Author: Big Mama

  • Ten things I’d like to share that are of debatable interest

    I’m very busy watching the Sugar Bowl right now and being an Arkansas Razorback fan for the evening. We’ll see how that turns out.

    Anyway, in lieu of a real post with paragraphs, here are ten things that I thought I’d mention and/or share.

    1. There was a question in yesterday’s comments about how to make choffee. I really don’t want to brag, but I consider myself to be the foremost hot choffee maker in the United States. And possibly the planet.

    I only use Ghiradelli Double Chocolate hot chocolate mix. I put three heaping teaspoons in my favorite oversized coffee mug while I heat up a cup of skim milk in the microwave. I add about two or three splashes of P’s morning coffee (Ted Nugent’s Wackmaster Sunrize made with a french press because if it’s good enough for Uncle Ted then it’s good enough for us.) and then pour in the warm milk. Then I heat the entire mug up for an additional 30 seconds or so.

    No, I’m not high maintenance. Why do you ask?

    2. Speaking of microwaves, we had to throw out our old microwave after we burned the Kraft Mac and Cheese to the ground a few weeks ago. The smell. My word, the smell. I can still smell it right now if I think about it for too long and then I begin to gag.

    So I went to Target and bought a new microwave. It’s a stainless steel Emerson and just as cute as it can be. However, it seems to be possessed and turns itself on at random times. I know it sounds crazy and I totally thought P was messing with me until I witnessed it for myself. Not to mention that he woke up Sunday morning to discover it had turned itself on and been running for who knows how long. You have to think that’s not safe.

    Needless to say, I’ll be taking it back to Target this week. In the meantime we just unplug it every time we finish using it which kind of makes me feel like my grandparents.

    3. Gulley and I went to lunch at Urban Taco yesterday. I am a big fan of their zucchini jalapeno salsa. It’s an unexpected, yet delightful, combination of flavors.

    4. Several people have emailed and asked about Caroline’s outfit on Christmas Eve. It came from Naartjie and she picked it out all by herself. I love it because it’s so much more practical than a fancy dress that she’ll never wear again, plus she can mix and match all the pieces.

    5. The Bachelor. I don’t even know what to say.

    Actually that’s not true. I do know what to say. If you’re seriously looking for a wife, then I would suggest you bypass the gal with her teeth shaved into fangs that tried to bite your neck.

    Also, the one that got out of the limo and yelled, “Catch me!” as she ran towards him took at least ten seconds off my life as I died of all the feeling awkward.

    And what are the odds that in a group of thirty women you’d have to specify which “Chantal” you’re talking about? Jennifer, maybe. But Chantal? Although I did see earlier that one of the Chantals is actually a Shawntel. Not to be confused with Shawndeen from My Blue Heaven.

    6. After I mentioned The Other Boleyn Girl the other day and several of you commented on it, Gulley and I got excited and discussed that it might be fun to have a little internet book club on the blog. Any thoughts on that?

    7. I just asked P to get a splinter out of my foot and he just walked back in the room wearing his headlamp and carrying a magnifying glass and a knife.

    I’m frightened by his enthusiasm.

    I think I may opt for the splinter to stay and make a permanent home in my foot.

    8. Caroline and her friend were riding in the way back of the station wagon on the way home from school yesterday. The topic turned to boys, so I did what any savvy mama would do and turned down the radio so I could hear the conversation.

    I heard Caroline say, “There’s a boy in my class that really likes me. He likes that I act like a boy and can run super fast on the playground. AND he’s from a whole other world called CALIFORNIA.”

    It may be time to invest in a map.

    9. I don’t think I’m really helping the Razorbacks.

    10. That’s all.

  • Back to life, back to reality

    Well. Yesterday morning was everything I imagined it would be. Complete with crying and real tears over all the tiredness along with an attempt to possibly manufacture a little stomach pain. And it was rough on Caroline, too.

    (I totally used that same joke on Twitter earlier. I apologize but I’m struggling for material here.)

    But, in the end, I helped her get dressed, put her hair in a ponytail, found her schoolbag, and sent her off to school with a cheery “GOOD NEWS! YOU ONLY HAVE TEN MORE YEARS OF THIS AHEAD OF YOU!” before I crawled back in bed.

