Author: Big Mama

  • Some stuff that relates to Thanksgiving

    Yep.

    6:45 a.m. yesterday morning. That’s what time Caroline woke me up by shaking me and saying, “I’m supposed to go running with Bops and he forgot to wake me up!”

    And I looked at the clock and growled, “IT’S ONLY 6:45. GO BACK TO SLEEP.”

    She didn’t listen to me.

    Instead she jumped out of bed, put on her running clothes and ran downstairs to make sure Bops still planned to take her for a jog around Memorial Park. Honestly, the exercise first thing in the morning gene must have skipped a generation.

    Because I rolled back over and tried to go back to sleep. I’m not sure I ever did, but it makes me feel better to say I was successful.

    So, yes, we’re in Houston. Mimi and Bops bought a little place in Houston over the summer and we decided to come visit them for a few days. They still have a house in San Antonio, this is just like a vacation home. And, no, I don’t know why it’s not on a lake like most vacation homes. They missed the big city with all its restaurants and shopping and I have to say after spending most of yesterday walking around The Galleria and eating incredible Italian food for dinner that they may have a point.

    But we’re headed home in the morning because it will be time for me to begin all the slicing and the dicing and the chopping for Thanksgiving dinner. I’m also sad to report that it’s inevitable that I’m going to have to make one more trip to HEB.

    Here are just a few quick notes of interest:

    1. Beth is sharing some Thanksgiving cooking tips over on the LPM blog and giving readers a chance to leave comments with tips over their own. It’s totally worth checking out right here. I’ve already learned that Williams-Sonoma makes the best base for turkey gravy and that’s the kind of information that can change your life.

    Or at least your mashed potatoes.

    2. The Aggies and the Longhorns are meeting on Kyle Field for the last time this Thursday night at 7:00. And I want the Aggies to win so bad that I even dreamed about it last night. I also looked online and debated buying a way too expensive ticket at the last minute and hauling down to College Station to see it in person.

    I’m sick that the rivalry is ending for now. What are we going to do in Texas next Thanksgiving?

    For now I am consoling myself with one of my favorite renditions ever of the Aggie War Hymn by my friend Shaun Groves.

    Beat the hell outta t.u.

    3. Several of you asked for the recipe for my broccoli rice casserole. I also have a recipe for dressing and a recipe for cranberry sauce that doesn’t come from a can. You can find all those recipes and EVEN MORE on this page that lists every recipe I’ve ever posted.

    Apparently I used to cook more than I do now. When was the last time I posted a recipe?

    I guess no one needs to know that you take the pizza out of the wrapper and place in oven.

    4. I think I may have mentioned this years ago, but I have a family goal. I want us to become a family that plays games. Like card games or Trivial Pursuit or something. Do y’all have any favorite games that will provide hours of fun for the entire family until someone decides to be a sore loser and throws their cards across the table? (Bops, I’m looking at you.) Please fill me in.

    5. That’s it for today but I hated to end with just four things.

    Have a lovely day.

  • It would appear I have found my words

    So here’s something great. Caroline’s out of school for this entire week to celebrate Thanksgiving. Which means I won’t have to be up at 6:45 a.m. packing ham sandwiches and carrot sticks in a lunch box.

    Instead I’ll be up at 6:45 a.m. growling, “GO BACK TO SLEEP. IT’S ONLY 6:45 IN THE MORNING. WHY ARE YOU AWAKE?”

    I know this to be true because it’s what I did on Saturday and Sunday morning and I see no reason why it should be any different at this point. Even though it’s 10:33 p.m. right now and she’s still awake playing some game involving a barking Chihuahua on my iPhone.

    I’ve never wished more that I didn’t own an iPhone.

    Anyway, I picked her up from school on Friday afternoon and we went straight home to finish packing our suitcases so we could meet up with Gulley and her boys and hit the open road. We’ve had tickets to go see the Aggies play Kansas since August when I was naive and optimistic enough to believe the Aggies would be going into that game undefeated, ranked in the top ten and about to win a final Big XII Championship.

