Babies R Robinson

My beautiful sister Annie Fannie is pregnant with her very own little Doak....errrr....Robinson. It has been so much fun to see my sister pregnant. And why, by the way, are we not capitalizing on this Immaculate Conception? We should be millionaires!!

After Mark and Anne told us at Thanksgiving they were preggars, I started asking every week how big it was. “It” started as a poppy seed, then a blueberry, then an olive, then a peach, etc. Eventually “It” turned in to “him” and then “him” turned in to “Graham”. We have all watched his nursery come together (slowly but surely, in true Anne fashion). Besides Anne’s humongous cankles that look exactly like Grandma Bernie’s (ugh…), she looks amazing. She thinks she looks like a swarm of bees stung her but who am I to argue? She has the crazy pregnancy hormones running through her and lets be honest, she already shaved part of my head. What’s next? Nope. Not getting in to that with her face to face. But on my blog where I can say anything I want, I can say it. She looks great and is such a trooper. I can’t imagine having a stomach big enough to hold LeBron James and she really hasn’t complained at all. Well, I imagine maybe to Mark…but not to me. Everyone has read her blog and knows how big this butterball is. While she is a bit nervous about having to deliver this little fatty, I think this is fantastic news. Fat babies are the sh*t. I think Anne probably finds quite a bit of comfort in the fact that our mom (who was a miniature 110 pounds or something ridiculous) gave birth to 5 children that were all 9 1/2 and 10 1/2 pounds. I would think that would give someone serious bragging rights but if you ask my mom she’s like, “ohhhhh it’s nothing.” WHAT? You better believe if I had a baby as fat as Pat (almost 11 pounds…right? Just disgusting) that I wouldn’t be so blasé about the whole thing. BUT. That is one of the many things about my mother that makes her amazing. I feel pretty confident that Anne will give our mom a run for her money.


I can honestly say more than anyone I know, I think Anne will be the most amazing mom. She is fiercely protective of the people she loves. The most important thing you can give a child is love and there isn’t even the slightest possibility that her kids will ever doubt how greatly they are loved. Her creativity mixed with Mark’s wit will make them a fun set of parents to watch raise children. I’m so excited to watch Anne be a mom – it will be so natural for her. I really think some people are just born to be parents. My mother certainly was. I will always believe that her purpose on this earth was to raise children and make people smile. I can’t think of two more fitting people to do exactly the same thing.

Can't wait.

The definition of overdoing it

I come from a pretty pastey family. I’m just going to refer back to Anne’s post a while back. Now…while we can all look like we were extras on the Twilight set, our mom actually has a lot of olive in her skin. THANKFULLY I inherited a combination of my white ass father and my Italian looking mother. I can actually get pretty tan. I look like a used hand bag when I get that tan, but atleast I’m capable of it. Poor Anne can’t get a tan to save her life. She’s either white or red. Period. (No offense Roonie) All of the rest of us are atleast capable of getting a little bit of color. For the past two summers I have decided I would rather be pasty than look like I’m 40 when I’m 30. I really haven’t been out in the sun very much and I’ve gotten several comments in the past few weeks on my “see through skin”. Ugh. Okay. Maybe just a little tan. I’ll just get a little color so the circles under my eyes won’t show so much (thanks for that too Mom and Dad) and I look like I’m living in the same season as everyone else.

So I’m sitting at the pool with my friends they were like, “you’re really white…shouldn’t you really load up on the sun tan lotion?” and I say, “Nah, I put on some oil that has 8 in it…I’ll be good. I can actually get a really good tan”.


Fail.

Just Dirk it

So this picture has been floating around Facebook and it cracks me up. I’m certainly not putting it on FB, and probably shouldn’t even put it on here…but it was too good to pass up. He is so good it’s ridiculous.

A tale of six ducks

I. Love. Ducks. And elephants and penguins…but that isn’t the subject of this post. We showed up at our first kickball game at the JCC and there are ducks waddling through the dug out. I think I shrieked out of giddiness, commented on how cute the little family was, snapped a photo and walked away.

