Coffee Talk With The Cajun Mamas
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Coffee Talk With The Cajun Mamas
Crawfish Houses and French Words: A Conversation with Tanya Ardoin
Crawfish, culture, and keeping the Cajun flame alive—author Tanya Ardoin is on a mission to preserve our French-speaking heritage through delightful children's books that charm readers of all ages.
The catalyst for Tanya's journey into authorship came from profound personal loss. "When I lost my mom, my biggest regret was I didn't record her voice speaking French," she shares candidly. This realization sparked a determination to document her aging family members' voices and stories before they disappeared. What began as recordings of her grandfather teaching French to her little cousin blossomed into the Crawville book series that's capturing hearts across Acadiana.
Each book cleverly introduces just one French word per page, making language learning accessible for young readers while including translations and phonetic spellings for parents. The characters themselves—Claudi the little girl and her Pawpaw as a crawfish—are lovingly based on Tanya's cousin Audie and her late grandfather. Beyond mere storytelling, these books serve as cultural touchstones, filled with authentic details from Corelle dishware to traditional "palettes" (floor bedding). Tanya has expanded her offerings to include companion coloring books in both children's and adult versions so families can learn together.
As a member of what she calls "the lost generation" of Cajun French speakers—those whose parents were punished for speaking French in school and thus didn't teach their children—Tanya's work represents a heartfelt attempt to reconnect younger generations with their heritage. Her upcoming third book will feature Cajun cooking with Pawpaw, doubling as both storybook and cookbook because, as she explains, "every book has to have a purpose."
Want to join the Cajun cultural revival? Visit TanyaArdoin.com to explore her books and learning materials, and don't miss the Grand Revé Acadien celebration in Church Point on October 18th—a perfect opportunity to immerse yourself in the language, music, and traditions that make our community so special.
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So she's drinking out of the corral oh, I love it. She's drinking out of corral oh perfect, yes. And then I collect the green pyrex. So there's a lot of my heart in this book.
Speaker 3:Oh, I love it.
Speaker 2:Welcome to Coffee Talk with the Cajun Mamas. Grab a cup of coffee, settle in and let's dive into real conversations about life, motherhood and a little inspiration to brighten your day.
Speaker 3:Welcome to Coffee Talk with the Cajun Mamas. We are well into September. I can't even believe.
Speaker 4:This is a great time of year I love this time of year, burr months, you know september yes, the frisson months are coming and I can't wait y'all.
Speaker 3:We have a great, great um guest for y'all today. Her name is tanya ordwin. She is a local author. We cannot wait to talk to her first.
Speaker 4:We're gonna go ahead and mention our grand sponsor for September, acadia Cajun Harvest Country Y'all. There's so many things going on in Acadia Parish all the time and sometimes it's hard to keep up. So you need to go ahead and go to AcadiaTourismcom because they have it all there, literally things that we don't know about, and realize, oh my gosh, we missed out on this. And then we sad. So go check out their calendar, because it's all laid out. You can plan your trip. You can plan around the events that are coming, especially october 18th, okay, let's talk about what's coming to church.
Speaker 4:Point on october 18th, the grand revé is coming, the grand revé acadien. This is a celebration of all things Acadian, like in our culture.
Speaker 3:I love this so much. I know, All right, Our cousins from Canada to Louisiana. We're going to reconnect with our heritage, share stories and keep our French-speaking culture alive and thriving.
Speaker 4:Yes, there's going to be like some little markets you can get different craftings. There's going to be live music. They even have a French mass at Our Lady of Sacred Heart Church, you know how I feel about that.
Speaker 3:Yes, I know I cannot.
Speaker 4:Oh, I'm going. I know Free songs everywhere, it's going to be good y'all. So make plans to come out to Church Point October 18th and take part in the Grand Rive.
Speaker 3:And if you need more details, go to AcadiaTourismcom. Go get all the details there, because there's it's so much that we're probably going to miss something, but we're going to try.
Speaker 4:Okay, we're going to try and thank y'all for being the grand sponsor, the official sponsor the official sponsor of this podcast of this podcast.
Speaker 3:Okay, all right, so let's get started with Tanya. Tanya who?
Speaker 4:are you? Who's your daddy, who's your mama? Tell us everything. So my name is Tanya. Tanya. Who are you? Who's your daddy, who's your mama? Tell us everything.