    Bless my heart.

    Hope springs eternal.

    But we were still excited because it’s become a tradition for us to go see Honey and Big the weekend before Thanksgiving and it was going to be Caroline’s first Aggie football game and she doesn’t care if they’re ranked. She just cares if there will be popcorn and large snow cones.

    We ended up taking two cars because Gulley’s husband was going with us and Caroline and I planned to drive to Houston on Sunday instead of home to San Antonio. (I realize this post is chockfull of unimportant details but we all know I have a fondness for over-explaining.) This led to much debate about who was going to ride in which car and with whom. For some reason Gulley’s husband didn’t go for our suggestion that he drive the car full of kids and let us ride together and so the journey began with me all by myself in the stay wag and Caroline in the car with Gulley, Gulley’s husband, Will, and Jackson.

    It was a blissful forty-five minutes full of much loud singing to whatever I wanted to listen to.

    (On a side note, I can’t explain how disturbing it is to me that I can remember ALL THE WORDS to any song by Juice Newton or Alabama even thirty years later. Yet I threw away my car keys in the trash last week. The human brain is a mystery.)

    (Just call me Angel of the Morning.)

    (Just touch my cheek before you leave me.)

    We made a quick pit stop in San Marcos because Gulley and I are both at a point in life where we have to go to the bathroom every hour. It’s very glamorous. And while we were taking a bathroom break, Gulley hopped in the car with me along with Will and Caroline. Unfortunately Will had spent the previous forty-five minutes eating an entire bag of gummy bears and began to feel a little queasy right as we got to Bastrop.

    Which led to Gulley having to climb into the backseat of the car and hold an empty bag of Doritos while he threw up in it. Needless to say the entire experience caused me to suffer from post-traumatic Ecuadorian bus syndrome. The bag of chips, the car sickness, the crying. It was a dark time for me. And I had to MIND OVER MATTER myself to not pull over and get sick right along with Will.

    I called Gulley’s husband to let him know we needed to stop again, chiefly to dispose of the offensive Doritos bag but also to procure a Sprite to settle Will’s stomach. We pulled over at a Shell station and Gulley and Will got back in their own car. Caroline chose to stay with me because we both know that once Will blows there’s a good chance it will happen again.

    When we finally pulled up in Honey and Big’s driveway an hour later, Gulley told me that she’d sat in the back seat with Will the rest of the trip and stroked his hair until he fell asleep. He woke up about five minutes outside of College Station, lifted his head from her shoulder and said in an accusatory tone, “Next New Year’s Eve if we go to the ranch I wish you’d remember to bring my jacket. I was so cold last year because you forgot my jacket.”

    Isn’t motherhood full of special moments that warm your heart and make you consider throwing your own child out of a moving car as you yell, “I JUST HELD AN EMPTY DORITO BAG FULL OF VOMIT FOR YOU. YOU CAN REMEMBER YOUR OWN JACKET.”

    Fortunately, Saturday brought a day full of great memories and good football. The game started at 11:00 but the kids got up early to go to their first tailgate party with Gulley’s husband.

    They practiced sawing Varsity’s horns off before they left.

    And then Gulley, Honey, Big, and I met them at Kyle Field right before game time. I’m all about tailgating, I just prefer to do it at an hour that I don’t consider the crack of dawn. The Aggies had a 35 point lead going into halftime and, even though we’ve shown we can blow a halftime lead like no one’s business this year, I felt like we were probably safe.

    And then, to our great delight, the entire Aggie band plus the Corps of Cadets formed a block T on Kyle Field for the first time since 1956.

    After the game we all decided we were up for a little tailgating and were so excited to meet up with AJ for just a little bit.

    And our friend, Michelle. Even though my hair is so unfortunately windblown in this picture. Easy on the hairspray, Nancy.

    I cannot explain why my hair appears to be the only one affected by the wind. But that’s my story and I’m sticking to it. Michelle was kind enough to say it was a windblown look like in a magazine, but it’s rare to see a magazine featuring hair that looks like it could make a nice home for a small bird.

