I Know Walt Disney

You remember Lucy, right?

schmooopie

It should come as relatively no suprise that Lucy likes princesses. Disney princess in particular. Princess Aurora specifically. And when Kim mentioned to her that the lady who sang Princess Aurora in the Disney movie Sleeping Beauty lived in Knoxville HER HEAD POPPED OFF.

Of course, when Dipsey Doodle heard about it he picked up the horn to Mary Costa and asked her for a signed photograph for Lucy. (never mind that I might want a signed photograph of Princess Aurora to the Prettiest Girl in Knoxville HUMPH why don't you go buy her a Barbie Doll Dreamhouse while you're at it) and it showed up the other day. She was so excited she went a bit overboard on the thank you note. Which I encourage. WRITE THANK YOU NOTES PEOPLE.

thank you note extraordinaire

Upon receiving this note, Mary Costa was beholden to pick up her own horn and call Lucy and tell her that a. she loved her thank you note, b. her photograph she included of herself in her Aurora costume was hanging on her fridge, and c. SHE KNEW WALT DISNEY.

Er. Meh. Gerd.

Lucy's degree of separation to Walt Freaking Disney just shrunk to one. I immediately starting plotting a way to talk to Mary Costa. I literally was in the shower this morning trying to engineer a meet and greet when it occurred to me that GASP. I didn't need to. My degree of separation to Walt Disney just shrunk from eleventy billion to TWO. Squared. Because Kim answered the phone and talked to Mary Costa too.

Y'ALL. I practically KNOW Walt Disney.

P.S. Daddy, I think you should arrange a meet and greet for me and Mary Costa. But don't invite her to a throwdown. She's a LADY you know, and ladies don't eat dead animals from grills. Invite her to... like a TEA or a luncheon or something. Or... you know what. Never mind. Forget I said anything.

PP.S. Mama? Can you have a tea for Mary Costa please? And invite me?

PPP.S. Just had lunch with Lucy. She keeps calling Mary Costa Dolly Parton.

PPPP.S. My mother gave me a flower arrangment at lunch. With a spider on them. I think my mother's trying to kill me.

The Jerks Are Earning Their Keep (about time, too)

The other morning Mr. Smith and I woke up on our own. No cats jumping on heads, no Polly giving hickeys, no Olive squeaking for food... nothing. The alarm went off... still nothing. After a few minutes, Mr. Smith sleepily asked where the cats were and I set off in the dark to find them. I walked into the bathroom and saw their little shadows in the dark on the floor staring intently at something on the floor and thought "Oh good, they're all right" and turned on the light.

They caught their first mouse. I gave them lots of hugs and pets, and told them what good girls they were for being such nice mousers. This is, of course, after I ran screaming back into the bedroom where I remained firmly under the covers until Mr. Smith had time to do the honors. Then lots of cuddles and praise.

olive and polly are proud of their catch. actually, they had no idea what to do with it, they were just fascinated by it.

poor little mouse

Next, Cousins Greg and Jen were  kind enough to go on a double date with us! To a concert! Lynyrd Skynyrd opened for ZZ Top OH THAT HAPPENED.

greg, jen, mr. smith and moi

jen had passes through her work and we totally got the hook up on awesome location. i almost got on the front row during "legs" but a big girl up front elbowed me so i didn't push it. tee hee!

I wore a costume!

why yes those are red cowboy boots THANKS AMBER!

Ever since we got Polly and Olive, I have had a runny nose and slight cough. After awhile I got that yucky gross eczema on my eyelid and doctors started talking about what I may be allergic to.  I was really worried that I might be allergic to the girls so I went and got allergy tested. Ouch. I did the scratch test just fine, but the shots on the arm were a different story. After the first one I shrieked how many more were there to the nurse and she was like, 18. And I freaked out. She made me lie down and put a cold cloth on my neck hahahahaha.

Fortunately, not allergic to cats, dogs, dust, mold or any kind of food! 

but i am allergic to trees, grass and ragweed. spring, summer and fall. thanks mother nature.

AAAAHHHH!!!!

when i told my sweet mama what i was allergic to, she wailed "oh no! all those hours in allergy clinics you waited for clay to get his shots! i should have just had them give you allergy shots too and you wouldn't have this problem!" i told her that was going into my mommy dearest novel.

ESPN College Gameday came to town!

welcome to knoxville!

And that's all we'll say about that. Ahem.

