Alexa Martin, MOM JEANS AND OTHER MISTAKES

[1:39]Zibby Owens: Hi. This is Zibby Owens, you're listening to the award winning podcast, Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books. And speaking of books, I have two of my own books coming out this spring and summer. Princess Charming is a picture book, which debuts on April 19, and Bookends, a memoir of love, loss, and literature comes out on July 1, and it is truly a labor of love. I hope you'll preorder, order, and join me on tour as I go across the country. You can find out more at zibbyowens.com or bookendsmemoir.com. And you can follow me on Instagram at zibby owens because I always post about everything. Enjoy the show. Alexa Martin is the author of Mom Genes and Other Mistakes. Alexa is a writer and stay at home mom. A Nashville transplant, she's intent on instilling a deep love and respect for the great Dolly Parton in her four children and husband. The Playbook series was inspired by the eight years she spent as an NFL wife and her deep love of all things pop culture, sparkles, leggings, and wine. When she's not repeating herself to her kids, you can find her catching up on whatever Real Housewives franchise is currently airing or filling up her Etsy cart with items she doesn't need. Welcome, Alexa. Thank you so much for coming on Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books to discuss mom jeans and other mistakes.

[2:59]Alexa Martin: Thank you so much for having me. I'm so excited. Oh, this is really fun. You're not just the author of this book. You have a whole series of other books, and you have this rom com you are, like, so prolific. I love it. It's amazing. So for people who aren't familiar with you yet, please talk little bit about Mom Jeans and Other Mistakes and what that's about. But I also just want you to describe your whole series, which is the coolest. Okay. So Mom Jeans and Other Mistakes is about two best friends who are kind of struggling and decide to move in with one another to help for financial and emotional support. They're polar opposite. One is just single influencer. The other is a single mom who is very by the books and showing how they support each other. It's really about moms and daughters and friends, just like all of the relationships that women tend to have. And then my first series is a sports romance. And it is four books. And it is very loosely based off of the four years that I spent as an NFL life. Or after the eight years did I just say four years? Four books based off the eight years. Four books, four kids, you know. So funny. So I know this will be released later, but as we're recording it, the Super Bowl was last night. And I've just realized that I'm interviewing two different NFL wives this week. It's like my Super Bowl NFL wife week or something. I don't think I've ever interviewed an NFL wife before. So anyway, when it rains, it pours. On your website, you said, like, never say never that you were gonna ever write about all this stuff. And you said you moved to Green Bay, and you had no friends and a baby, and you were like, I'm just gonna start. So be so tell tell me the story because and by the way, like, between your book and your site and your Instagram, like, just so you know, you come off as, like, the most likable person ever. Basically, it's basically like an invitation to be your friend. Thank you. That's all I want. Please be my friend. Yeah. I, like, nod my head yes to, like, you know, laugh out loud everything you write and say. I'm like, yes. So, anyway, keep going. Yeah. So, gosh, my husband got drafted to the NFL when he was 21, and I was a baby. I moved out there when I was 19. And you were married at 19? We got married when I was 20. Wow. And then I had my first baby when I was 20. Oh my gosh. And so we were in Baltimore. He played for the Ravens for the first three years of his career. And then I was pregnant with my daughter and he got traded to Green Bay. And it was just like, if you were traded, move tomorrow, basically. And I was, I think, like thirty six weeks pregnant. Was very, very pregnant. Oh my gosh. And so I had to pack up our apartments and my mom flew out and we drove from Baltimore to Green Bay. I met my doctor once before. It was so funny. The people in the hospital were like, this is your first appointment. I was like, here, it's my first appointment here. Then the guy was very negligent. Yeah. And so then within, you know, I had my daughter Harlow, like a week or two after moving to Green Bay. And so yeah, I had literally no friends that year because I had an 18 old and a newborn. And it is cold in Green Bay if people don't know that. So leaving the house wasn't really anything. And I can be very painfully shy, so it's hard for me to kind of jump into the mix. And so we were in Green Bay for two years. And while we were in Green Bay, I started kind of like a blog just to keep my family involved and everything that was happening. Was just like, my kids did this today. That was the entire blog. I don't think anybody read it except for my mom and grandma, maybe my aunt. And yes, so then he left Green Bay. So two years in Green Bay, he left Green Bay, was picked up by the Giants. And he was picked up for the Giants, I think, a few weeks before I gave birth to my third. And I had scheduled an induction and they're like, Oh no, he can't come home on that day. He can come home the next day. I was like, You know how