It didn’t really occur to me how they were going to get out of the fenced area (because you have to walk allll the way around the dug out to the other side) until some annoying girl started screaming asking everyone if they were “animal people”. I mean, what the heck were we supposed to do? Pick up the wild duck and her ducklings and politely carry them to a safer area? Yeah right. I like ducks but not that much. So the ducklings are jumping back and forth through the fence because they’re little enough, but the mom is flipping out. She keeps sticking her neck through the holes but then gets stuck. So then she tries another hole the exact same size because well…she’s a duck and she’s stupid. (Whoopsies)

So not only can we not play our game with a bunch of ducks behind home plate, but I’m also worried that this mom is going to kill herself trying to save her family or give herself a heart attack. – Can ducks have heart attacks? I wonder how common that is? – Anyway.

My plan is this. I will simply break the fence, hold it up and scoot the little ducks through the hole. Um. Negative. I can’t break the fence – it’s metal! Oh wait. Found a part of the fence that was already sort of broken (thank you poor city maintenance). So I’m pulling the bottom of this fence up with all my might so this damn duck can waddle under. Unfortunately me being there is scaring her…so while she gets CLOSE to me…she never actually goes under. Finally I found the first aid kit, stuck it under there to hold it up so the humans could step back. She knows something is good about what I did, but again…she’s a duck and she’s stupid so she’s jumping on TOP of the hole I made. The damn duck just can’t figure out she needs to go UNDER. Finally after probably 20 minutes (I’m not exaggerating) she finally figures out what the h she is supposed to do and jumps under the fence with her little babies safely in tow. Lizzi to the rescue. I know, I’m amazing. Who knew I would be such a duck lover? Our childhood dog Smokey scared the sh*t out of me for the whole 48 hours we owned him.

Hopefully they didn’t walk across Northaven and get run over after my heroic attempt to save their lives.

Tiny Wings

Okay, I’m jumping on the band wagon. A friend of mine told me to download the Angry Birds app. I knew about it but didn’t really care to learn how to play and I’m not totally in to video games. Except the original Mario, Duck Hunt, and Contra. DUH.
He let me play it on his phone and it was actually sort of fun, so I downloaded it. Honestly, I think it gets kind of old after awhile but it led me to the subject of this post. Tiny Wings.


It’s the same idea…a lame game that helps you kill time. But caution: This game gets addicting. It’s this little birdie (who is adorable by the way) that zooms down hills when you press your finger on the screen and then flies based on the amount of momentum he gains. It’s your job to know when to press down your finger to give him more and more momentum. If you have a “good slid” you get points. If you get him high enough (tee hee hee…) to touch the clouds, you get points. You have certain objectives and when you check them all off of your list, you get a new nest which just advances you to the next level where you are assigned new objectives. It’s way fun. I’m just saying.

Kickin' it

If you’re young and half-way normal (even if you’re not), you most likely know someone on a kickball team. I’ve always thought of doing it but never took the plunge. Amy (of course) called me a couple of months ago asking if I wanted to be on a team. And so it began. I wont lie, the team is a little random and I basically know no one…but I saw serious potential for fun and an excuse to drink on a Thursday night (now when did I ever need an excuse?). There are a lot of things going on here. First of all, trying to learn the rules. The last time I played kickball was in my fourth grade science class. I mean…it’s like baseball, right? Only problem there is while I love going to baseball games…it’s only for the beer, dollar hotdogs, and the opportunity for a tan. I never actually WATCH the game. What the hell do I know about baseball? General rules of course but…whatever, I’ll figure it out.



Week number 1. Amy sends out an email. She needs volunteers to be head referee and line refs for each game. Ugh.

