emerged a few minutes later wearing red and white striped socks with a googly-eyed Santa Claus on the side with some red, sparkly mary-janes. It was a fashion combo that looked adorable during the holiday season, but doesn’t necessarily translate to late February. Or paired with pink camo.

    I told her she was more than welcome to wear the ensemble to school. In fact, my exact words were, “It’s your prerogative, but for the record, those are Christmas socks.”

    And then I had a moment of total clarity where I realized what’s missing from my workout playlist on my iPod. BOBBY B! Old school Bobby B. Because it is my prerogative.

    Anyway, before it was all over, she changed out of the Christmas socks into her Hello Kitty! socks and traded the pink camo capris for a pair of jeans. And somehow I managed to get her into the car and off to school without having to to medicate myself.

    I may enroll her in private school just for the uniforms. The wardrobe issues have me hanging on to my sanity by a very thin thread, my friends.

    Now for the questions.

    1. Several people are asking the same basic question: “What about skinny jeans? Am I too old for them? How do I know if they are right for me?”

    I’m going to be totally honest and say they might be right for you. They might be everything you’re looking for in a denim partnership and, if so, I wish you and your skinny jeans a lifetime of happiness.

    But, for me, they are wrong. It’s not a jean journey that I’m willing to take again. I wore skinny jeans for many, many years, but the majority of those years were before puberty really hit and I developed hips.

    The only reason I would personally buy skinny jeans would be to tuck them into a pair of great boots, but I just cannot imagine that I’ll ever go back to the skinny jeans with flats or heels combo. That particular brand of fashion ship has sailed for me.

    However, all that being said, they are in style. If you can pull them off, both figuratively and literally, then more power to you. I don’t think there’s an age limit as much as there is a figure limit.

    My opinion is that by the time you’re in your late twenties to early thirties, it’s more important to wear something that is truly flattering than to bow to the current trends.

    To prove my point this is a picture of A MODEL wearing skinny jeans. A MODEL. She probably eats one celery stick a day with a lemon water chaser and I still think she’d look better wearing jeans with some sort of wider leg.

    2. Brandy asks: “Where do you find cute, but affordable scarfs? And purses. I want a cute purse!”

    I linked to this on my Stuff I Like page yesterday, but I would totally check out Primo Purses if you’re looking for a fun, affordable purse. They’re going out of business and everything is 40% off. Another great site to find affordable, trendy purses is Aldo.

    As for affordable scarfs, they are everywhere right now. Walmart has them in every color for $5.00. FIVE DOLLARS. In the words of the tacky ammunition catalogs that P gets in the mail, that is CHEAPER THAN DIRT.

    Especially because the price of dirt has skyrocketed in these tumultuous economic times.

    And if you are like me and only venture in Walmart during times of excessive desperation or while participating in a scavenger hunt that requires you to take a picture of an elderly woman covered in tattoos and smoking a cigarette while riding a Rascal scooter, then you might prefer one of these darling scarf options.

    Remember, it’s the year of the scarf.

    3. Joan asks: “What is your solution to the muffin top? Please don’t say pilates.”

    Oh Joan. I promise I won’t say pilates.

    I believe that you need to become friends with some body-shaping garments. They are a marvel of modern fashion and make any outfit look better. Spanx makes a phenomenal body-slimming cami that has the ability to corral a muffin top. And Target sells a less expensive version called Assets, but I’ve heard it doesn’t have quite the power of Spanx.

    There is one other brand I’ve heard great things about called Yummie Tummie. They are body-slimming tanks that come in a variety of colors and, while they are a little pricey, it’s almost worth it just to be able to tell people you’re wearing a Yummie Tummie.

    4. Jessica asks: “I’m going to a rehearsal and wedding in March where the dress code is semi-formal/formal. What can a girl on a budget wear?”

    Well, the ideal scenario when you’re on a budget and need two dresses, is to find a friend that’s your size and borrow something. And if you don’t have a friend in your size, then you might want to make a new friend to expand your social horizons and your wardrobe selection.

    In all seriousness, your best bet is to probably go somewhere like TJ Maxx or Kohls. It can be hit or miss, but if you dig through the racks you might find some really cute dresses.

    And because I hate to not link to something, I think something like this cherry taffeta party dress would be precious for the rehearsal dinner and this black halter party dress could totally work for the wedding paired with some pretty patent heels and sparkly jewelry.