    We eventually made it back to Honey and Big’s house. Honey had cooked a huge dinner and Gulley and I went to pick up Nena so she could join us. Nena lives in a retirement center that’s full of activities and she asked to live there about two years ago because so many of her friends are there. They are constantly getting together plus Honey visits her almost every day whether it’s to take her out to lunch or to do her laundry. Nena is self-admittedly a social butterfly and even enjoys happy hour at the retirement center on the days when Mrs. Herzog doesn’t kill the mood by coming in and playing hymns on the piano.

    But Nena decided that she was going to serve up some guilt along with the ham and beans Honey made for dinner. And as we sat around the dining room table we were talking about someone who was all alone. Nena said, “That’s like me. I’m all alone. All the time. I’M JUST ALL ALONE.”

    Honey piped in and said, “Mother, that’s not true. You have friends all around you. Your children visit you almost every day. Most days you eat three meals a day in the dining room with all your friends.”

    Nena replied, “Yes and it’s exhausting. I feel like all I do is dress for dinner.”

    Which kind of contradicts her earlier statement about being all alone.

    And that’s when Gulley looked at Honey and said exactly what I was thinking, “”Next New Year’s Eve if we go to the ranch I wish you’d remember to bring my jacket. I was so cold last year because you forgot my jacket.”

    Because guilt really is the gift that keeps on giving.

    No matter how old you are.

  • Fashion Friday: Edition I’m kind of phoning it in but there’s a giveaway

    My heart isn’t in Fashion Friday today. To be honest I think I’m finally going to admit that I’m suffering from a tad bit of Post Traumatic Ecuadorian Stress Syndrome. Maybe I’ll go into more detail about it next week if I find a way to put it into words.

    But right now I kind of feel like I’m out of words. Which would be okay except for that book I’m supposed to right. I’m just choosing to believe my words will return next week.

    (Please notice that I just typed the “book I’m supposed to right”. I would change it to “write” but I feel like the typo perfectly illustrates the current state of my brain.)

    (I’m sure my book editor will be so pleased.)

    Anyway, on a fashion related note, my friend Kendi from Kendi Everyday was asked to come up with thirty looks using thirty pieces from the Fossil collection for their lookbook. Let’s just bypass the part about how envious I am of that entire assignment and the fact they styled her with some hairstyles that make me want to cry at the perfection.

    Let’s also overlook the fact that we aren’t really friends because we’ve never actually met. But we did exchange emails once and had plans to meet and I’m going to believe that counts. We are totally friends.

    The point is that she came up with some great looks. Here are a few of my favorites:

    You can see the rest of the looks she came up with on the Fossil website. It’s given me some great ideas about how to mix and match things I already have in my closet, although I also feel like I might need the jacket she has on in the second photo.

    In other EXCITING NEWS, the nice folks at Ruche are offering a $50 gift certificate to one lucky winner. If you’re interested just click over to my giveaway page and leave a comment there for a chance to win.

    Y’all have a great Friday.

  • I will give thanksgiving for sleep

    I feel like I need to apologize in advance because I’m going to talk about being tired. Honestly, I just googled “sleeping sickness” to make sure I don’t have it.

    As it turns out it’s generally only contracted in Africa after being bitten by a tsetse fly. And tsetse flies don’t live in South America. I know this is true because the google told me so.

    But maybe I’ve become a narcoleptic at some point in the last week because all I think about is when I can sleep again. And I’ve really gotten a decent amount of sleep, but I think I’m working off a major Ecuadorian sleep deficit.

    I’m also enjoying the luxury of flushing toilet paper down the toilet and brushing my teeth using water right out of the tap. It really is the little things.

    Anyway, there isn’t much going on here right now. I got home late Saturday night and spent the next twenty-four hours with Caroline sitting as close to me as she could possibly get. Not that I was complaining. I was overjoyed to see my people.

    And at some point I realized I had to tackle a giant pile of laundry, including the jungle attire I brought home in a garbage bag inside my suitcase because it smelled so bad that I was afraid it might contaminate all my other clothes. Thankfully P had done his own laundry before I got home, but Caroline’s clothes hamper was overflowing.

