Author: Big Mama

Well, first, let me share the news that my eye is going to be just fine. I went back to the optometrist on Monday and he said he could still see where my cornea was scratched, but it appears to be healing just fine. And, in what was a real moment of triumph, I even wore mascara yesterday.

On Tuesday I woke up feeling so much better about my eye and life in general that I decided it was a good day to go back to Smart Barre. My original plan was to start at the beginning of January, but honestly I knew I was going to be so sore for the first few days that I never wanted to start because I couldn’t find a stretch of days when I wouldn’t mind that I might have to use the wall for leverage to get off the toilet. And so I procrastinated and then Caroline got sick and then I just wanted to sit on my couch and drink coffee instead of exercising.

But I finally realized I couldn’t put it off any longer. Mainly because it’s been in the 80’s here this week which made me realize there will come a day when I’ll want to wear shorts again.

So I went to Smart Barre and there was a moment when I was doing a plank that I had to accept that all the sugar cookies and wine over the Christmas holidays proved to be detrimental to my core strength. This was confirmed during ab work when the sweet instructor came to adjust the position of my legs to help me better target my lower abs and if I could have breathed or spoken at that moment I would have said, “It’s not that I don’t know where my legs should be as much as I can’t continue to do this exercise the right way or my guts will explode all over this room.”

In spite of that, I managed to get through the class and felt so energized afterwards that I came home and decided it was a good time to move the old armoire from our bedroom into Caroline’s closet. I won’t bore you with the game of non-musical chairs we’ve been playing with furniture right now, but the short version is we’re changing Caroline’s bedroom furniture and making room for a desk and decided that the best thing to do is to put a dresser in her closet. Then I remembered we have an armoire in our room that we aren’t using for anything. So I measured it and it turned out to be exactly the size I needed with even more storage than a dresser.

(So much for the short version. Good night. What is this? HGTV?)

Anyway, I got home from Smart Barre and, since P wasn’t home, decided to employ an old trick I read about from Martha Stewart years ago. I put beach towels under the armoire and dragged it across the house and into Caroline’s closet. That sentence makes the whole thing sound much simpler than it actually was so I’ll tell you there was a low point as I tried to wedge it into the corner of the closet that I wished I’d paid more attention in geometry. I felt the need to channel Ross Gellar and yell “PIVOT!” but it was just me and I was already pivoting for all I was worth.

Finally, I got the armoire positioned where I wanted it and then began the process of cleaning out her old dresser and moving all her clothes around. This led to making a pile of things she’s outgrown and things she just won’t wear which includes anything pink. And then the whole project essentially became a real life version of If You Give A Mouse A Cookie where one thing led to another and I wasn’t going to be satisfied until I had gotten rid of every single thing we don’t use or don’t need.

Before I knew it I had three full bags to take to Goodwill and two bags that went straight to the trash. And here’s a fact about me you may or may not know. There is nothing that makes me feel levels of pride and accomplishment like cleaning out some junk and loading bags in my car to haul it away. I mean I have written three books and I would never dream of mentioning it to a total stranger, but I will absolutely engage the lady checking out my purchases at Walgreens with my fascinating story of how I just cleaned out my daughter’s bedroom and playroom. Kind of like I’m doing in this blog post.

I spent the rest of the day on a productivity high and continued to marvel at the levels of neatness and organization I’d achieved. And you need to know it’s not even that impressive. I’m sure if an Elfa specialist from The Container Store came to review my work they would weep and tear their clothes in agony.

But I regret to inform you that I might have overdone it. I woke up Wednesday morning with a headache and achy feeling all over, but considering my guts almost exploded at Smart Barre the day before I didn’t give it much thought. However, I had plans to meet my friend Leah for lunch and I drove to meet her a little early so I could make a quick stop in Homegoods and could tell I was beginning to feel worse. After lunch I was going to run a few more errands and all of a sudden I had that feeling of I just want to be home RIGHT NOW.

And so I came home, took some Advil and laid on the couch until it was time to pick Caroline up from school. I think I’m either suffering from the beginning of a virus or a case of maybe you shouldn’t work out for the first time in months and then move an armoire across the house and clean out bags full of stuff from your house all in the same day.

I’ll let you know which one it is when I know for sure.

It’s been a long day. Not a bad day, just a day full of busy and running around and getting stuff done. And so here’s just a few quick things you might want to know about.