Because of our yuckola loss to Florida (wait! I thought we weren't going to talk about it!) seats at the next home game were a dime a dozen. A couple pair of tickets landed in my lap and since the Smith-in-laws were coming into town Mr. Smith and I decided to take them. Suzy wasn't interested in the game, but she came to the tailgate with us, and Mr. Smith and I:

had a bring your dad to game day!

In preparing for the game, I perused my closet and decided that the loss to Florida (WAIT! Not talking about it!) left me in somewhat of a non-orange state of mind. So I picked a gray dress to wear. With orange accessories! Imagine my surprise to find that Beth:

was feeling the gray too! great minds, beth-bot!

Lastly, over the weekend I ran my first Marine Corps Mud Run! It was a lot harder than I thought it would be, but my goodness it was a lot more fun than I thought it would be too. Amanda, Shawn and I had a ball slogging through the mud and laughing. At the first big obstacle I hesitated a split second, and the Marine in charge of it saw me and my brief pause. He said, "don't think. Just jump in there." Good advice. I didn't hesitate again.

before

and after. i waded into the lake and washed off as best i could, then changed into clean clothes at the car. at home, mr. smith kindly got in the shower with me (with his eyes averted, dipsey doodle) and scrubbed me down from stem to stern. even so, i still left mud stains on all the white bath towels - whoopsie!

Good times had by all. Fun couple of weeks!

Over and out,

M

Polly is a real pill

Wow. All I can say is... wow.

I live in a house with one very smart cat (Olive) and the other one. And Mr. Smith who adores the other one. I very well may wring her neck one day soon.

You may remember the hickey incident, right? (Still happening BTW except now the scarf doesn't foil her for a second - it's merely a minor challenge). She's now getting bigger and bigger and is INTO EVERYTHING. She's into plants, potpourri, the tub when I'm taking a bath, you name it, she's in it. The other day Mr. Smith was out of town and I think the only words I spoke all day were "Polly get down/off/out" in rapid repetition. But the kicker? SHE DOESN'T LEARN. Polly will jump on the kitchen counter three times in a row while I'm shredding chicken forcing me to scoot her off with my elbow each time. And each time she indignantly hits the floor is all "What? WHAT? WHAT?" *jumps back up* while Olive patiently sits in the corner with her paws behind her back being the good girl that she is.

knocked over the floor lamp the other evening

tommy said two seconds after he snapped this she ran behind my portrait and knocked down. he also spilled all his coffee on the couch whilst attempting to save the portrait in a crouching tiger, hidden dragon esque way. and potpourri was everywhere because i foolishly, FOOLISHLY thought it was out of her reach on the mantle.

Mr. Smith are befuddled with what to do, and today he had a eureka moment. Actual conversation:

Mr. Smith: we need to give her something she can play with. You know, like a challenge. So she won't keep getting in the corn plant and eating all the potpourri one piece at a time. 

me: tell me about it.

Mr. Smith: you know. Something she can play with. Like bark.

me: bark?

Mr. Smith: yeah, you know, like a bowl of bark?

me: bowl of bark?

Which is why I was texted this photo from the Home Depot this afternoon while getting ready to leave work for the day:

polly's bag of bark

If it works, I will be a) amazed and b) grateful, but I have a feeling that what's going to happen is that I'm going to start cleaning up bark bits in addition to chewed up philodendron leaves and potpourri that I'm currently cleaning up on a daily basis.

Oy.

In other news, we had a tree cut down.

me being the tree

This just in: Mr. Smith reports that Polly is happily playing with her bowl of bark.

Over and out.

August 2012 was Mega-Exciting

Busy month, August was!

Spent some time with the family - here we were going to go swimming, but the weather didn't cooperate. So we went to Chili's instead!

mmm queso dip

Then, it was Tommy's birthday. We took our annual trip to Nama (puke). I ordered something I thought would be like pad thai, but it was more like worms. Blech.

lookin' good birthday boy!

shawn and amanda are looking good too!

Then, it was my high school 20 year reunion!

moi, hs besties laura and andrea. we're GROWNUPS can you BELIEVE IT.

Then, it was Amber's birthday! We had a slumber party. Here we have our album cover photo:

the french broads

Lastly, and try not to be too jealous... It's official. I am the prettiest girl in Knoxville. Know how I know it's true?

cause alcide herveaux said so, bitches.

And now back to work after a nice long three day weekend! Yippee!

Summer in the Chester

Every summer, Mr. Smith and I take a trip to his hometown, the thriving metropolis of Winchester, TN. This year was especially a fun trip, since we made it the weekend sister-in-law Teddy was in with her two boys, Hampton and Dalton!