Speaker 1:So my name is Tanya Ardoin and I went to high school in Church Point, graduated from here, but grew up in Eunice. My daddy still lives in Eunice and I left for the military at 18, didn't look back for many, many years and my daddy started getting older and I started losing family members that had that French speaking connection. And so talk about the free songs yeah, um when okay.
Speaker 1:It's okay. It's okay. When I lost my mom, my biggest regret was I didn't record her voice and her speaking French, so I started um started recording my daddy. Well then my grandpa was diagnosed with terminal cancer, so every day I had the phone on him and he probably thought I was crazy, but I started recording him on the front porch teaching my little cousin French and I decided it was a book. So yes, here we are.
Speaker 4:Yes. And now you? I mean you're adding author to your yes here we are.
Speaker 2:Yes, and now you I mean you're adding author, to your, to your titles.
Speaker 4:You know that's amazing and I feel like you just are. There's such a focus right now and I love it on like the grand revet, like revival of this cajun culture, and you are a part of that. You know like you have a passion for keeping this all alive and now you, you bring it to the children, which is where we need to focus Like we don't know. We're trying to learn what we can, but the kids are even like, like they're sponges like we talk about you know.
Speaker 4:So bringing them, these, in these little simple ways is so nice.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I started with the first book, which is just called Crawlville, and the first book is basically focusing on the town of Crawlville and my little cousin and I we would go and collect crawfish houses and we would make communities in the front yard.
Speaker 4:Like pull them up off the ground. And if you don't know what a crawfish house is, well, it's like a dirt mound. So they they dig into the ground and the dirt will come up around it and it looks like a little. Uh, what'd you call?
Speaker 1:it A chimney. A chimney, a, made of dirt. Yeah, so it. This was supposed to be a practice book and to see if I even wanted to do this. And it's just been so heartwarming how people have just, you know, they they love it. The response, yes, the response has been great. And then, um, so I started tinkering with a crawfish as our pawpaw, or our pawpaw as a crawfish, and I started drawing him. This one is all digitized. This one I decided to hand draw, so it looks different, and this series is going to, for now on, be hand drawn.
Speaker 4:Well you are. That's how I found you. Let's back up a minute, Because how I found you? Well, I saw we must have connected on TikTok first. Yeah, tiktok is where we saw where I saw some of your content and stuff, uh, but then realized that you're an artist, and a fabulous artist too, um, and you had painted a commission piece for me.
Speaker 3:You should have brought it.
Speaker 4:It's in Nathan's office at his work, like I gave it to him as a gift. Yes, it was like, uh, louisiana and it was filled with all like his favorite things, like a bag of community coffee, uh, cajun family tradition sausage, mardi Gras beads uh, what else did we put?
Speaker 1:oh he, he runs in Mardi Gras and you wanted a chicken, a chicken, yeah, I put a chicken standing on the state. Oh, evangeline, evangeline Made Bread.
Speaker 4:I think was one too, just like all of our icons of Louisiana. And so, yeah, that's hanging in his office. And then you had sent me with that, or maybe you sent it separately, but it was a little hand-drawn card, like a greeting card, and it had a pelican on it and it was a Christmassy-type card.
Speaker 4:And I hung it up in my office because it was so cute. But then that's when, like I was like man, the talent like you have, you really are talented. So I'm so glad to hear you draw and you crawfish now yourself.
Speaker 1:Well, I have a graphic graphic design degree, so this just kind of came natural and I have to really practice when I draw, because I don't draw every day anymore. But yeah, from now on the series is going to be hand-drawn and I'm going to start doing those commission pieces again good, oh good, yes exactly so I'm sure everybody wants to see the cover of this one.
Speaker 1:So this is my grandpa as a crawfish, and this is my little cousin, audie as Claudie. Claudie, yeah, her name's Claudie. So, um, every page has one french word, so that it's not overwhelming to learn, and then on the back of the book, it um has the translations and the phonetic spelling, so that you can sound it out like a glossary type uh-huh.
Speaker 1:Oh yes, I love so, um, but the last, the first book. She's sleeping or she's laying in bed and she says she can't fall asleep because she's going to go see her pawpaw and she's so excited. So this one starts with her mama telling her get up, we got to go, oh, Klaue's waiting on us. And so then she says but can you fix my coffee milk first?
Speaker 3:Oh, and it goes on like that, so I love it, and y'all know that I love me some corral, so she's drinking.
Speaker 1:You drew the corral oh, I love it. She's drinking out of corral oh perfect, yes. And then I collect the green pyrex. So there's a lot of my heart in this book, yeah.