1. The Ikat Elephant

 

I’m such a fan of The Ikat Elephant. They have sales every Wednesday night on Facebook starting at 8:00 p.m. and Heidi gave me a sneak peek of this week’s offerings because I messaged her to ask if she was getting in any more of the monogrammed terry sweatshirts pictured up above. I bought Caroline and me each one before Christmas and it is my favorite thing to throw on. Lucky for you, she got more in stock and I personally would order a size up from what you normally wear.

But now I feel like I need a few of the other things she’s offering this week, specifically that knit and crochet charcoal kimono sweater which is available in sizes from small to 2XL.

Anyway, just visit The Ikat Elephant on Facebook and you can receive 15% off your total purchase at checkout when you use code Bigmama15 from January 28 until February 2.

2. Ten quotes for writers

My friend and editor, Stephanie, has a blog and yesterday she posted these great quotes about writing. I will tell you that I’ve seen one or two of these appear in emails she’s sent when I’ve emailed to let her know there is no way I can possibly finish whatever chapter I’m working on and all hope is lost.

 

3. Social Media stuff

I realize that not all of you are on Facebook or Twitter or Instagram, but lately I’ve received emails asking how to find me on all those various sources and so I thought I would make it easy for you if you’re interested.

Facebook – Melanie Shankle – The Big Mama Blog

Twitter – @BigMama

Instagram – melanieshankle

 

4. A Little Salty to Cut the Sweet by Sophie Hudson

This is Sophie’s first book that came out almost two years ago, but just in case you haven’t read it you might be interested to know the ebook version is currently FREE DOLLARS.

You can find it on:

Amazon

Barnes & Noble

Christianbook.com

 

5. Lindsay Letters

I’ve loved Lindsay Letters things for so long now and just thought you might want to see some of the cute things she has that might make great additions to your house for Valentine’s Day. Or any day.

These are some of my favorites.

Love is the only gold canvas

With You I am Home canvas

XOXO stamps

Have a lovely Wednesday!

In the interest of full disclosure, I will tell you that we recorded this last Thursday afternoon. I don’t think it makes much difference and can’t remember if there’s anything that makes it seem like it’s five days later.

Well, except for the fact that I don’t mention my eye injury because I can PROMISE it would have been a topic had it already occurred. Speaking of, my follow up visit to the doctor confirmed that my cornea is healing nicely and he said I just needed to continue to medicate with plenty of wine and chocolate.

Or maybe that’s just what I heard.

Anyway, I can’t remember everything we cover but I do know that Travis made a surprise guest appearance for the last fifteen or so minutes and you know I got him to do just a little Neil Diamond before it was all over.

Also, not surprisingly, we talk about Amy Grant.

You can click here to listen. Or here. You can even listen right here.

Or, as always, you can subscribe on iTunes.

This weekend was planned to be fairly uneventful. We don’t have any sporting events on the calendar yet and so it was just going to be low key. My biggest hope was to get some closets and cabinets cleaned out and figure out what we’re going to do with Caroline’s bedroom now that she’s decided she’s officially over pink and lime green and ready for a change.

On Friday night Caroline went to dinner with some friends and P left to go hunting and so I went to eat Mexican food with Mimi and Bops. I guess when you reach your forties, life comes full circle and you go back to spending some Friday nights eating dinner with your parents. They even took me out for ice cream afterwards. Fingers crossed they’ll buy me a pony for my birthday.

Later on I picked Caroline up from her friend’s house and we pretty much went straight to bed because we were both so tired. Which is why I found it so unfortunate the puppies decided to get up at 7:00 a.m. on Saturday morning. Actually, Piper did her patented voracious ear shake at 6:25 and I never really went back to sleep after that.

So at 7:00 a.m., I got up to let them outside and decided there wasn’t much point in going back to bed. My hope was that I could let them back in and maybe they’d go back to sleep while I dozed on the couch. The fact I thought this was even a possibility just proves that in the deepest part of my heart I am an optimist. Because what they did instead involved playing tug of war with one of Caroline’s headbands they found in her bathroom and playing chase around the dining room table. I put them back outside at one point but then they began to bark and I didn’t want to alienate the neighbors so I brought them back in.