Papa Tom is a doctor extraordinaire. He's forever picking at my moles and telling me to keep an eye on the 'suspicious' ones. I've had some problems recently with a. eye funk and b. getting in to see my dermatologist (she's the best in town. Downside? Six weeks to get an appointment, yo.) I even went to my family physician who was worried about prescribing anything for around my eye, so I have lived through two months with scaly eyelids (no. I'm not kidding. And as an aside, whenever I get anything, it's not like a COLD, or the FLU {NEVER HAD THE FLU. NOT ONCE.} oh no, nothing normal for normal people to take amoxicillin and call it a day. Nope, whenever I get anything, I get it on my FACE. Hives? Face. Ringworm? Face. ECZEMA WHEN EVERYONE ON GOD'S GREEN EARTH GETS ECZEMA ON THEIR ARMS AND LEGS BUT WHERE DO I GET IT? BINGO! Snakeskin eyelids forthwith, please.) So I was especially pleased with the timing of this visit to the Chester in order to get a little doctoring in courtesy of Dr. Tom.

He did not disappoint! After supper, he handed me a bottle of liquid which he avowed would "sting like Hell" but get rid of the eczema lickety split. It stung like Hell. He then immediately turned to the dog and put some of it on her. (Me, indignant: "Did you just give me DOG medicine?" Tom, equally indignant: "NO! I give the dog people medicine!") It took three more applications, and I left the Chester on Sunday with peeled snakeskin eyelids, hooray! Thanks, Tom!

Saturday morning I awoke to the screams of 4-year-old Dalton. In my sleep coma I could have sworn he was squeezing out crocodile tears and for someone to tell the baby to stop crying but fancy that. They were real. He had been playing under some furniture and had cut a huge gash in his leg on an exposed tack. Dr. Tom took one look at it, cleaned it up and slapped on some numbing cream. He then informed Teddy that stitches would commence in twenty minutes. At the appointed hour, Tommy and Lexie were enlisted as assistants and before you could say "bite down on this bullet" they had Dalton sewn up.

he was a less than willing patient, poor thing

Next, off to the lake! Dr. Tom slapped a waterproof bandaid on his stitches (revolutionary. Would have made my childhood summers much more enjoyable - how very many times was I sidelined on a pool deck or confined to a boat when nursing bad cuts or stitches!) and we were off boating and swimming.

And jet skiing.

After a jaunt with nephew Hampton and Tommy (where Hampton repeatedly called Tommy Grandpa and urged him to go faster) I told Tommy his driving was scaring me and to take me back to the dock. He obliged, and took Hampton back out for a no-holds-barred ride of his life.

He should have held a few more bars. Hampton came back with a busted chin and blood down to his knees. We were out on the lake and by the time we got back home and cleaned him up, his cut was not deemed stitch-worthy, but was butterflied up to heal.

those boys play rough and tumble

Here we have a shot of Dr. Tom's patients from the weekend:

i wore a butterfly on my eyelid in solidarity

And here, because it's funny:

hampton's take on the bunny ears. he calls it "the unicorn."

And now we're back home. I needed some rest after all that excitement.

Over and out,
M

VenableCon 2012

The Venable/Smith/Terry/Mowrer/Deaton/Gilmore Clans convened recently to celebrate VenableCon 2012. Too, too soon... it was over.

The day before we travelled to Ocean Isle, we attended Monty and Kristina's wedding! They tied the knot and we were there to help them celebrate in style. See?

they had a photo booth! i was all over that all night long.

amanda, jenny, the blushing bride, mama, moi and tabby

and if there's mischief to be had, you know i needed to be part of it. here we are decorating their car for the honeymoon trip. amanda, jenny and i ransacked the joint looking for makeshift items to use for decorations. i even roped the children and mama into helping!

one of about twenty self photos of me and jenny pretending to be talking about something shocking.  i don't know why. i really don't. 

and dancing! my favorite! gross and sweating cutting a rug, but having fun anyway. 

Next, BEACH BEACH BEACH! Here are my two favorite shots from the week:

jenny and me jumping joyfully into the pool while lottie sue shrieks on encouragement

me and my mermaid protege, lucy, after a week of swimming lessons earned a pink pool coverup just like mine

But! First things first! Here we have the children in the pool the first night here. I was put in charge of watching the children while the other grown-ups cleaned the kitchen. I had to jump in fully clothed to fish out CJ when I turned my head for TWO SECONDS. Then I cried for 20 minutes because it scared me so bad.

almost everyone was floatie-free by the end of the week, thanks tommy!