    Not really. I didn’t go back to bed. Although I seriously considered it for about five minutes. Instead I fixed a cup of hot choffee and listened to some of Passion 2011 online before I finally made myself get dressed and go for the run I’ve been dreading for the last three weeks. Yet I did it because I’d promised myself I would every time I reached for a sugar cookie over the Christmas break. Which means I promised myself about 8,064 times.

    I survived the run, but didn’t experience a runner’s high so much as a MOTHER OF PEARL! THE PAIN! THE PAIN!

    (I’m using a lot of exclamation points today. I don’t know why!)

    After I got home and quit hyperventilating, I decided to run up to Michael’s and look for some picture frames for the living room. They’re currently 50% off with an additional 25% off coupon. (Supplies are limited. Limit one coupon per customer. I promise that Michael’s did not pay me to mention this and I’m just oversharing about the craft store savings.) Anyway, they were out of black frames in large sizes except for one that had a big scratch on it.

    I debated driving across town to the other Michael’s but that would have taken at least eight minutes and I was cold and lacking in frame ambition. So I went home. But I still need to find a frame because I finally ordered a vintage Texas map for the living room wall in the hopes that it will offset the large antelope hanging on the opposite wall.

    (Just play along with me on that. I realize there is no way to offset an 800 pound animal hanging on your living room wall with horns that make it look like a minion of the devil. But I need to hold on to just a bit of false hope.)

    I got back to the house just as P was getting home from having lunch with Caroline. He’d brought sushi up to the school because we are not opposed to food bribery when we’re trying to convince our child that she’ll have a great time being back at school after two weeks of all the fun, all the time.

    And so P and I sat down on the couch and spent the rest of the afternoon watching Rudy like we were a couple of kids in college with nothing better to do during the middle of the day than watch a movie that’s almost twenty years old and one of us has seen several times.

    (P had never seen Rudy. He didn’t even realize it was a true story. I don’t even know what to say about that. However, he did know that he was supposed to chant, “RUDY, RUDY, RUDY” so at least there’s that.)

    I had to leave to pick Caroline up from school right before Rudy actually got in the game. (I’m sorry if I just ruined the ending but it’s twenty years old and I figure if you haven’t seen it then you probably don’t care to.) She walked out of school smiling and holding hands with one of her best friends and they begged to have a play date, so it would seem that she survived the day in spite of the three part Greek tragedy she performed earlier that morning.

    Then I opened up her homework folder and the reality of spelling words and word problems hit me squarely in the face and I wished we could go back to Christmas vacation and a world where I don’t have to figure out how many hours Mary was at basketball practice if she got there at 4:00 and left at 10:00 but left for one hour to have a snack. Yes it’s basic math, but it’s still math that involves numbers.

    Of course I actually did my own math problem yesterday before she got home from school because when P asked me how much the frames at Michael’s were going to be if they were 50% off with an additional 25% off, I knew the right answer was CHEAP.

    Otherwise known as $15.00.

  • Meanwhile, back at the ranch

    Happy New Year. I hope 2011 is treating you well thus far.

    It was treating me immensely well until I spent the day yesterday taking down all our Christmas decorations and vowing that I won’t use as many lights on the tree next year. Even though we all know that I’ll forget all the pine needle inflicted agony of the past few hours by next Christmas and will once again get caught up in all the festiveness and feel the need to use eighteen strands of lights on one tree.

    But now the tree is down and the garland is gone and the toffee has been eaten. It’s time to return to real life. A life that requires me to wear pants that button and aren’t made of flannel.

    We spent New Year’s Eve down at our friends’ ranch. Which is the same way we spent last New Year’s Eve and has become my favorite way ever to bring in a new year. There is something about being away from everything and just hanging out with friends you’ve known forever and eating a lot of chips and dip and homemade cheesecake and black-eyed peas.

    After the kids spent Friday afternoon building forts and zooming back and forth on the zipline and the mamas spent the afternoon sitting on the front porch not doing one thing and the daddys made sure all the guns were sighted in and helped the kids catch a few perch, it was time for the evening hunt.

    The mamas continued to sit on the front porch because it’s what we do best.

    Meanwhile, P decided to take the big kids out for the hunt. But first they needed proper face paint.

