Category Archives: life

A sad tale of large feet

hee hee

But really, I do have a sad tale to tell.

My new little glambaby, Aniston, is the tiniest human being I have ever held. She weighed in yesterday at 5 lbs and 12 oz. Almost back up to her birth weight. She is long and skinny and TINY.

But people comment, when they see her photos, that she has big hands and big feet. And she does. And they look like Geoff’s.

Can you see how her little toe curls under? When I arrived on Sunday, the first thing Geoff said was, “Look at her feet. Her little toes curl under like mine.” And so they do. Nikki’s sister thought there was something wrong with her toes and it was the first time they noticed this.

It’s been kind of hard for Nikki to find something for Aniston to wear since she’s so long but so skinny. The premie clothes are too short but the newborn clothes are too big. Except for the footies.

And they are just too small.

Her socks have been too small since the day she was born and first wore them.

Of all the traits she could have taken from the Rottmayer side, I wouldn’t have chosen the feet. Geoff wears a 15, Brandon wears a 14, David a 12 (which is probably more normal than the rest of us) and I wear a 10 square.

Yes, my feet are square. LOL! They have always been wide and I remember when my mom bought me my first pair of wide shoes when I was six. They were navy blue and ugly and I could wiggle my toes for the first time! 🙂  Wide shoes have improved vastly in the last five years or so but it’s still a struggle to find just what I want.

Yes, we want her to have her own Rottmop. The four of us have more hair than 10 normal people and, while Brandon and I have coarser thick hair, Geoff and David have the most gorgeous wavy thick hair. Any girl would be blessed to have hair like that.

And we would love her to have Geoff’s long eyelashes and pretty teeth.

But feet?

Hopefully, she’ll grow into a more normal sized foot as she gets older and take after Nikki.

Because I just don’t think I could keep from crying if history repeats itself when she’s in eighth grade.

When Geoff was in eighth grade, his class had an end of the year skating party. Sadly, Geoff wasn’t able to skate because the skating rink didn’t have size 14 skates. He said he played video games all day and had fun but it just broke my heart that he couldn’t skate with the rest of his class.

I’m sure that Geoff wasn’t scarred by the skating experience but it’s something that stays with me for some reason.

And that is my sad, sad tale of large feet.

Bathroom communique’ – Part II

If you’ve known me for any length of time, you know how much I love to laugh and to make other people laugh. I always view myself as the entertainment.

As The Rock says, “Know your role”. 🙂

So I particularly enjoyed the Bathroom Communique‘ David and I had going last week.

I didn’t think there would be time for him to answer before I left for Oklahoma but I was wrong.

I found this:

To which I replied:

And left for Oklahoma.

I got back to Little Rock, Tuesday evening. And, as of yesterday, my reply still hung on the towel rack. I was going to get rid of it but, after spending my whole life at the DMV yesterday, I was barely in the bathroom at the house.

This morning, when I went into the bathroom I saw this:

Bahahahahaha! OMG I am laughing SO hard. I don’t even have a come back for this one. But I’m heading to Oklahoma again in a little bit so I’ll have a few days to come up with one. 🙂

A new kind of love

We’ve been waiting for so long and after a very long day of labor, our first grandchild, Aniston Lee, was born at 8:59 p.m on Monday night.  She weighed in at 5 lbs and 15 oz and measured 20 inches long.

She is long and skinny like her daddy was when he was born.

The first photo I saw was so completely precious to me and I couldn’t quit looking at it.

And there I was: falling in love with a photo of my child falling in love with his child.

Amazing. I really have no words.

People have told me that being a grandparent is one of the most awesome things you get a chance to do. And I have so looked forward to this part of my life. But I never, ever knew about the incredible range of emotions you feel when you’re on the brink of becoming Glammie and then when you finally hold that sweet baby in your arms for the first time.

It’s nothing short of incredible.

Watching Nikki with her is awesome. It’s like she was born to be Aniston’s mommy. I knew she’d be a good mom and I wasn’t wrong.

Geoff is just so tender with her. Delighted is the only word I can use to describe the look on his face at times.

It turns my heart inside out to watch him be her daddy.

