Author: Big Mama

  • Escape from Arctic Blast

    The last week has found all of us at Casa de Big Mama homebound and stir crazy for days on end. By Wednesday, I was so desperate to get us out of the house that we kept a scheduled playdate with one of Caroline’s friends, in spite of the fact that I had to start my car thirty minutes before we left just to thaw the ice off of my windshield. I had reached a point of desperation and honestly, would have put us both in snow shoes for the one mile journey to our friend’s house just to get out. We were in dire need of a change of scenery.

    After our playdate, Caroline had her first trip to the dentist, which went really well. All that guilt my pediatrician laid on me about Caroline having her paci until age two (actually she had it until she was three, but I started lying to the pediatrician around her two year appointment, but lying is such an ugly term so let’s just say I didn’t fully disclose) was completely unfounded. The dentist said that Caroline has great, healthy teeth and the best part is that she has great spacing which means that she may never have to endure the orthodontia hell that her Mama is currently undergoing.

    The dentist said “Wow, she has really great spacing so you probably don’t have to worry about flossing her teeth” and I said, “Oh yes, that’s why we haven’t really flossed her teeth” while what I was thinking was “WHAT?! I’m supposed to floss her teeth?” I thought I was up for Mother of the Year because I manage to get them brushed at least once a day…most of the time. Don’t throw flossing at me, I’ll short circuit and our entire oral hygiene routine will go out the door. It’s just too much.

    On Thursday Caroline was finally able to go back to school (is that Handel’s Messiah I hear in the background?) and I had tons of work that I needed to get caught up on after having a holiday on Monday and then two ice days. By Thursday afternoon, I was missing our leisurely days of doing nothing and we still had a birthday party (which I still have to tell y’all about, but it needs its own post) to attend that evening.

    We were so tired after Thursday that we all slept in until 9:00 Friday morning. This may not sound like anything special to y’all, but it is the first time in the history of the free world that Caroline has slept even remotely late. I’m sure it’s not a trend, but it gives me hope for a brighter future filled with mornings that start a little later than 6:30.

    So Friday morning after the sleeping late, P mentioned that he wanted to head down to the ranch for the day and asked Caroline if she wanted to go with him. God bless her little heart, she was so excited at the prospect of going to the ranch with her daddy that she immediately ran into her playroom and started packing her camo hunting bag (don’t all three year old girls have camo hunting bags?). She packed her toy gun, her binoculars and her magnifying glass. Here she is packing.

    I watched her pack her little bag as she chattered excitedly about everything she was going to see and how she and Daddy were going to shoot some ducks, and I got a little teary eyed. I’m not sure what choked me up the most, the fact that my little girl loves her daddy so much and was so excited to spend time with him or that FINALLY the day that I have dreamed of lo these three years, has finally come and I get the house all to myself while the two of them go off to enjoy a day at the ranch.

    It was a little piece of heaven here on earth…for all of us.

  • Driving Miss Caroline

    One of the things that I love about raising a child is seeing all of the little things she does that are like me or like her daddy. It’s so amazing to see things in her personality come out . P and I spend a lot of time saying “Oh, she is so your child today” or “She gets that from you”.

    When I was pregnant with Caroline, I read an article in Martha Stewart Living that talked about DNA and how sometimes children will actually have more traits in common with a grandparent than their parents due to recessive genes that skip a generation. I could give y’all the whole rundown from 10th grade Biology about how two green peas always make green peas, but that would be impossible since all I remember from 10th grade Biology is that dissecting a pig completely grossed me out. I was so thankful that I wasn’t in Honors Biology because that would’ve required dissecting a cat and since I was in school in Beaumont, no telling where that cat might have come from originally.

    Anyway, the point is that this evening I realized a trait that Caroline has received not only from me, but from my daddy, otherwise known as Bops.

    Road Rage.

    Bops and driving are a legendary combination. He is the most mild mannered, laid back guy y’all could ever hope to meet, but you get him behind the wheel of a car and it’s as if his whole personality changes. All of a sudden everyone else on the road is an idiot that can’t drive fast enough or doesn’t go soon enough when the light turns green. It is an amazing phenomenon to observe.

    I could write a horror novel about the two weeks that we spent driving all over Sicily with Bops behind the wheel of an eight passenger van. We curved around the highest mountains I have ever seen at speeds that defy human logic. My poor brother- in -law had to just hunker down in the very back of the van with a book because he couldn’t bear to look. He could just tell from our screams when the driving had gotten especially perilous.

    At one point we were driving down some small country road when all of a sudden Bops realized he needed to take a right. You haven’t tasted adventure until you’ve made a sharp right in a top heavy eight passenger van at 70 miles an hour. I literally saw my life flash before my eyes.