    Of course after I started sorting her dirty clothes into whites and colors I realized it was largely due to the fact that she just threw everything into her hamper whether she’d actually worn it or not, including several shirts still on the hanger, a down puffy vest and three stuffed animals. And so we’ve since had many discussions about what actually constitutes a dirty clothing and navigated the skill of hanging clothes ON HANGERS instead of just shoving them into a hamper for your narcoleptic mother to deal with.

    But I’m happy to report that all our clothing was clean for at least six minutes. It was a tremendous accomplishment although short lived.

    I also made a marathon trip to HEB to buy milk, eggs, every other item of food you can possibly imagine, chocolate and wine. The wine and chocolate were to help me recover from all the laundry.

    And now I’ll spend the rest of this week going to a Thanksgiving lunch at Caroline’s school because I never miss an opportunity to eat instant mashed potatoes. Then there’s a fun run fundraiser at her school on Friday and I volunteered to count laps as the kids run. And then I will officially give thanks that next week is Thanksgiving and I’m done with fundraisers and packing lunches and braiding hair at seven o’ clock in the morning for an entire week.

    Of course there is the small detail of Thanksgiving lunch. I’m hosting the entire thing at my house which I’ve never done before. And I’m trying to plan the menu. All P cares about is dressing and chocolate ice box pudding for dessert. All I care about it is dressing and broccoli rice casserole. But I feel like there should be more. Obviously a turkey. Even though I personally believe the turkey is just a vehicle to get the dressing in your mouth. I guarantee the Native Americans ate turkey because it’s all they managed to shoot that morning and I don’t know why we insist on perpetuating the tradition of serving tasteless, dry bird. Why couldn’t they have killed a nice cow so we could all gather around and eat steak instead?

    What do y’all have for Thanksgiving? Are there any dishes I need to try? Last year I made roasted Brussels sprouts with pomegranate molasses and I felt that the molasses was a mistake. Which was sad considering I went to eight different stores to find it. I’d love to hear what’s on your MUST HAVE Thanksgiving list.

    Unless it involves green bean casserole with french-fried onions on the top. There was a year in my childhood when I got into a can of those french-fried onions and didn’t know that a little goes a long way. It was unfortunate.

    I still bear the french-fried scars.

    Now excuse me while I go to bed. After all, it’s 9:45 and Mamaw needs her rest.

  • Bare Minerals Giveaway

    BareMinerals Eyeshadow Giveaway

    **Please note that this post was originally posted here. All entries via comments here will be pooled with those entries.  No duplicate entries, please.**

    So, I turned forty in August. I know. But it’s weird, because forty doesn’t feel like I thought it would. Especially when I was in my twenties and believed forty was some ancient age that came with a minivan and elastic waistband pants.

    I think part of the reason forty seems okay is because forty looks a lot different than it used to. When I look around at all the women I know, I tend to think the ones that are the most beautiful are the ones in their forties. Maybe it’s because we’ve quit trying so hard and grown comfortable in our own skin. It’s no longer about what pleases others, but about what makes us feel beautiful.

    Pretty is a state of mind, but beauty is a force. True beauty is accepting the wrinkles that have come with time and making them work. It’s not focusing on our imperfections, but learning to appreciate what we have and go with it. Even though there are days I don’t like what I see in the mirror or those new lines around my mouth, I’ve come to accept it’s part of who I am, and there’s no point in making myself miserable over things I can’t change.

    I mean, technically, I guess I could change those lines with Botox but that seems like it might be painful. So I’ll take the new lines and appreciate them because real beauty is a life filled with a lot of laughter, and that’s why I have those lines in the first place. Well, that and fading collagen production.

    But y’all know I am always on the lookout for a great new product. Which is why I was so excited to have the chance to review the new bareMinerals READYTM Eyeshadow 2.0. They sent me The Epiphany duo and even though the colors are a little more dramatic than I normally wear, I loved the rich texture and the way it lasted all day. It goes on super easy and allows me to create equally good looks for daytime or evening depending on how I blend the colors.