long twenty four hours is when you are this pregnant with like three small children. And I think that was around the time I really had started reading. I wasn't a huge reader before. And my grandma was like, Oh, have you read those 50 Shade books? I've seen them everywhere. And I was like, No, grandma, I haven't. She's like, Everyone's talking about them. Maybe you should read them. So I started reading them and it was like my gateway drug into reading. I just like could not stop after that. And yeah, so then Dash was born and I think we kept staying in Colorado by myself for three months with the three kids before Dash could fly. And then we went to New Jersey for a few months and it ended up being a couple months longer. Because they weren't I didn't think they were that good that year. I remember being like, oh, cool. We'll go home early. But they ended up winning the Super Bowl. It was like a very long stretch of being there. Yeah. And then I think he played a few more seasons before he ended up breaking his collarbone. It was a car accident like right before preseason. So that was the end of that. Yeah. But it was a lot of moving. It was a lot of babies. It did not feel glamorous. And so when I started writing, I was like, I will never write a sports romance. This is not fun. Who wants to read about this? And so the first version of Intercepted is not a sports romance, like really at all. And I was really lucky. I was picked for this mentorship writing program called Pitch Wars. And they're just like, Well, why wouldn't you? You have a really cool perspective. Maybe you should try. And I was like, I don't know. But eventually I was like, Okay, yeah, I'll give it a go. Because really, would have done anything for them to pick me. I just wanted to learn about writing because they had no idea what I was doing when I started it. I literally, we got home from vacation. I was like, I'm gonna start writing a book. And I locked myself in the basement. I didn't tell anybody I was writing, not even my husband. I think eventually he was like, what are you doing in the basement with a twirl? She starts reading 50 Shades. Next thing you know, she's locked in the basement for hours at a time. I don't even want to know. Yeah, exactly. And so I was like, Yeah, sure, I can do that. The first book took me four years to write. They're like, you'd have to rewrite the book in about four weeks and then we'll give you rewrites and you'll do edits in like another four weeks. Can you do that? I was like, yeah, sure, no problem. Meanwhile, I was like, can't do that. It took me four years to write this. You want me to do it in a month? And I had had my fourth child by then who was about a year. And my mother-in-law had just had knee replacement surgery and she was staying with us and we had just moved back from Wyoming to Colorado. And I was like, yeah, yeah, no problem. It was a lot of Red Bull and a lot of crying. But yeah, so that's how I wrote Intercepted and it really just all kind of spurred off from there. Oh my gosh. Wait. Just because my husband's a football fan and might care, I don't I wouldn't even know. But what who what was your what is your husband's name and what position did he play? Derek Martin. He was a, like, defensive back. So he played, like, cornerback and safety. He was really great on special teams, though. Yeah. He was really good on special teams. That's what he played. And then he played often. Yeah. So Intercepted gets sorry. That was for him. Okay. So Inter Intercepted Intercepted gets picked up and then did a traditional publishing firm buy the rights to all these other books? Is that what happened or what happened? Yeah. So I signed with my agent from Pitch Wars and then we sent that out and Berkeley picked it up and I got a free book deal for that. And so I wrote Intercepted first, then Fumbled, then Blitzed. And Blitzed was supposed to be the end of the series, but in a wild, crazy, other world turn of events, it was picked up by it was optioned for TV rights with stars. And so they're like, okay, here's one like, let's throw one more book in there. And I was like, what do you mean one more book? I don't know how to write football games any other way anymore. And so then I wrote Snapped, which is a little different from the first three books, but I still really love it. Snapped is more of, it's about Elliot, who is biracial and raised by her white father, And Quentin, who is a quarterback who takes a knee on the field. And so it's about Elliot really fully coming to understand her identity. I'm also biracial. I really connected with her. It was a pretty personal book, honestly. So Is your dad white the same as the book? Well, no. So it's a little different that my dad is black, my mom is white, but I was raised by my mom's family. My dad passed when I was really young. And so I was like, very long time ago, but thank you. So I was raised by like my white family and always just kind of never I think it was really learning to come to my kind of to terms with my identity as an adult because they didn't really notice this much as a child. And, you know, the microaggressions you kind of let pass and you don't see them and then you're an adult and you're like, oh wait, I have a lifetime of realizing like things that have happened and they all kind of hit you at once. And especially during, you know, I wrote that book in the end of twenty nineteen. Yeah, so the end of