    But here’s the thing. Bops is a good driver, he’s just an adventurous kind of driver who gets completely frustrated by drivers who aren’t paying attention to what they are doing. I have many fond memories of riding in the car with my dad while he taught me phrases like “they should just bomb this whole freeway” or “that guy ought to be shot for driving like that”. It shaped my childhood.

    However, those that live in glass houses can’t throw stones. I have inherited this tendency towards road rage. There is nothing that makes me angrier than someone driving 40 mph in the passing lane on the freeway, or being slow to go at a red light, or the mother of all my pet peeves, backing up and pulling forward 85 times to get out of a parking place when CLEARLY they have enough room to just back up and go.

    I have conversations out loud with these drivers and I’ll admit they are not always friendly, although let me state for the record that I am good about keeping my mouth shut when Caroline is in the car because y’all know that little pitchers have big ears (and no, I don’t really get what that means except that they repeat everything they hear usually at inopportune times). I’m not saying I’m proud, I’m just saying that I realize I have inherited a tendency toward road rage and no, I’m not packing heat or anything, so don’t get nervous.

    Lately, I have noticed signs that Caroline has inherited this driving gene. It all started a few weeks ago when we were driving home from church and she was beyond upset that there were cars ahead of us on the freeway and insisted we needed to “Beat those cars Mama! Go FASTER, Mama, they’re beating us!”.

    Then tonight on our way to a birthday party, which I’ll tell y’all about tomorrow, it was confirmed that as far as driving goes, she is like her Mama and her Bops.

    We were stuck in traffic due to the fact that we live in a city where everyone needs to stop and look at every orange cone on the side of the road, when I hear my little backseat driver say “We’re NEVER going to get there because of ALL these BAD drivers. I’d like to kill ’em”.

    And the people said Amen.

  • You don’t look a day over 62

    Gulley’s mama has been in Bryan visiting Nena, so y’all know that I love to be able to share a good Nena story.

    Nena and Grandaddy are about to celebrate their 62nd wedding anniversary. Sixty-two years is a mighty long time to spend with a person. In fact, Nena sent me a note a few years back and mentioned in the note that Grandaddy was driving her crazy. It made Gulley and I a little sad to realize that even after 62 years, there will still be times the husbands will drive you a little nuts.

    Anyway, Nena wanted Gulley’s mama to drive her down to THE newspaper so that she could give them a picture of she and Grandaddy to commemorate their 62nd anniversary in print. As they were waiting in line, Nena started to chit chat with a young girl standing in line in front of them.

    It turns out this girl was there to turn in a picture for her engagement announcement (I guess no one has ever heard of putting anything in the mail or even better, sending it ON THE COMPUTER). Nena shared that she has been married for 62 years.

    The girl said “Oh my! You’ve been married 62 years? How old are you?”

    Nena replied, “I’m 82”.

    The girl said, “Well you look great! I would’ve thought you were just 62 years old!”

    Nena smiled at the girl, handed her picture to the head picture guy at THE paper and they left. As they were walking to the car, Nena looked at Gulley’s mama and said, “WELL, I would feel a whole lot better if she had said she thought I was 52!”

    Gulley’s mama said “Well Mama, she gave you 20 years!”

    Nena said “Well, of course she did, do you see how good I look?”

  • Interrupting reality to bring y’all entertainment news

    We are in Day 4 under siege and finally, the ice has actually made an appearance. If it weren’t freezing cold and sleeting, I’d take a few pictures of the yard, but to do that would require being cold and walking more than five feet away from the plate of cookies. Not going to happen.

    So since real life has come to a screeching halt, here are a few thoughts I’ve had on the entertainment front:

    I didn’t watch the Golden Globes last night because let’s be honest, the best part is seeing what everyone has on and I knew I could see that online this morning. I did see that Jennifer Hudson won Best Supporting Actress for Dreamgirls and that Dreamgirls won Best Movie. Even though this is the only movie I’ve seen from the list of nominees (P and I were going to see The Queen, but saw Talladega Nights instead), I have to say it was a well deserved win.

    Gulley and I braved the cold rain and ventured out into Arctic Blast ’07 on Sunday night to go see Dreamgirls. I haven’t seen a musical in years, but let me say that I loved this movie. If I could come back in another life as someone else, I would choose Beyonce. She is gorgeous, talented, and came up with the term “Bootylicious”. How much more fabulous can one person be?

    Jennifer Hudson brought the house down with her performance. I have never been in a theater where people applaud and cheer after a performance, but it happened several times during this movie. Girlfriend can sing. She is the next Aretha and I don’t take Aretha lightly. Do yourself a favor and go see this movie, but leave your husband at home unless he likes musicals and multiple costume changes.