I love this new kind of love we are all experiencing. Even if I did cry for another four hours on the drive back to Little Rock. 🙂

Cry me a river

Oh. My. What is wrong with me?

I wasn’t a big Whitney Houston fan. And yet I cry for her loss.

I wasn’t a Michael Jackson fan, either, really. But I cried when he passed, too.

I think it’s because they are our age. And those two were so incredibly talented.

I cried all the way home from Arkansas yesterday.

Why?

Because I just know that my mom and dad would love the heck out of knowing Geoff’s little daughter, Aniston.

I think about Nikki suffering to give birth. And I cry.

I think about Geoff feeling bad because Nikki is in pain. And I cry.

I miss Leo. And I cry.

<sigh>

I’ll be okay. I learned to wear waterproof mascara from Miss America.

And today? If my eyes are green? It’s because Mom and Dad are there for Aniston’s birth like they were there for Brandon and Vanessa’s wedding.

Bathroom communique’

Yesterday, I nearly fell in the toilet when I tried to use the bathroom. This hasn’t really been an issue for many years but has been since we moved into this apartment.

So I left this note for David.

I just found this return note:

To which I have replied:

I’m headed to Oklahoma today before he’ll get a chance to see this one. I’ll be interested to see the reply. 😉

Glammie Boot Camp

I spent this last week in Texas at, what we dubbed, Glammie Boot Camp. My best friend Denise and her husband both had to go to meetings out of state on the same week and I went to help them watch their four month old twins “Lauri” and “Laurence”.

You know that I’m going to be Glammie very soon (February 13!) to little Aniston Lee. But it’s been many, many years since I’ve hung out with and taken care of a baby. I was up for the challenge.

The babies are so sweet and snuggly and I enjoyed every last minute I got to play with and take care of them.

My first confusion came in the area of bottles. They don’t make bottles like they did when I had babies.  I mostly breastfed anyway so I looked at this multi-pieced contraption with much confusion. I tried this way, then that way. Finally, doh!, I looked at a used bottle that hadn’t been disassembled and was able to figure out how to put the bottle together.

I was down on the floor with the babies and playing with them, entertaining them, coaching them to roll over which they each did for the first time!

The first night, I laid down in bed. Early. I thought I would die. I hurt everywhere. I felt like I used to feel after pageant weekend was over and I’d been on my feet in heels for days.  I slept well! I heard the babies in the night but knew the night nanny had them and went back to sleep.

Fortunately, during the days, the babies’ Grande was there and there were two of us taking care of them. I’m not sure I could have done it alone even if I were younger. 😉

I was able to check out the cool toys for Aniston.

I purchased the monkey ball yesterday. Wee hoo wheeeeeeeeee!

He’s currently in the back of my car having a high time. I’ll leave him with Nikki today.

I still need to get the Baby Einstein jumper.

“Laurence” loves that thing and spends hours in it running and spinning the tunes. “Lauri” is still such a tiny thing that she is almost swallowed up by it. She does like it, just not for as long.

I scoped out the cute clothes.

Glitter socks! I’ve already ordered these and they are on their way. I KNOW Aniston must have them. 🙂

All in all, it was a fun and special week. I love those little guys so much and feel so honored that Denise and Jason would let me take care of them.

It was hard to leave them. But I’ll be back to visit in a couple of weeks. I can’t wait! I think I’m going to bring them balloons. 🙂

I’m an Arkansas Woman Blogger!

I was hanging out in twitter the other day when I saw this:

Oh! Well, actually I DO live in Arkansas a lot of the time now so I clicked the link to check it out.

I wasn’t sure if I could join because we are only in Little Rock temporarily so I sent an email to see if I could join. Julie responded back that I was welcome and to fill out the application form at the website which I did.

I just got my notification yesterday that I have been accepted as a member of the Arkansas Women Bloggers!

Arkansas Women Bloggers

I’m excited because I don’t really know anyone there except for David and his guys.

I’ve been back and forth between Oklahoma and Arkansas with a little Texas thrown in since the project began in Little Rock last December. I feel kind of like a rolling stone. Hmmm. Does that mean I’ve got moves like Jagger?