twenty nineteen and then 2020 happened. And it was like, oh no. Like the taking a knee, everything was like more relevant than it was when it first happened. And so I was like, oh, this is a little nerve wracking. So then what happened? Because this is Mom Jeans and Other Mistakes is like a departure, different story, friendship story, women focused, not football. Like tell me about how this So came to throughout the Playbook series, I really focused on like there's the female friendships within those books. And it got to a point where it's like, I kind of like writing these more than I like writing the romantic scenes. So I thrown out to my agent, my editor, what do you think if we do one that's like more women's fiction and more about female friendship? They're like, well, cool. Give us like a list of four things that you would like themes you'd want to talk about. Female friendship, like identity through mothership, mother daughter relationships. And I can't remember what the last one was. I can't remember what the last one was. But so they're just like, Yeah, that's great. Write that. And my editor was like, What if it was two moms that moved in together with all their kids? I was like, That might be too much mommying. But I already have four kids. Gonna a mom. Thought this was an escape for me. That stresses me out a little bit. Let's do a little less kids. But I really wanted to discuss being a millennial type, like a mother and a daughter, right? So it really focuses on Lauren and her struggles being a mom, single mom, relationship with her own mother. And then Jude's relationship with Addy is kind of like a bonus mom and really her dysfunctional relationship with her mom and how that works. It was really important for me to kind of use like the to kind of I don't know if I want to say like a message, but like where it's okay to kind of set boundaries and protect yourself no matter who you're protecting yourself from. I've had me and my mom were like best friends and then some stuff later in life happened and it was like really hard and I could never set those boundaries. So was something that I really wanted to just see. So it was really kind of therapeutic for me to write this like alternative ending to my life and where everything could be happy. And hopefully down the line there could be a happily ever after. But right now, just saying this is what I need is happy enough, putting myself first. So did your mother did not pass away? I thought from the acknowledgments, she passed away. Yeah. She did. Yeah. She did. Oh. Yeah. The big, iffy end of twenty twenty. It was a rough, I don't know, like seven years before that. You know, like I said, my dad had passed away a long time ago, and not to like fully turn this, but in like the same year, one of her best friends died and her brother died. And it was at the time where nobody got therapy. My grandma, I remember her telling me once that her friend had therapy. She was like, She's seen him for a year now and she's still going. You only need to go for a few months. And that was the thing. She's like, now he's just ripping her off. And I was like, no, I don't think that's how it works, grandma. So, you know, like we never talked about mental health in that capacity. And I think you can only bury trauma like that for so long before it rears its head. And it's something that I've been able to kind of understand since she passed, like way before. It was like a lot of hurts, and it was really hard to see past like everything that was going on. So yeah, I was really afraid for her to read this book. I was so afraid that she would see. Because I mean, some of the scenes felt like they were just really fully pulled from my life. And so I was really worried that she was going to see things and be hurt. And it was like wild because then she she passed just, before it came out. So yeah. I'm sorry. That's a lot to go through. It was I mean, twenty twenty, I think, hit everybody pretty hard. That doesn't make it any less severe for you. I mean, just because other people have bad years doesn't make bad years any less relevant. I appreciate that. Yeah. Wow. Well, I'm really sorry. And you're so young. Oh my gosh. I feel like, you know, that's just you just have so much on your plate. You've done all this great stuff. Well, I don't know. I'm like you in that I feel like when I have complicated stuff going on, I like to write about it. I'm not like a fiction person, but you clearly can are using this medium to sort out your stuff in some way or something. It is it is my nice little version of therapy some days. I'm just like, we'll just put it in the book. Yeah. I was just before this recording a bunch of, like, my ads that are coming up for the show, and I have this new sponsor, Cerebral or or whatever. And I was like writing you know, about saying this ad about how mental health is so important and like you can get free med not free meds, but can get medicine and all this stuff. I'm thinking to myself, guess. My god. What is that again, Mary? I've never, you know, beeline to this app now myself. So anyway, I'll just say therapy never hurt a soul. Ever. It is the best thing. That was the other thing I was really proud of in mom jeans is to show like therapy on the page. Yes. Like not just like allude to it, like there's therapy, go to therapy. It is necessary for most people. Yeah. Maybe everyone. Today's episode is sponsored by Quince.