    Then they had the delight of looking at themselves in the rearview mirror.

    And, finally, it was time for the mighty hunters to head out for the evening.

    Sadly, they didn’t manage to shoot a deer. Which is shocking because CAMO FACE PAINT. You would think that would totally throw the deer off in spite of all the gum-smacking and hair flipping and loud stage whispers of “WHEN DO YOU THINK THE DEER ARE GOING TO SHOW UP?” and “DO YOU SMELL A TOOT?”

    They did manage to shoot a very large male hog. And P said there were some discussions about its anatomy.

    I’ll leave it at that.

    The rest of the evening was spent lighting various fireworks and the kids loved it even though we couldn’t shoot off the massive aerial ones like we did last year since we’re in the middle of a drought and surrounded by dry grass. Nothing would kill a new year’s celebration like a massive grass fire.

    After I took those stellar photos, I realized I was cold and went back inside with Julie and Gulley and we treated ourselves to some decaf coffee with a little Baileys Irish Cream which was a delightful addition to the celebration. I give it five stars.

    Eventually all the revelers made their way back into the house and we waited to count down to the New Year while Will walked around trying desperately to pull his loose front tooth out of his mouth because he wanted to start 2011 off with some cold hard tooth fairy cash in his pocket. Alas, his efforts were in vain.

    Gulley served as our official timekeeper. Mainly because we realized her watch was four minutes faster than everyone else’s and we were all ready to go to bed. We counted down from ten, hugged and kissed and HAPPY NEW YEARED, and then all went to our respective rooms and crashed for the next nine hours. Except for P who got up in time for the morning hunt because hunting never takes a holiday.

    (I just made that up. I don’t know if hunting takes a holiday. I just know it doesn’t take a holiday at our house.)

    After breakfast all the kids wanted to go for a ride in the Polaris. The mamas immediately strategized and managed to load all the kids and dads, Beverly Hillbillies style, into one vehicle.

    And we opted for a ladies only cruise in our own vehicle.

    It turned out to not be much of a safari. P said it was because the mamas talked so loud in our own vehicle that we scared everything off. However, we did manage to see this guy.

    It was a rare sighting. Especially considering that you won’t be seeing his kind at any sort of bowl game this year.

    (Just a little rivalry humor.)

    (The Aggies play LSU this Friday in the Cotton Bowl. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a little nervous. Mainly because Les Miles is insane and manages to win even when it doesn’t make sense.)

    Anyway, we all went back to the house and I headed home with Gulley and her peeps while Caroline and P opted to stay and hunt the evening. I felt like I needed to get back and have a little time to get the house in order and enjoy some quiet. Plus it was totally worth riding home with Gulley because I got to sit by Will and he offered me multiple chances to pull his front tooth for him.

    I passed.

    After I got home I made myself a fire in the fireplace, turned on the Christmas tree one last time and just listened to all the silence. My inner introvert was in desperate need. I also managed to finish The Other Boleyn Girl which I’ve been reading for the last two weeks and haven’t been able to put down. I don’t want to ruin the ending but Anne Boleyn gets her head cut off.

    And then I spent about an hour researching the history of the Reformation and the British monarchy like a big nerd. Of course my main source was Wikipedia so there’s a good chance that everything I read isn’t even true. But that doesn’t mean I won’t try to manipulate multiple future conversations to the topic just to so I can share my knowledge that may or may not be accurate.

    Caroline and P made it home about 10:00. He said she talked non-stop all the way home which is always a sign that she’s exhausted and fighting sleep with everything in her. We all fell into bed and she and I didn’t wake up until 10:30 yesterday morning.

    Then we spent the entire day in our pajamas taking down Christmas decorations.

    Which means that Monday morning and the alarm clock are going to beat us like a rented circus monkey.

    But other than that, 2011 is off to a good start.

    (That picture doesn’t really go with anything but it makes me happy. So there it is.)

  • The eve of a new year

    I know.

    I didn’t post anything yesterday.

    But if I’m being perfectly honest, which I am, I haven’t even taken my Christmas decorations down yet. Or really even thought about taking my Christmas decorations down. Although I did buy two new ornament bins at Target on Wednesday which felt like a step in the right direction until I got home and looked at my tree and thought WOW, THAT SEEMS LIKE A LOT OF WORK.