I went ahead and fixed my coffee when it became apparent that going back to sleep wasn’t going to happen and sat on the couch to catch up on current events or maybe to look at people on Facebook when Piper came and put her head on my knee. All was forgiven because she is just the sweetest and so I scratched her ears and told her how pretty she is and then she put her paws up on my lap. I’m not sure what happened next because it’s all a blur, but somehow she ended up scratching my eye with her paw. Yes. My eye. With her paw.

It felt like hot nails.

I seriously think I blacked out for a minute and then I worried that my whole eye was gouged out. I walked into the bathroom to check the damage in the mirror and was relieved to see my eye was intact although very red and watery. So I rinsed it out and waited for it to feel better.

But therein was the problem. It never started to feel better. In fact, it began to feel worse and I couldn’t open it without it watering profusely. I’m not an eye doctor and I don’t even play one on T.V., but I knew this wasn’t good.

When I was fourteen years old, I woke up one morning and my eye wouldn’t stop watering. I tried to go to school, but it only got worse. And a trip to the eye doctor led to the discovery that I had somehow gotten a speck of paint on my eye that they had to laser off. This was all good and fine until the doctor informed me I’d need to wear an eye patch for a week. You know what will make an adolescent girl wish the ground would swallow her whole? Walking around high school looking like a pirate for an entire week. There are only so many times someone can walk up to you and exclaim “AARGH, MATEY!” before you start to feel a little fragile. Fortunately, I had a sweet mullet haircut to make it all look more attractive.

Anyway, on Saturday morning as I began to realize my eye wasn’t getting better, I consulted the Google in the hopes of finding an eye doctor who works on weekends. I called and told them my sad story and they said they could fit me in at 12:50. In the meantime, I tried to keep my mind off my eye by cleaning up the house and doing some laundry. But then I started sweeping and worried the dust was making my eye worse. So I dug through the basket of dress up clothes in Caroline’s closet, channeled my fourteen-year-old self and ended up cleaning the house looking like this.

This is probably not what Jimmy Buffett had in mind when he wrote A Pirate Looks at Forty. But you do have to admit that patch has some flair.

Mimi and Bops drove me to the doctor since my vision was impaired and I didn’t think I could see well enough to drive, thus making my transition back to childhood complete. The doctor put some drops in my eye, took a look through whatever you call that magnifying thing and said, “OH WOW. THIS LOOKS BAD.”

Well. That is very comforting.

He went on to say, “She got a chunk of your cornea with her paw.” Which was the first time I’d ever realized you really don’t want to hear the word “chunk” associated with your eye. He prescribed some antibiotic drops and debated on giving me a painkiller but said, “that might be overkill”. I assured him that I am a fan of overkill when it comes to pain relief, but he decided I’d be okay with just Extra-Strength Tylenol. I shared my story about the patch when I was in ninth grade and he told me they really don’t use patches anymore. Sadly, the optometry community made this decision thirty years too late to spare me from teenage angst.

The good news is my eye feels significantly better than it did yesterday and I’m going back to the doctor tomorrow so he can make sure it’s healing properly.

As for Piper, she has no idea she wreaked such havoc and caused me to spend lots of money and time at the doctor on Saturday morning. But Mabel knows. In fact, I found this haiku she wrote about it in her poetry notebook later that day.

Sister is too rough
Big paws nearly gouged an eye
She shows no remorse

I’m not even kidding.

Something is going on with our internet or WordPress and I just wrote an entire blog post with – well- let’s call it delightful and insightful commentary even though that may not be true – and the whole thing just disappeared into the wide world of the web.

So now you’re just going to get a quick version of the cute things I’ve found this week:

1. steve madden patzee bootie

I love these booties. But I might love even more that the name makes it sound like someone with a French accent is telling us Steve Madden patted someone’s bootie.

And, even better, these are 30% off with code HITREFRESH until the end of the day.

2. crochet trim hoodie

I love a hoodie with a little something extra.

3. topshop geo knit cape

Love the colors and style of this. I would replicate this exact outfit.

4. bib popover tunic

Always a fan of a white tunic. Easy to throw on with jeans or leggings with boots or flats. It’s a crisp, clean look. And this is 35% off with code BEST at checkout.

5. old navy pleated skirt

I always love these skirts by Old Navy. Perfect to transition from winter to spring to summer depending on what you wear with them.

6. simplicity on a saturday tunic

This is really cute to throw on with jeans now and shorts later.

7. woven hem layered look sweater

These layered look sweaters are great and on sale for $39.90. They come in several different color and pattern combos.