    5. Stephanie asks: ” While browsing today at the Fashion Show mall, they had a fashion show on swimwear for the season. Several of the models/ensembles involved wearing gloves with swim suits. There were a variety of lengths and textures- wrist length, elbow length, etc. My husband informed me that maybe its the Summer of the Glove, (I then kicked him in the shin) but it prompted me to ask you if this is a style trend that I was not informed of?”

    Oh, I hope so!

    Because I know when I’m wearing a swimsuit, my primary insecurities revolve around how my hands look.

    Y’all have a great Friday.

    I’m putting up Mr. Linky if anyone has any fashion advice they want to share with the group.

  • Jose, can you tile?

    My deepest apologies go out to Mac Davis. Apparently, he isn’t dead.

    I don’t know why I thought Mac was no longer with us, but I made the same mistake with Ed McMahon about two years ago. I guess it’s true what they say; out of sight, out of mind. And I am so glad that Mac isn’t gone because it means there still might be a chance that I’ll get to hear him sing “Tequila Sheila” in person.

    They just don’t make songs like that anymore.

    Yesterday I committed myself to cleaning the house and I decided I might as well start in the bowels (no pun intended) of hell, otherwise known as the master bathroom. As I cleaned, I spent a lot of time deep in thought. I thought about how nice it used to be when we had Cata clean the house even though her abuse of Pledge Grab-its almost drove us to the poorhouse and I thought about how people that are overly dramatic about inconsequential things get on my nerves.

    And then I realized I was about to die from the fumes of all the cleaning products and laid on the bathroom floor and wept for the years that Cata came on a weekly basis. Why is my life so hard? How long, O Lord, must I clean my own toilets?

    In all reality, I think I almost died at the hands of Tilex. I sprayed the entire shower stall liberally with the Tilex and forgot to turn on the bathroom vent. When I felt my throat begin to burn, I knew something was amiss and rushed to air out the bathroom. Because when my time on this earth is through, I don’t want to be wearing rubber gloves and holding a scrub brush.

    Anyway, every time I clean the shower I can’t help but think of Jose. When P and I added on to our house six years ago, Jose was the man who tiled our new shower stall in our new master bathroom. We had originally hired a man named Mr. Baldo of “Baldo and Son Construction” to tile the shower and other various jobs, but Mr. Baldo took off with our money before he ever completed all the work we’d hired him to do.

    Of course, we shouldn’t have been shocked by this turn of events considering that he’d already admitted to us that he didn’t actually have a son, even though his business was named “Baldo AND SON”. I guess he just felt that the “AND SON” gave him an air of legitimacy, much like Fred Sanford.

    We found ourselves without a tile guy and with a shower that desperately needed to be tiled. One of our sub-contractors mentioned that his brother-in-law, Jose, might be available to do some tile work, so we called him. He was more than happy to do the work, his price was reasonable and, best of all, he could start the next day.

    Jose showed up promptly the next morning with his bucket of grout and began laying tile in the shower. He turned out to be quite a chatty fellow and while he was working began to carry on a conversation with P. They talked about the neighborhood and our construction project and then Jose said, “You know? I didn’t even know how to install tile until last week, but I bought this video at Home Depot and now I think I know what I’m doing.”

    Well.

    That certainly is comforting, Jose.

    You would think he might have wanted to keep that bit of information to himself, but I think Jose was a firm believer in being transparent. And, as it turned out, he was also a firm believer in something else.

    P returned to the job site the next morning and could tell that Jose had left in a hurry. His tools were strewn about the bathroom and he hadn’t covered the bucket of grout. When Jose showed up that morning, P asked him what had happened. Jose informed P that our house was haunted by ghosts and we needed to have some sort of exorcism.

    Okay, sure. Let’s get that scheduled.

    When pressed further, Jose based this suspicion on the fact that he’d heard voices after everyone left. Never mind the fact that we live in a corner house where people are constantly walking by and every window in the house was left open. The logical conclusion was that we had us some ghosts.

    We never did have the house exorcised and, shockingly, we’ve never had any more ghost issues. However, there is something in our house that’s extremely frightening. The tile job in our shower.

    It’s painfully obvious that we didn’t need a priest as much as we needed someone with more tile experience than an hour spent watching a video from Home Depot.

  • Good help and good t.v. are hard to find

    When P got in from work yesterday, I told him that many of you seemed to think that he looks younger now than he did four and a half years ago. In the words of the late Mac Davis he said, “I can’t wait to look in the mirror ’cause I get better looking each day”.