    The other reason I didn’t watch the Golden Globes (other than not caring about anything other than the clothes) is they were on the same time as 24. When Jack Bauer is busy saving the world, it is must see T.V.

    Here’s my thought on 24, when will the powers that be realize that Jack Bauer is never wrong? How many seasons do we have to listen to Jack say, “Bill, you’ve got to trust me on this”? Jack knows everything, don’t question when he has a hunch. Although thanks to Gulley, I have spent the last two nights watching and wondering if Kiefer Sutherland really is so small that his jeans wouldn’t fit a twelve year old girl.

    Moving on from 24, while watching last Thursday’s Grey’s Anatomy, I had a thought. It’s all fine and good that Meredith Grey has abandonment issues but personally, if she were dating my neurosurgeon, I would prefer that he get a good night sleep so that he can focus while operating on my BRAIN, than make her feel better by sleeping in the same room with her although she snores. I’m just saying that my brain might be more important than her host of issues.

    And lastly, my new favorite show on T.V. is Friday Night Lights. I was slow to start watching it because it came on Tuesday nights at the same time as Gilmore Girls and Dancing with the Stars and frankly, my DVR didn’t have the room. However, I recorded the Bravo marathon airing of Friday Night Lights over Christmas and got all caught up. Maybe it’s because I’m a Texas girl and I’ve spent many a Friday night at high school football games, but I love this show. Texas Monthly wrote this editorial on it talking about how they didn’t like it because it perpetuates Texas stereotypes. My thought was “Well, of course. That’s what makes it so good. I know these people.” Kyle Chandler as Coach Taylor has officially replaced Dr. McDreamy as my favorite character on T.V. If y’all aren’t watching, you’re missing out.

    And so there, now y’all know the thoughts that have been keeping me up at night that I feel compelled to share. Hopefully this ice storm will end soon and I’ll actually be able to talk about something that isn’t happening on T.V. like you know…real life.

  • For Kelli


    I just wanted to remind y’all that this is going on at Boomama’s on Tuesday. If you don’t know what I’m talking about click on this link to read more. Thanks, y’all.

  • I showed him the true meaning of life

    After the last twenty-four hours of living through the ARCTIC BLAST ’07, which so far has consisted of intermittent cold rain, I now realize why God made me a southern girl, other than the fact that I have a tendency to like big hair and good manners.

    If I lived in the north and was cooped up all winter long, I wouldn’t just be a Big Mama, I would be an enormous two ton Mama. I cannot quit eating. It’s like I have turned into some sort of mammal that is stocking up before the hibernation.

    I’m not sure how much is due to the cold weather and how much is due to the complete boredom of being stuck inside for over twenty-four hours, but either way I have got to stop the madness, especially in light of the fact that the really bad weather that they keep forecasting hasn’t even hit yet. At this rate, P and Caroline will be rolling Mama out to play in the snow on Tuesday.

    Yesterday, I had two breakfast tacos, a chocolate chip cookie, peanut butter crackers, two diet cokes, more chocolate chip cookies both in dough and cookie form, and a bag of Sour Patch Kids.

    I’m planning out my dinner menu for the next three days and the common ingredients are butter, cream of whatever soup, cheese, and more butter. It is like I’ve turned into Paula Deen, but with better hair.

    The stir craziness has also led me to completely clean out the playroom. I dug deep and packed up toys that haven’t been played with in over a year and wouldn’t you know that those are the toys that Caroline spent all morning trying to find. It’s like she has some kind of radar. Would it be wrong to tell her they died and went to toy heaven?

    I also cleaned out her closet. In the top of her closet, I keep a small, plastic crate that serves as a home for a few college/newlywed/pre-child mementos. There are cards from my grandparents, notes my dad wrote me in college letting me know he was working hard to keep me in the style to which I’d become accustomed, and tons of photos.

    There are a few of Gulley and me with hair so big that I can’t believe we both fit in the picture. Seriously, someone should have told us to step away from the teasing comb and the hairspray. Of course, I can blame some of our big hair woes on our roommate Meredith who shared with us her secret for great hair which was, “You’ve just got to tease the sh*t out of it”. We listened. We listened well.

    Anyway, as I was looking at the pictures, I came across a framed photo that was taken right after P and I started dating. Seeing as how that was twelve years ago, we look a little different. P weighed 155 the day we got married and he’s 6 feet tall, so you might say he was a little on the thin side. Over the course of the years, he has filled in a little. He still looks good, just a little meatier than he used to be back in his bachelor days.

    I showed Caroline the picture and asked her if she knew who it was. She didn’t, so I told her it was Mama and Daddy. She said “Oh, look at Daddy! He looks brand new!”

    Yes sweetie, that’s when Daddy was brand new, before Mama wore him down and showed him how to hibernate and consume mass quantities of cream based soups and chocolate products.