[20:07]Alexa Martin: I like how in mom jeans too, you also show because, you know, Jude is a Instagram person. Right? So you have all this talk about, like, how she's being so perfect, and yet that's not that's not her life either. Right? And, like, what does it mean when you're trying to show that you're perfect and yet your life is not like that? I'm trying to find one of the many parts here that I dog eared, as I said, some of these I did a long time ago. But that but basically that your life, you know, does it does it make sense to portray a life of perfection when inside, you know, like, she was saying her mom, in relationship to how her mom did it, here she is taking her life and like, you know what? Her own life isn't perfect, but she's making this her job, so so be it. Right? She's taking what, like, the raw material that her mom had to handle in a totally different way. And she's like, yeah. So you know what? I'm packaging it up in this way. So tell me a little I bit about love Jude so much. And I think my favorite character is just like a hot mess who means well. I think that is Jude to a T. She is such a disaster, but she loves really hard. And you can tell she loves Lauren and she loves Addy. And she is a Pilates influencer. Her mom is a Real Housewives type character and who kind of just derailed her life. Her mom was like, come do this, and it kind of snowballed into her life. And so now what she was left with was this influencer career that she actually takes very seriously. But it's funny, she's mentioning her sheets that photograph well, but the rest of her room is covered in boxes and is a mess. And she alludes once to, she loves the great thing about vodka is it looks like water in a picture, right? So like it's just kind of showing what you see on Instagram might look really pretty, but if you kind of step away, it really could be a full hot mess. And I think in a time where we're really comparing ourselves to everything we see as we scroll, it was really interesting to kind of dive into that world and see all of it. I listened to influencer podcasts, I took a few influencer courses to see everything behind them and how they set things up. And it really is a job for so many people, like a full time job that takes a lot of time and a lot of planning. I mean, I can't even post on my Instagram every week. So maybe we'll have these relevant posts every day. That takes a lot of time. But you had the cutest picture on your Instagram of your baby in a football helmet. Oh my gosh. That was like the cutest thing. Our newborn pictures. Yeah. We shoved Harlow in a little cream bay helmet. So cute. Oh my goodness. Pictures. No. It's true. I listened to Jo Piazza's podcast called Under the Influence where she did, like, an expose on influencers and mom influencer in particular and sites like Like to Know It and all of these places where you monetize everything. Right? Like, have a picture and you're like, and now buy my scarf for a week. You know? And I was like, oh, maybe I could do that. So I applied. I actually had COVID at the time, and I forgot I even, like, applied because I was, like, in bed. I was like, well, let's see if they take me. Anyway and then they took me, and I like, how did I get this? Anyway, I tried for, a day. I was like, oh, okay. You know, how hard can this be? I'll add these things. I was like, this is a job. Like Yeah. I I cannot add this job to my plate. This is like you have to be so strategic and Yeah. Focused and links everywhere. And I was like, oh, no. I'm too tired. I'm just letting this go. I can't certain point, I feel like we see those links everywhere that just like, do you really mean this? Like, do you really there are some people that are great for it, and I'm just like, oh, they posted it. I must buy it now. Like, I will buy anything that you post. But I went to Target with my mom a couple months ago, and I bought these brown shoes. And I literally wasn't sure if they were hideous or not. So I posted a picture of me wearing these. They were like clog boots or something. They were super comfortable. So I posted a picture in the morning. I was like, are these ugly or not? And then all these people went and bought the shoes. That's so funny. They were like, no. They're amazing. And I was like, oh my gosh. And the next thing I do, people were like taking pictures of themselves wearing the shoes. And, you know, like, half the people still thought they were really ugly. I was like, great. Anyway, I was like, this is wild. This is really wild. Like, if I It is. Yeah. I mean, I yeah. Like, accidental food fluencer or something. What it's time to be alive. Yeah. Right? It's so funny. I mean, delighted. Great. They're super comfy. I'm glad anybody bought them. Yeah. Why don't somebody show me comfy shoes because I cannot wear a heel anymore? After I think I had my second or third kid, like, I don't know, some of the bones in my ankle shifted. I don't know. Like try to put on heels and I'm