Long story short, some rando assigned to our team volunteered to be head ref (thank god). Unfortunately…no one volunteered to be line ref. So guess what Doak sisters were stuck in that sticky spot? I would like to take this opportunity to reiterate that the last time I played kickball was when I was like…10 years old and it was geared towards science so I'm pretty sure adult rules didn't apply. Clearly I didn’t know the rules. Some crazy man tried to explain the rules to us about three minutes before the game. Force out? What the heck is a force out? What constitutes a foul? How do you get someone out? Ugh. Amy looked like she was going to throw up and her nervous laughter started kicking in and I was like, “dude, what’s the worst that can happen? It’s just a volunteer kickball league”. Oh. Hmm. Here is a situation that could happen:

Someone kicks a ball and it comes flying at you (duh, it’s a kickball game) and on instinct you lift up your leg to block it.

Whoops. Was that still in play? ……………..Needless to say, the team I helped get to first base was happy and the other team was…not. I had to sit the rest of the game listening to the team behind me talk sh*t. What did I do? Pretend it didn’t happen. I’m too cool for school. Duh.

Whoops….


*I feel it necessary to say that the man in the picture is not on our team. He is from Google. But I really wish he were on our team and my new best friend.

It was Miss Scarlett in the conservatory with the knife!

Well. What an interesting night I had. Remember the feather post? Yeah. Got those in the mail. I was way excited about them so asked Anne if she would help me put them in. I thought, she's crafty, I trust her, etc. Uhm. Yeah.

Lets set up these scene. First off, you need to know how you actually put these suckers in. Basically you have this little bead (think Indian bead but bigger) made out of metal. You have to put a chunk of hair through that, then stick the tips of the feathers underneath that, then clamp the bead with pliers so its holding the feathers and your hair together. Make sense? Great.

Anne and I march in to her bathroom to leave Mark and the basketball game in peace. We talk for a few minutes about where I want the feathers to be and I sit down. Anne tries to figure out how to thread the hair through the bead for a couple of minutes...and pretty soon we're ready to go. I hand her the feathers and she sticks them in the bead. It should be noted that at some point during this process Anne said atleast once, "okay...I'm not a moron." I. BEG. TO. DIFFER.

The picks up the "pliers". Oh. Why is that in quotations you ask? Hmm. Well. Because Anne didn't pick up pliers. Anne picked up wire cutters.

Pause for dramatic effect.

I hear a very loud SNAP next to my ear, Anne shoots across the room laughing so hard she can't even tell me what happened, and I look in the mirror to see stubble. STUBBLE. ON. MY. SCALP. I look at Anne's hands and sure enough -- she's holding all five feathers and a chunk of my hair. Whoopsies. No big deal. I mean...I don't have fine hair or anything. I didn't need those. Right? Wrong. It took about 20 minutes, but she eventually admitted, "I know see the error in my ways". Uh huh. I bet you do.

Why in the world would you think that wire cutters would clamp a bead shut. Take that one step further. Why in the world would you think that wire cutters wouldn't cut the chunk of hair you're holding in your hand? Shockingly, my hair is not stronger than wire. I am not Chuck Norris.

The Weapon:

So Anne. Thank you. You are officially off my "crafty helper person" list and officially on the "mothers who should go no where near people's heads with sharp objects" list. You and Mom are the only people on that list, by the way. Amy, I now understand the humiliation you must have felt when mom cut your hair when you were little and things went terribly awry.

Why I will never be a size 0.

My childhood was legit. Some of my best and worst memories involved food (SHOCKING, I know). There were so many of us and my badass mom used to make dinner every night. Probably because she wanted to make sure we were eating healthy, thought it was her job, but also I'm pretty sure a meal out for 7 people would have been like, $200 at McD's. Good memories though. Seven people all together at the dinner table every night. Usually Michael's legs were stretching under the table and kicking us (grrrrr) and we were constantly fighting about it. The boys in their two chairs on one side of the table and the three girls on a black bench that we had for the longest time. Sam's was a weekly stop. It's probably a sign you need to stop procreating when both the mom AND the dad have their own massive shopping cart at Sam's and they are both totally cram packed full. They used to buy these massive cans of vegetables and apple sauce from Sams -- you know? the cans that are LITERALLY 100 ounces? Sick. It's restaurant style. So many kids. For some reason, I always wanted to carry them in from the car and I ALWAYS dropped them on my foot. I'm pretty sure I had a black and blue big toe for atleast 3 years of my life. My mom used to make mac and cheese that was probably actually pretty good, but she insisted on cutting up these cubes (yes, cubes) of ham and throwin' them in there to give us "protein". Wah wah. It was sick. Meatloaf was often a staple which I still think is all kinds of disgusting and I'm not even going to discuss the meat grinder that was a staple on our countertop. *Shudder*