    And now I’m ignoring all the ribbon and the blinky lights and the garland on my mantle.

    In other words, my motivation is at an all-time low. This Monday is going to be a big slap of reality right in my face. A slap of reality that will require me to once again be out of my pajamas before noon and get back to my Couch to 5K program and quit considering three iced sugar cookies to be part of a balanced, healthy breakfast. In other words, January 3rd is going to be a major buzzkill full of resolutions and exercise and steamed broccoli.

    I wish I had something profound to share with you. Some sort of deep reflections about 2010 and all the ways I grew as a person this year. But I’m not sure I do. I feel like it’s been one of the fastest years I can remember and, although it was filled with many blessings, it was also filled with some hard times and tough lessons and a general overall feeling of WHAT AM I DOING WITH MY LIFE?

    And so I think that’s what 2011 holds for me. I want to be more intentional about how I use my time, my money and all the blessings God has given my family. I want to be a better mother, wife and friend. I want to listen more than I talk. I want to quit being so afraid of failure that I don’t even try. I want to listen for the voice of God and go where He leads even if I’m not sure what that looks like. I want to be the person He created me to be and realize that He knows all my flaws and frailties and there’s no sense to beat myself up about them on a daily basis.

    So, in short, I have my work cut out for me in 2011.

    I wish you all the happiest New Year. I hope it’s filled with everything you hope for and even better things that you didn’t even know you wanted.

  • Happiness and cheer

    Well here it is, multiple days after Christmas. I guess I better take the time to recall all the Christmas memories before I forget them all. Especially considering that I can’t even make a trip to the HEB anymore without forgetting at least two things that are WRITTEN DOWN on my grocery list. I used to be able to remember all sorts of things, but have reached a point where the only thing I can recall with total clarity are the words to just about every Beyonce song. Which is a handy life skill.

    Caroline spent the night with Mimi and Bops on the eve of Christmas Eve with her cousin Sarah. I knew things hadn’t gone that well when Bops showed up at my house with both girls by 8:15 the next morning. Word on the street is that they were all hyped up on the Christmas excitement, woke up around 3:30 a.m. and never really went back to sleep. I think they should consider themselves lucky that Bops didn’t just come to a rolling stop in front of my house as he kicked them out of the car. Not that he would do that. He’s a grandfather and grandparents tolerate things that parents don’t because they have the luxury of dropping kids back off at their house the next morning and going home to take a nap.

    The girls helped me roll out the dough for the fourteen pans of cinnamon rolls I was making and by helped I mean that they punched their fingers in the dough and forced me to have to roll it all out multiple times while I wondered if these are the kinds of conditions Mrs. Baird had to work under.

    Later on in the day it was time to head to church for the Christmas Eve service. Before we left the house I wanted to take some pictures of Caroline in front of the tree. This is what I got.

    Bless her heart. It’s like she’s never seen a camera.

    After church we went to Mimi and Bops’ house to eat tamales and open presents with my sister and her family. At that point I was able to get a few more candid shots of Caroline that more accurately depict her Christmas Eve countenance.

    We ate tamales and then Caroline read The Christmas Story to us before we opened our presents.

    My nephew Luke was busy being a muppet and had on white knee socks and black dress shoes. I could have sopped him up with a biscuit.

    After we opened presents, we cranked up Caroline’s new iDog from Mimi and Bops and just enjoyed being together and playing a little Scrabble Flash until we realized she and Sarah had been up since 3:30 a.m. and might be about to head south on us.

    We headed home so Caroline could put out milk and cookies for Santa and get in bed.

    And then Santa Claus began the daunting task of trying to figure out how to hook up the Wii. Santa is a little frightened by all modern technology, particularly cables that have to go in the back of televisions and possess the potential to possibly screw up all the recorded programming on the DVR. Not to mention that Santa had to perform feats of strength to move the T.V. out of the armoire so his elf could help run all the cords through the back. It’s all fun and games until a television crashes to the ground and ruins Christmas.