    That’s not really what he said.

    What he actually said was something about the poor lighting of the photo and how it didn’t expose all his gray hair, but between you and me, I think he’s been dipping into my stash of Oil of Olay because his skin has never looked better.

    As for me, I’m trying to eat a little healthier these days because the temperatures have reached the mid-80’s here this week and all that sunshine is a constant reminder that I will donning the equivalent of just my underwear in public before I know it and taking the walk of shame at the neighborhood pool.

    Oh how I regret all the cheese I ate to get me through the long, mild winter.

    So last night after dinner, I decided to eat blackberries for dessert instead of my usual handful or fifteen of M&M’s. And, really, it was almost the same except for the fact that I didn’t find them to be at all satisfying or comforting. In fact, I think I felt a little rage towards the blackberries for not melting in my mouth like the Valentine’s M&M’s that have treated me so well throughout the month of February.

    Or maybe my healthy fruit snack (NATURE’S CANDY!) rage was misdirected and the real target of my anger was ABC and their stupid “Women Tell All” episode of “The Bachelor”. How many times now have I watched some “Bachelor” programming where they trot out Trista and Ryan as proof the show works?

    I’ll tell you.

    TOO MANY.

    But I’ve never been more grateful for the invention of the DVR because what could have been two hours of my life I’ll never get back, turned out to just be one hour and three minutes. Modern technology has allowed me the luxury of rotting my brain in moderation.

    On a totally different subject, when I walked through the door on Saturday night after getting back from North Carolina, I noticed that my kitchen island was completely covered in crumbs and various clutter in the form of a lot of catalogs that sell cheap ammunition. Then I carried my suitcase into the bathroom and saw that our sinks looked dirty and the shower door had grown some sort of film.

    I made the decision right then and there to fire our maid. Not to talk ugly about someone, but she is horrible. A chimpanzee on Xanax could do a better job of cleaning our house. I couldn’t believe she would let it get into that kind of condition. It was shameful.

    And then I remembered that I am the maid.

    I wish I could fire myself, but I don’t know if I could find anyone else who would be willing to clean my house in return for a cold Diet Coke and all the change they can find in the couch cushions or the pockets of P’s jeans.

    Needless to say, I’ll be spending the next few days trying to get my house back into some kind of order. While eating blackberries. And hiding my Oil of Olay from P.

    Oh, and maybe downloading some Mac Davis songs on iTunes.

  • My peeps

    This is one of my favorite pictures ever of Caroline and P.

    And this is one I took of them last week.

    img_6127.jpg

    Hello, time? I’d appreciate it if you’d slow down just a little bit.

    My heart can’t take all the growing up.

  • FYI, they have mountains in North Carolina

    I have to start this post by saying a huge thank you to all of you who prayed for me this weekend. You need to know that I appreciate it more than words could ever convey. I’ve said it before, but y’all are the best part of this blog.

    I’ve gotten so many emails asking about the weekend and how everything went, so I’ll do my best to recap in a concise, articulate form. But, really, when do I ever do anything that’s concise and articulate?

    By Thursday morning Caroline had been completely fever-free for 24 hours and seemed to be feeling fine. She went to school and when I picked her up at the end of the day, she excitedly told me all about her day and appeared to be completely over the flu. I was so relieved that I wasn’t going to be leaving town while she was sick.

    But I counted my flu-free chickens before they hatched.

    She slept in my bed on Thursday night and I could tell she was restless. Then about 1:00 a.m., I could feel the heat radiating from her body like one of those little stoves that the Amish make. The fever was back. I gave her some Motrin and then spent the next two hours listening to her feverish ramblings about how her favorite Disney princess is Pocahontas because she has a pet raccoon.

    Technically, I’m not sure that Pocahontas is really a Disney princess, but I didn’t want to argue the point at 4 a.m.

    Anyway, she finally fell asleep again around 4:45 in the morning, just in time for me to get a refreshing 15 minutes of sleep before my alarm went off at 5:00.

    Armed with about two hours and fifteen minutes of sleep, I stumbled into the bathroom to get dressed, stuff a few more things in my suitcase, and then head to the airport. I’ve never felt more refreshed.

    Also, P was still asleep when I left the house so I just put a note by the coffee pot that read, “Caroline has fever. No school today. May God have mercy on your soul.”