like, nope. My Oh my gosh. They don't work anymore. Sorry. I had to wear like my it just went to my dad's 70 birthday, this like very small thing. But anyway, I had to wear heels with like a red dress. And I was like, I'm never doing this again. This is terrible. You know? I put my I'm like, I just can't. So that's my once a year maybe moment, I think. So the book was so much of this is about relationships and all that, but you do have quite a bit about how black women are treated in hospitals, particularly pregnancy when you are black. Tell me a little bit about that. Well, so I am very thankful. I mean, it's probably bad, but I had my children so young that I was so ignorant to the numbers and everything that I wasn't scared. But I think if I were to get pregnant now, I would be terrified because the mortality rate for Black women is just so much higher. And then you hear these stories of Venus Williams and Beyonce who also weren't listened to. And you're like, okay, if they're not going to listen to them, who are they going to listen to? And it's just like this really sort of ugly history that we have of how we don't really take Well, for one, the strong Black woman trope, right? So we think we can just handle more. And also just not believing Black women when they say they're in pain or when they say they need medicine and just not taking these things seriously. So it's caused just so many the numbers of Black women who die is just so much higher. And I'm so glad that people are starting to talk about it. I mean, it's terrifying, but I don't think obviously things can't change until we talk about it more. So it's something that I wanted to kind of tap into it. I mean, because I think in this book it is pretty underhanded. I didn't want to hit people over the head with race things. So actually, I feel like most of the conversations dealing with race actually come from Jude, who was white, and not Lauren, who was black. I think sometimes it's easier to take things in when it feels like it's just like a friend's telling you instead of somebody yelling or preaching at you. Yes. But so kind of throughout the book Lauren alludes to it and you finally find out what had happened and how she was like telling people like, I need help. And they're just like, oh, you're fine. You're or that if you would have told us in a calmer voice, we could have listened, right? Because it's bad. It's the aggressive labels that get slapped on Black women so easily and how that affects how we're seen. Would like to say that most times it's inadvertent. It's just so built in and these stereotypes that it's hard to notice them. I was talking to my friend the other day, and it's just like when you're raised and we all have our prejudices, we all have things we need to unlearn, but I think that these past few years have really taught us that we all have things and unlearning is so important. It's not enough to just be like, Oh, I'm not racist. You have to be fully anti racist. You have to unlearn all of these things that have been slowly ingrained into you without even noticing. Very true. Well, no, I didn't mean it was not being hit on the head. It was, you know, conversation. It was very artfully done and all that. But, you know, but it made the point, right? Because it's important. It's really important everybody remember. Right? And, like, take it in and do something about it. Yeah. And to understand that these numbers are actually real. Like, this isn't just people complaining, like, these are lives being lost. This is something that is actually happening. And and, yeah, like I said before, like, we have to, like, be aware of it. You can't change things if people don't know. I'm not saying that my book is gonna make everybody happy. No, no, but whatever. I mean, have you read a memoir by Jodi Patterson called The Bold You should read it. She's so amazing, by the way. Or actually, listen to it. I listened to I did half listen and half read, but she narrates the book, so it's, like, really good. And she has many kids too. But she got COVID, like, before COVID was even really a thing. Like, I wanna say in February. But she had a whole section on how as a black woman, she was completely not taken seriously Mhmm. And stripped of her glasses and her makeup and her nice clothing and, like, the fact that she was such a badass at work and all this stuff. Like, she was completely ignored. Like, everybody thought she was like it treated her terrible. Anyway Mhmm. But it's about her and it's not about that. That's just like one little scene in the book, but it's a great book anyway. I read it all the time. So anyway, whatever. I'm like getting totally off track. Okay. So what books do you have coming are you writing another book? And if so, what's that about? Yeah. So I just turned in edits for my next book that comes out in the fall, and it is another romance. And it is called Better Than Fiction. And it's about a I love woman that. It's about a woman who doesn't