    Fortunately, Santa managed just fine and in the scheme of all the past “some assembly required” Christmases, it wasn’t so bad. In fact, it was much easier and required far less wine than the Polly Pocket Shopping Mall Roller Coaster Debacle of 2008.

    Caroline woke up Christmas morning and was so impressed that Santa not only brought the Wii, but that he took the time to set the whole thing up. She and her daddy immediately began to play.

    While an antelope watched his tree by night.

    Yes. He’s still here.

    There were cinnamon rolls and breakfast casserole to be eaten and more presents to be opened.

    And then Bops couldn’t resist the call of the Wii, so he and Caroline took each other on in a round of boxing.

    I wish I were kidding when I tell you that not only did he do the whole deep-breathing boxer thing with every punch, but he went full on Rocky Balboa and lifted both arms as he danced around in victory after defeating his seven-year-old granddaughter.

    It was a precious moment.

    After that we got dressed and headed over to P’s mom’s house to have Christmas with his family and apparently that’s the point when I completely forgot to pull my camera out and take a few pictures. There were more presents and food and family.

    Later in the afternoon we finally got back home. I could have laid down on the couch and slept for about six or seven years, but we hadn’t busted out the Just Dance 2 yet. And my need to dance triumphed over my need for sleep.

    Caroline put it in the Wii and picked “Call Me” by Blondie. Ten minutes later I had stripped off my sweater, taken off my boots, put my hair in a ponytail and was dancing like a woman possessed. Or obsessed. Unfortunately, my moves seem to be too much for the Wii. It doesn’t understand me or my rhythmic sensibilities.

    And so ultimately this will be the Christmas I’ll remember as the one where my child learned to talk trash to her mother.

    Good times.

  • Scattered pictures of the smiles we left behind

    I woke up yesterday morning at the crack of 9:30 a.m. and promptly pulled the covers back up and rolled over. Mainly because it was FREEZING in our bedroom. I actually dreamed that I was Kate Winslet floating on a piece of the Titanic at some point during the night and desperately wanted to get another blanket but that would require getting out of bed which would mean MORE COLD. And so instead I spent the night drifting in and out of sleep while humming “My Heart Will Go On” through my chattering teeth.

    Shout out to P for sleeping with the windows open when it’s 27 degrees outside. Last I checked we weren’t harboring any Eskimos or penguins. Let’s not be afraid to warm our bedroom up to temps above 35 degrees.

    Once I finally dragged myself out of bed and stumbled into the kitchen for some hot choffee, I was seized by a desire to organize the house. And then I promptly felt overwhelmed by that whole prospect so Caroline and I took Bruiser to the dog park with Mimi and Bops and their dogs.

    Later on, Gulley and the boys came over for our much anticipated Just Dance tournament. Gulley scored an all-time high 9,000 points and was on fire 66% of the time. Meanwhile, Caroline suggested that I should check my Wii remote to make sure it’s actually working. Everyone is a comedian around here.

    Anyway, at some point later in the day, I was once again taken by the urge to organize the house. But I decided to organize my computer instead. I have scads of photos that need to be burned onto discs and videos that need to be turned into DVDs. And so I worked tirelessly to burn photos onto discs and upload photos to Shutterfly while I made promises to myself that I will sit down at some point and create actual photo books. It is exhausting to be a family historian in 2010. Whatever happened to the good old days when all a kid had to document their childhood was a couple of Polaroids and yellowed 3 x 5 photo with curled edges stuck in some kind of ghetto album with a psychedelic 70’s cover?

    Now there is all this pressure to have hardback photo books and slideshows set to music and video montages. And that’s why I desperately tried to make several iMovies yesterday to burn onto DVDs. It all seemed to be going so well until I actually burned the DVDs and realized that none of them actually have sound and I don’t know why. They had sound when I made them, so where did the sound go?

    I don’t understand.

    And I’m too frustrated to try to figure it out right now. Maybe I’ll just set the whole thing to music and Caroline can just watch her childhood home movies Charlie Chaplin-style.

    Or maybe I’ll go with my other impulse which involves throwing the computer out the back door.

    So, now I’m curious. Do you actually have photo albums with pictures in them or do you keep everything on the computer? Or do you order photo books? Or do you have professional quality video that actually has sound? Or is there some other technology that I need to know about so I can feel even more inferior?