    Once I got on the plane, I was gripped with fear. Not fear that we might crash, not fear of the fact that I was speaking to a group of women, but fear that I would fall asleep with my mouth open in front of a plane full of strangers. And, horror of horrors, maybe even snore.

    (Disclaimer: I don’t normally snore. I am way too delicate and feminine. I just thought the altitude might cause some freak sinus issues.)

    Sure enough, I did the fall asleep, mouth open, head bob and jolt awake routine more times than I want to recall right now. To my fellow passengers on Delta Flight 5022, I apologize.

    Once I arrived at the airport in Asheville, North Carolina, I was greeted by Becky and Beth who were holding a large sign that said “BIG MAMA”. At that moment I was so proud that I chose such a distinguished, sophisticated name when I started this blog back in July of 2006.

    We headed to The Cove Retreat Center and the scenery was unbelievably beautiful. I asked a lot of intelligent questions like, “Are those mountains or just really big hills?” At that moment I bet Becky has never questioned her judgement more in asking me to be a part of their retreat.

    The whole weekend was just one of the biggest blessings of my life. I spoke at four different sessions with an overall theme about being the woman that God calls you to be. All the prayers you said were absolutely answered because I didn’t pass out and I didn’t trip over anything. Each time I got up to speak, the nerves went away and I felt total peace.

    More than anything, I have to say that the women of Lee Park Baptist in Monroe, NC are some of the most incredible women I have ever been privileged to meet. They could not have made me feel more welcomed or loved. As I heard bits and pieces of some of their stories over the twenty-four hours I was with them, I was amazed by their faith and strength. They inspired me.

    I got to meet a woman who’s traveled to over 68 countries in her life and is celebrating her 60th wedding anniversary this year by traveling to about five more. She has more energy at 78 than I had, well, EVER. I talked to a woman who just found out last Monday that she has breast cancer. There were women there facing so many challenges and struggles that I don’t even know what to say except that it made me feel incredibly humbled to be there.

    And, y’all, they made me laugh out loud. There is nothing I love more than a group of people who don’t take themselves too seriously. I got to see some stupid human tricks, a New Kids on the Block rap, and a preacher’s wife who wasn’t afraid to wear a paper plate bonnet.

    I heard all about Harris Teeter, which is one of their local grocery stores, and I now know that if I ever need to find plastic, curved toothpicks that you can get them in the wine department and if you ever buy a rotten coconut, you can bring it back and they’ll replace it with not one, but TWO coconuts. And they have their London Broil on sale this week, buy one get one free, and if you put it in the crockpot with some Lipton Onion soup mix, it is delicious.

    I never thought I’d feel sad over a grocery store, especially since we have HEB here in Texas, but now I feel like I’m missing out on a blessing because I’ve never been to a Harris Teeter. (Even though I never could remember the name and I kept referring to it as Humpy Wheeler. Which they all appreciated because Humpy Wheeler used to be the head of NASCAR and we were in North Carolina so they all actually knew who I was talking about.)

    What I’m trying to say (so much for concise and articulate) is that they just took me in and made me feel like I was their own. And for a nervous, tired girl from Texas who wasn’t sure what she was doing there, it was a huge blessing. So, big shout out to Lee Park women. Thanks for everything.

    When I finally got home late Saturday night, P met me at the door and told me there was leftover sushi in the fridge. California Roll is my love language. So I ate my sushi, talked his ear off, and then headed to bed.

    Caroline was in our bed and when I tip-toed in the bedroom, she opened her eyes and said, “HELLO MAMA!” and then fell back asleep so she would be well-rested and ready to wake me up for a round of Candyland by 6:36 a.m.

    I think she’s back to her old self.

    Y’all have a great Monday.

  • Unfashionable friday

    Okay, so it’s not Fashion Friday, but I’m sitting in the San Antonio airport and it’s 6:31 a.m. I need to do something to keep myself from curling up in one of these chairs and falling asleep.

    Last night I was trying to pack and Caroline wanted to help. I laid out a few outfit choices trying to decide which ones I wanted to cram into my carry-on bag. There was one jacket that was questionable, so I decided to try it on to see how it fit.

    As I was looking at myself in the bathroom mirror, Caroline walked in and said, “I would not go with that jacket.”

    Okay, Anna Wintour. I’ll take that under advisement.

    So then I decided to see how it looked with a certain necklace.

    “Oh Mama, please not that necklace. I am not a fan.”

    According to her, I have no business telling anyone what they should wear. It’s a wonder that I can dress myself.