I digress. 😉

Anyway, I’m super excited to have found this group and look forward to a meet up next month in Little Rock. I hope to meet some new friends! 🙂

Up hill both way with no boots

Our daughter-in-love has been experiencing high blood pressure at the end of her pregnancy. The result is that she needs to be on bedrest.

This happened to me when I was pregnant with Brandon.

She tells me she’s bored.

Bedrest IS boring, no doubt. But when I did it, not only was there no internet but we were stationed in Cuba on the Guanantanamo Bay (Gitmo) Navy base and there was only one Armed Forces TV channel.

I have told her how much easier it will be for her with all of the satellite channels on TV, text messages, facebook and Pinterest.

It gave me a giggle this morning when I thought about how my telling her that my bedrest experience was like being held in a terrorist holding facility was the equivalent of my grandparents telling us how they had to walk to school in the snow, uphill both ways, with no boots.

hee hee 🙂

Failure is not an option

The first time I was asked this question was at Toastmasters a few years ago. It was the Table Topics question.

Table Topics, if you’re not familiar, is an opportunity to speak extemporaneously on a random subject for one to two minutes. And you get approximately that much time, possibly less, to compose your answer.

I think this is the kind of question that you could ponder for quite some time.

Still my answer at the time was there is nothing I wouldn’t attempt, if I really wanted to do it, whether failure was a possibility or not.

Every time I see this question, I do think about it and I arrive at the same conclusion. I would still do something I wanted to do even if I might fail.

Lloyd Jones said

The men who try to do something and fail are infinitely better than those who try to do nothing and succeed.

And why is this?

Because with each “failure” you learn something that will make you better at whatever it is you are trying to attempt. And it may even make you a better person in general.

There are lots of quotes about failure with this perspective. Here are a few of my favorites:

There is no failure except in no longer trying.  ~Elbert Hubbard

Try again.  Fail again.  Fail better.  ~Samuel Beckett

There are defeats more triumphant than victories.  ~Michel de Montaigne

And my favorite

I have not failed.  I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.  ~Thomas Edison

So I encourage you. If there is something you want to do, don’t even bring the idea of failure into your thought process. Just do it and do it to the best of your ability. If it doesn’t turn out the way you think it should,  look for the lesson inside the experience. The lesson is invaluable and is your prize for trying.

David has some shirts that say “Failure is not an option” on them. I agree with this but, I’m sure, in a whole different way.

Because failure is not an option. How can you fail when you learn from the experience and get up and try it again, better?

🙂

Ugly, Uglier and Extra Ugly

So we’re living in a corporate apartment here in Little Rock and they furnished the apartment for us. The lamps that were brought in are, in a word, extra ugly.

Okay, two words, but they really are extra ugly. And they are not color coordinated. With my personal motto being “color coordination is everything” the lamps could not be allowed to remain.

I spent so much money just outfitting the kitchen with glasses, pans, dishes, etc. that I balked when I saw the price for new lamps. Do you know they don’t sell them all together? You buy the lamp base and then the shade separately.

I guess it’s been a long time since I’ve bought a lamp.

Anyway, I decided I was going to check out the Goodwill. I had seen a big store when we were out to dinner one night.

I found two lamps.

Ugly

and

Uglier

For some reason the gal who checked me out told me she was going to give me 85% off of Uglier. I felt kinda bad for him but who am I to argue with an 85% discount? Besides, I was going to make him gorgeous.

So I paid $6.50 for my two lamps.

Then I headed to Hobby Lobby and got some paint and Wal-Mart to get lampshades and the hardware to attach them to the lamp.

I started painting Uglier and look!

He looked like a gorgeous chocolate fountain. Yummy! 🙂

Once he was dry, he still looked gorgeous but not so much like a chocolate fountain. Doesn’t he look great by our bed?

Next I had to paint Ugly. He was going to remain in the living room with the black and tan furniture. I’ll never understand why they put a green lamp in here.

Anyway, I think he turned out beautiful, too.

Now our house is color coordinated and we can sleep nights. Ahhhhh. 🙂