Not all meals were weird/gross though. My dad used to make these sick hamburgers and my mom would make chocolate shakes from none other than Blue Bell Vanilla Ice Cream (TEXAS, WHAT WHAT!!). She also makes the most insane potato salad ever and her mashed potatoes are still to this day my favorite food. Randomly, one of the best foods was Mama's Pizza. Best. Pizza. Ever. I always used to want to go with my parents to pick it up, but driving home smelling that pizza (even if it was in the truck) was the worst torture I have known to this day. We'd go home and dig the hell in. Mom and Dad would crack open their Coors Original (.....who drinks that?) and we'd call it a night.

Long story short, I drove from Uptown to Parker and Custer today to get myself a Mama's Pizza. I had completely forgotten about it, haven't thought of it in atleast 10 years and it was probably the most satisfying meal I have had in a month (except for the chicken tetrazzini my momma made

recently that was also a classic staple). If you haven't had this pizza -- go get it. The restaurant itself is slightly questionable from the outside but I promise you wont be disappointed. Go. Now. It's amazing.

**After my mom's comment I feel as though I need to add a little addition here. My mom is the shit. Most everyone reading this is one of her children so you know as well as I do -- but in case you aren't -- read carefully. My. Mom. Is. The. Shit. She really is a good cook when she doesn't try to make orange glazed ham balls (another memory I try every day to forgot). As you can see by her comments -- she as an awesome cook. Lots of good memories.

Mini MJ

Oh holy hell. So. The story begins with Anne and I at Neimans a few weeks ago. We had both gotten $50 "perk cards" (FREE MONEY) and decided to go see what we could get. We end up in the kids section (duh!). We both buy little Graham a little sumtin' sumtin' and are happy campers. UNTIL I SEE MINI MARC JACOBS. I'm frantically looking for the boys section only to find out they don't have any. Are you kiddin' me? What do I do? I have to have it. I crossed my fingers and thought, "Dear Baby Jesus, please let Mike and Laura's bambino be a girl. Thanks."

Guess what? Good things come to those who wait. This week we got an email from Mike and Laura telling us that they are going to have a little girl (by the way...can we talk about how beautiful she is going to be? Jeez Louise). So what do I do? Marc (get it? wink wink) my calendar to go back and stock up on some Mini Marc Jacobs for the newest member of the Doak family. And oh my gosh, they still had the two things I thought were so way cute. This outfit is so legit I almost want to keep it for my future child (totally ridiculous thought) but hopefully Laura and Mike will think it's cute too. :) Because I haven't given it to them yet, I can't put a picture of it on here -- so I decided to find some of Marc's cutest "mini" items. Seriously. Can you argue? Cutest things ever. Check out the sweater (bottom left). Pretty sure I need to hunt that down for Graham.

Gettin' my hair did

This whole idea started a few months ago when a girl I know posted a comment on Facebook. She has a daughter (maybe 4 or 5?) that is always WAY done up. Tutus, HUGE flower headbands, cowboy boots, etc. So she said something about how she wanted to put feathers in her hair and I thought, "huh?" so I did a little Google research (my addiction to Googling random stuff could be a blog post of its own...but that will be for another time). Apparently this is a legit new "trend" which actually makes me semi not like it...but whatever. Some look WAY ghetto and some look super cute. I think if you tuck them in under your hair (so you can try and hide them if you need to) and keep them small they could be pretty darn cute. So.........I ordered some. :) I have a feeling this might be a similar situation to the "extension fiasco", but I figure it's way less dramatic. I don't know. Am I crazy? What are people's thoughts? I haven't even gotten them, let alone put them in...so I could still be persuaded to resist. I think it could be fun for the summer though. Who knows. I guess time will tell.