8. steve madden ecentric sneakers

I’ve been eyeing these for a while. A fun alternative to just your basic Converse sneakers.

9. weave lightweight poncho

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wait. A poncho for spring? Sign me up. I love how this looks with white jeans. But it also comes in a great navy and coral pattern too.

10. free people tie that binds blouse

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This blouse is so pretty in person and looks great with jeans. And it’s on sale for $49.95.

That’s it for today.

Have a great Friday.

So I pretty much spent yesterday catching up on all the things I’d neglected to do while I was in Dallas, including such exciting things as making a grocery list and then going to HEB to purchase said groceries. And I did some laundry and attempted to straighten up the drawers in Caroline’s room because she is basically incapable of finding the t-shirt she wants to wear without disturbing all the other t-shirts contained therein. I even tried this trick I saw on a friend’s Facebook page where you fold the t-shirts and line them up in the drawer instead of stacking them on top of each other, but to no avail.

I also spent some time doing hydrotherapy on Mabel’s leg which is a fancy way of saying I put her in the bathtub and sprayed it with the handheld shower head. The vet said this would help with the healing process and Mabel seems to think it’s quite the treat. And then I put together what might be my new coffee table. I say “might be” because I’m undecided on whether or not I’m going to keep it. It might be a little more antique gold than what I was wanting, but I’m going to obsess about it for a few days and get opinions from anyone who walks into or even nearby my house before I make a final decision. I’d get your opinion but that would require me to get up and take a picture and I’m past that point right now.

Speaking of new things that are still awaiting a final decision, I finally bought myself a new pillow. Some of you may remember that about two years ago I asked for recommendations for a good pillow because I was in need of a new one and, now – TWO YEARS LATER – I pulled the trigger. Maybe.

I’d long been intrigued by the My Pillow commercials and had a friend tell me several years ago that she adored her My Pillow and it was the best one she’d ever had. But I just couldn’t reconcile ordering a pillow online that I’d never felt or tested and if you’ve been reading this blog long enough you know I make the Princess in The Princess and the Pea look like a low maintenance sleeper who could doze off in the aisle seat of an airplane with no neck pillow.

On the My Pillow website it claims to be “the official pillow of the National Sleep Foundation” and that sounds totally legitimate even though I had no idea that such a foundation existed. For all I know it could be like when George Costanza made donations to The Human Fund. But I finally decided to order one over Christmas vacation when Caroline and I were watching T.V. one night and a commercial came on advertising a “Buy One, Get One Free” special on My Pillows. And I am a sucker for a BOGO. Plus Caroline said, “Oh Mom! We should try those pillows! They’re the official pillow of the National Sleep Foundation!”

Which just goes to prove the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.

So I went on the website and ordered them. They arrived a little over a week ago in a package that was so small that I didn’t even realize it was the new pillows until I opened it up. I pulled one of them out of the plastic packaging and tested it to see what I thought. And I’ll be honest, my initial assessment was that it was the jankiest pillow I’ve ever felt. Like if I’d tried it out at Bed, Bath and Beyond I would have dropped it and run the other way. It basically felt like the opposite of excellence.

But I kept thinking about all the promises from the website. It helps with neck pain and fibromyalgia and sleep apnea! Granted, I suffer from none of those things but still. I tucked Caroline in with her new My Pillow and she came out of the room about ten minutes later and said, “There is no way I can sleep on that thing. It’s so uncomfortable.” So we switched her back to her normal pillow.

However, I wanted to see for myself. I traded out my pillow for the My Pillow and laid there for about five minutes as I thought how it felt a little bit like I was lying on styrofoam peanuts. But, next thing I knew, I was sound asleep and woke up in the morning feeling refreshed. I decided it was probably just because I was so tired that I would have slept like that even if my head wasn’t resting on the official pillow of the National Sleep Foundation.

So I tried it again the next night and the next night and every night since because I keep waiting to decide it’s as uncomfortable as it seems to appear during the day. Yet I keep falling asleep on it and sleeping well. And I feel like the clock is ticking because there’s a 60 day money back guarantee. I’m just so intrigued that a pillow that feels so awful is allowing me to sleep. The whole phenomenon is fascinating, especially when you consider that I have tried and rejected so many other pillows over the years.

I can’t explain it.

But maybe the National Sleep Foundation is on to something.