like books but inherits a bookstore from her grandma. Oh my god. So now she's a bookstore owner. And a very attractive author comes in, who's invited by her grandma's friends, like this old lady book club. And they are always meddling her life, and so they try to set her up with this new author. And he is in town writing his book, and it's set in Colorado. And she was a photographer and so she well, the old lady is like, offer her up to show him, be his guide. And in turn he assigns her a book bucket list and does like dates around the books to turn her into a book lover. So it's this really sweet book that I think for me feels like so pandemic written because it is them just exploring the outside world for most of the book. Like if I can't get outside, somebody's going outside. And they just kind of wander around reading books and falling for each other. But then also because apparently this is just what I do, it also kind of touches on her learning to focus on herself and put herself forth first and move past the, like, grief of losing her grandma. Aw. I was like, it's gonna be light and fluffy and nothing bad is gonna happen. But I was like, wait. She just inherited it from her grandma. I was like, never mind. Grief. That sounds amazing. Do you have a pub date for that? I'm not sure the exact date. I know it's fall twenty twenty two, so fall of this year. So cool. Oh my god. I have to read then. Yeah. I'm really excited with how it turned out. It was hard for me to write. I think it was like right when I think I had like a delayed grief after my mom. So it was like right as I was in the middle of this, I was just like punched in the face with it. And so I was like, oh no. But thankfully I just like reread it while I was doing these edits. Was like, oh no, I like it. And then I'm starting to draft my next book, which it doesn't have a full title. In my head, I'm calling it HOA Holes. And it's about a woman who's back home with her parents and goes to war with the local HOA. Love it. Yeah. So I'm really excited for that one. I've been wanting to write an HOA book for years. Oh my gosh. You're really good at titles, by the way. Thank you. My agent was like, I don't think that's gonna work. I was like, well, that's what I'm calling it. I love it. I think it's awesome. Well, I am so excited to follow your career because I love your voice. You have such a great voice on the page, and it just jumps right off and it makes you love the characters. But seriously, it makes me wanna be like, alright. Let me get past the characters. Who is this person? Let me pee behind the curtain. So I'm delighted to have had a chance to get to know you, and you are as delightful as I anticipated. So that's great. Advice would you give to aspiring authors? I know this is so cliche, but honestly, just right. When I sat down to start writing, had no idea what I was doing. And it took me forever, but just actually starting to write and then reaching out and finding a community. I actually found my first writing partner in a mom group. Like, we were both due in March 2015. And she had mentioned, I want to be an author. Was like, Me too. Do you want to send each other pages? And so we really just every week sent each other a chapter. Neither of us had any idea what we were doing. She actually just got a book deal and her book It's is coming out now really exciting. And we're just like, You're so good. You're so good too. And that's all it was. So like finding support, because it can be really lonely. So sitting down and finding like one person that you can trust not to just stomp on you. I love that. It's really important. Aw, that's so great. Well, please send me the next book when it's I really am excited to read. And congratulations. This is really inspiring and awesome and, yeah, really, really awesome. Thank you so much. This was so fun. You made me put on makeup for the first time in months. I barely have any makeup, so sorry. I'm like Oh, barely, but something. My kids are gonna be like, why are you so dressed up and I'm in a sweatshirt? Yeah. Like, if I can get the mascara on, it makes a huge like, that's the biggest thing. Like, if you would if somebody were ever to ask, not that anyone would care what I would bring to a Desert Islanders thing, I would bring mascara. Yes. Like, my one beauty thing. Smart. Yeah. Otherwise, I look super old. I mean, I still do, but anyway. Okay. Bye. Thank you so much. Bye. Thank you. It was super fun. Thanks. Bye, Alexa. Bye. Thanks for listening to this episode of Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books. Don't forget to follow me on Instagram at Zibby Owens and at moms don't have time to read books. Also, sign up for my newsletter at zibbyowens.com and sign up for my virtual book club and meet lots of authors on Zoom every other week. Thanks so much to Steve and Ryan at Texture Sound for the sound editing, and thank you to Morning Moon Productions for providing this fantastic intro and outro music.