** Disclaimer: I reserve the right to never admit to liking this, doing this, or even considering this if I so choose.

Amy gets the horns

There are no words.

'Ain't no Shake and Bake

I'm such a lucky little girl. My BFFFFFFFFFFFF Blake, also known as Poodle, made me dinner tonight. In the 10+ years that we have been friends, I'm pretty sure this is the first time we have ever eaten something at one of our places that isn't take out. Amazing. And who would have thunk it -- the boy can COOK! Full, fat and happy.

The Jumper from our Past

This deserves it's very own little post. My mother, god love her, still owns clothes from the 80's. Duh. I give my mom credit for actually caring what she looks like most of the time. If she goes out, she pulls herself together, very unlike most women past the age of 45 who have decided to give up. This is not a post to celebrate my moms efforts. This is...incredible. My mother has a jumpsuit from 1982 that has managed to stay in her wardrobe of "must-saves". I didn't realize this little gem had made it through all of these years until I show up at her new house for a painting party. Oh. My. Gosh. People are going to see you in that, Mom. You know people are coming over, right? Yeah. She knew. And I will say...after comments from me, my brother, AND my sister...she still rocked this ridiculous look with her head held high. Props mom. Props.

Shotty Times

When I worked at Cowboys Golf, I got two tickets to Medieval Times from a Christmas party. Worst gift ever, right? No. The On the Border breakfast coupons were worse.

I regifted them to Amy for Christmas that year because duh, if anyone I knew would go to Medieval Times, it would be Amy. She was actually pretty pumped about them. Shocking. I know. So about a year later when they are getting ready to expire, she somehow convinces me to go with her ensuring an amazing time. We initially had tried to get Anne and Mark to actually PAY for tickets and make a "thing" of it...but they declined because they have half of a brain.

That night was quite possibly one of my top 5 grossest experiences of my life. I knew it had something to do with

horses...but oh my god. I had no idea. We walked in, were handed our cardboard crowns (wait, what?), and immediately found the bar. This is the only logical decision we made all night. We bought a bottle of wine and asked for two glasses. Oh wait. Can we have two PLASTIC glasses because the glasses you just gave us have someones lipstick on them. Gag. We sit down in our seats probably sidestepping manure on the way next to a family of 5 that had very clearly paid for their tickets and were all kinds of excited to be there.

So I'm drinking the wenches brew from my goblet and here comes our own little wench-waitress pouring what I believe was old Cambell's Tomato soup out of a black caldren into our pewter bowl. Um, Amy? Where is the spoon? OH WAIT, we are in Medieval Times and they were too primitive to use silverware. Do we stick out like sore thumbs in our Marc Jacobs and Forever 21? Most likely, yes.

Now the show starts. This is quite possibly the most ridiculous thing I have ever seen. I'm so embarrassed for the men with their long nappy hair who come bounding into the arena on their white horses so proud that they have just been promoted to head knight at Medieval Times. I wonder if any of them are available....

About 4 minutes later, we look at each other and decide it's probably a good idea to peace out before the turkey legs get passed around. Here is a little snack for your viewing pleasure:

When God Closes a door....

....He opens another door that is bright teal and way cuter. :)

Blog Alert: WAY random post.

I was looking up kitchens online because my Mom is moving/painting her new place. Not sure how...but I came across this photo and fell in love. I have a door on my wall (...yeah....)...but not a door-door like this. I really want one though so I can paint it a bright color like this. How cute is that?? Only problem? You reaaaally have to commit to that with the black walls (which is why the door is cute, right?).

...That's about all I have. Told ya. Random post. xx