Eating is a hallmark of the week. Matt thought he'd wow us with a fancy new cooking technique called SousVide. The SousVide machine is like $500. Instead, we used a cooler full of hot water. And cooked a steak. Sealed in a baggie in hot water. It was a very precise science to say the least.

mattie monitoring the water temp

After a few hours in the hot water bath, it goes on the grill for a flash to get a grilley taste.

waiting for the grill to heat up

on for just a couple of minutes...

and voila. it was eaten up. actually there was one steak and like ten adults so i'll let you do the math on how many bites each person got.

This is how my days usually go: wake up, go for a run. I got a nice little 2.5 mile route carved out the first day and ran it almost everyday. Come back, have breakfast. Put on sunscreen and then it was time for swimming lessons! I was Tommy's assistant.

my mantra was 'don't be scared.' i think i said 'don't be scared' about 500 times a day.

After swimming lessons was time for the beach. An hour or two in the sun and the surf, and it's time for lunch! I usually cooked bacon for BLTs or made lunch for the kids for morning chores. After lunch, pool time! The kids were usually down for naps by then:

i thought lucy was going to die from happiness the afternoon she woke up and both lottie sue and i were napping in bed with her (three humans, one double bed)

When the kids went for naps, we usually played volleyball in the pool!

matt goes in for a dig

After volleyball time, it's time to get cleaned up for supper. We have cocktails, fried appetizers (provided by Dipsey's Fry Kitchen) and get all the food ready for supper. It's quite and extravaganza. 

After supper, it's cleanup time, then time to go for a walk on the beach. Once it starts to get dark, we wander back inside. That was my time to kick activity into high gear - Mama and I were in charge of nightly baths for the two little girls. Lord help. Who knew they could get so sandy. We'd bathe them, dry them, get them in nighties, then sit each one down on the bed and tag team pig tail braids for them to sleep in. I was usually right side, Mama left. 

After, I would usually have a well-earned dessert, family fellowship and fun until I got sleepy, then go to bed. Rinse and repeat. 

And now for the weather. Julia?

here is a storm rolling in one evening

me and my cutie patootie, lucy

i painted all the children's toenails, including max's. he picked out the color(s).

lottie showing me her underwater prowess

and jenny shows off hers

matt made about one million loaves of no-knead bread and taught most every male in attendance how to make your own no-knead bread. share the wealth, yo. make a man a loaf, he eats for a day yadda yadda...

 

lucy and dipsey one night after supper

sanding up for her nightly challenge for me

one afternoon before supper we had an epic silly string battle with all the children. there were no winners, and no hostages were taken.

that cupcake was super excited about her silly string until it became evident she was not strong enough to push down the button to make the stuff come out. she would point and where/who she wanted squirted and i'd take care of business. silly string is really hard to get out of hair btw. (word to the wise - let it dry completely and then pull out. do NOT try to wash it out. who knew?)

On the 4th of July, we planned a double celebration: the Queen of Ocean Isle's Diamond Jubilee, and Mama's birthday! We had a lovely shrimp boil to kick off the festivities:

matt and tommy sweated profusely over pots of boiling water

the queen and  her bounty. let them eat cake!

After supper, the queen was presented with many fine things during her Diamond Jubilee. The ladies of her court were given roses, as was she.

the queen and her court

she was given a large sand dollar signed by all the subjects in her realm too

After supper, it was time to celebrate Mama's birthday! Jenny made a cake!

with an appropriate amount of salt too, i might add.

Everyone was feeling patriotic. CJ and Chris dressed in matching father/son outfits.

he's saying 'cheeeeese!'

And Mama was blown away with her birthday surprise!

she had no idea cake was involved

random afternoon volleyball hijinks...

and i annoyed everyone on our last night by heating up the whole house with three pots of boiling seawater. 

homemade sea salt! i'm preparing for friends hunting/gathering II: the sequel

And in an effort to prove that Jenny doesn't judge on looks, she gives me a smoocharoo despite my horrid overbite.

and a mmm-WAH!

but won't let me return the favor!

Next, BOOOO..... time to pack up and go home I DON'T WANNA.

sigh. stupid packing to leave for stupid knoxville and stupid work and stupid stupid.

Lastly, I give you:

the whole motley crew

kuh-razzeee!

Over and out until next year, Ocean Isle!