    And speaking of blending colors and application, check out these great tutorial videos they’ve put together. I love them.

    The best part is you have a chance to win a bareMinerals READYTM Eyeshadow 2.0 by sharing your thoughts and opinions about how you define a force of beauty, in the comments section of this post.

    Here are the rules:

    No duplicate comments.

    You may receive (2) total entries by selecting from the following entry methods:

    a) Leave a comment in response to the sweepstakes prompt on this post

    b) Tweet about this promotion and leave the URL to that tweet in a comment on this post

    c) Blog about this promotion and leave the URL to that post in a comment on this post

    d) For those with no Twitter or blog, read the official rules to learn about an alternate form of entry.

    This giveaway is open to US Residents age 18 or older.

    Winners will be selected via random draw, and will be notified by e-mail. You have 72 hours to get back to me, otherwise a new winner will be selected.

    The Official Rules are available here.

    This sweepstakes runs from October 25 – November 22, 2011.

    Be sure to visit the Promotions & Prizes page on BlogHer.com where you can read other bloggersí reviews and find more chances to win! For even more information, become a fan of Bare EscentualsÆ on their Facebook page!

  • And speaking of a jungle…

    Oh.

    Hi.

    It would seem that I haven’t been so great with the regular posting since I got home from Ecuador. I mean other than the giveaway for the HP computer, but that doesn’t really count. Especially when you consider that I am normally borderline obsessive about posting something new by midnight every night.

    So I’m going to say that I am tired.

    I know. It’s so lame.

    But it’s so true.

    We woke up at 4:00 a.m. on Saturday morning to catch our flight from Quito to Miami and I consoled myself with the thought that I’d be home on my own couch eating Mexican food by 7:00 Saturday night. But then American Airlines decided to have a “small mechanical issue” on my flight from Miami to Dallas and the next thing I knew I was throwing myself on the mercy of an American Airlines gate agent, begging her to get me on the next flight to San Antonio since they were the reason I missed my original flight.

    And so I got home, just as fresh as a daisy, at 9:30 Saturday night.

    After fifteen hours of travel.

    I have spent the last several days hugging my people, eating guacamole and chips, and trying to catch up on sleep. I also went to the mall yesterday to buy new makeup because I’d told myself before the trip that I needed to buy new makeup as soon as I got home. But then I was at the mall and thought how absurd it was that I just got back from the poverty-stricken jungle and I’m spending $40 on tinted moisturizer.

    Welcome to re-entry.

    It is delightful. And conflicting. And just kind of hard.

    But I still bought the tinted moisturizer because I was totally out and I’m forty years old and I need a good moisturizer. And then I just spent the rest of the afternoon feeling bad about it.

    On the plus side, I don’t think I have malaria.

    Not that I really ever thought I had malaria but, you know, I was in the jungle with mosquitoes. But since it appears I made it out without a single bite it looks like I’ll be okay.

    Is this making any sense?

    No. I didn’t think so.

    My brain still isn’t functioning normally. As evidenced by the fact that I read a headline yesterday that said, “First interview with Giffords”. And I thought how weird because does any really care about Frank Giffords anymore? I mean, I know Kathie Lee is on The Today Show with Hoda and maybe she talks about Frank a lot. I don’t really know because I can’t watch Kathie Lee without wishing that television had never been invented and that feels like blasphemy and so I just stay away from that hour of The Today Show.

    But then I realized about ten minutes later that the headline was actually referring to Congresswoman Giffords.

    Yes. That makes more sense.

    And, also, it’s Frank Gifford. Singular.

    Anyway, I promise that henceforth I will be back to my regular Monday through Friday posting schedule. However, I can’t promise that I’ll write anything meaningful or useful.

    In other words it will be back to normal around here.

    Thanks for a little bit of grace as I get back to life as usual.

    ———————————————

    Y’all make sure and check out the Bare Minerals eyeshadow giveaway. Because it’s fabulous eyeshadow and you could win it! Just click over to my giveaway page.