Speaker 3:Oh, I love it and.
Speaker 1:I will say that I drew the characters and I added the graphics.
Speaker 3:I did not draw the graphics.
Speaker 1:So just want to be clear on that. So that's the second book that just came out and I am absolutely in love. It's my heart. But then I decided I wanted to do, um, some companion learning items, and so I did color with Claudia and her friends while learning Cajun French. But then I thought about y'all actually mamas are learning with their kids right now. So I did an adult style and it's in the exact same order so that if you're on the frog page with your kid, then mama can do the frog page and learn how to say frog in french, get out of here.
Speaker 1:So let me see the adult, let me yeah, okay so that's the kid style sheep, and then it has obviously the french word and then how to say it. And if you open up to the adult if I could get there the pages are sticky, so it's a little more complicated. Oh, look at that, and it gets a little more complicated with each one. Wow. So if you're on, let's say this is page four, then they're going to do a simple, cute pelican and y'all can learn in color together. Let me show the pelican on page four. Okay, well, I don't know page four, I'm just saying yes, they're in order.
Speaker 4:Brushes, look, can you see it here?
Speaker 1:so oh cute, I love that. So it's the animals in the front and then to learn their colors. There's colors in the back and you can do that. It's the same. It's a little more complicated for the adults and simple for the kids, what a great idea rouge yep so I love that tanya.
Speaker 3:That's wonderful, so cute I've never seen that before, like a, like a kid one, and that's so good. What a great idea.
Speaker 1:I just feel like you know mom and dad, or even the older brothers and sisters if they want to learn. You know a 13-year-old is going to say oh, that's a baby coloring book, so let me do something a little more complicated. Very true, I love that idea.
Speaker 3:Okay. So let me tell you about Crawlville. So let me tell you about Crawfiel. Roz loves it. She tore half the pages out of it, but all of the. It's a favorite at party time. Every time she sees a crawfish, it's quaddie, it's quaddie-a.
Speaker 1:Quaddie-a, it's quaddie-a. Well, let me tell you when I cut my grass now, do you know how hard it is for me to mow over the crawfish houses?
Speaker 4:You bonded. Now Like you, you like, oh, they, I mean that's like, uh, it's a character now, yes, and every day I run into somebody.
Speaker 1:oh, I have an idea for a new series or a new book idea for the series and I'm like, oh yeah, what they could go to a crawfish ball. I mean no, they can, can't they? Can't go to the crawfish ball between crawfish balls and cutting my grass, I'm I'm having issues, oh man just thinking about that.
Speaker 4:No, but that's funny you might have got ruined on eating ball crawfish for life.
Speaker 1:Now, yes, yes. My daddy says I need to go to therapy. Some therapy, yeah.
Speaker 3:Therapy. Go on to the therapy.
Speaker 4:Oh man, that's great.
Speaker 2:Oh my gosh.
Speaker 3:Yes, well, this is awesome. I mean like every time we go somewhere where there's like local stuff, we see your book there and we're like look Tanya, look Tanya. You know.
Speaker 1:You're everywhere. They just the community Acadiana. They have just embraced it and the support is amazing.
Speaker 2:I've had people call me and say hey, we want your book, people are asking for it, so yes, uh, and I feel like I just want to.
Speaker 1:I'm already working on the third one. This just came out in March.
Speaker 4:I need to slow down. Well, I'm, I'm, bet your mind is constant now and you, you can see, like you, I mean so in each book. It's like one little story per book, but the ideas are like endless you can have a book on this little story. On this little story. A Christmas one, yep, like just Claudia, can go to Acadian Village and see the lights.
Speaker 1:Yes, Well, the next. Can I tell y'all the next book idea.
Speaker 4:If you want to, yeah.
Speaker 1:If nobody takes my idea.
Speaker 4:This is copyrighted by patent number 84765.
Speaker 3:And it's also, it's a commandment there you go, that's right.
Speaker 1:So the next one, she's going to go spend the night at papa's house and she's gonna make a palette oh my god night and they're gonna cook cajun meals together. So not only is it gonna be a storybook, but it's gonna have recipes, so it's gonna be a cookbook as well. I just feel like every book has to have a purpose. Yeah, so it just can't be a storybook. Okay, okay, everyone's gonna have a purpose.
Speaker 4:So I love that.
Speaker 3:Keeps things very interesting yeah, I love, yeah, I know now roz really likes the baby crawfish too in the. In the first one she's like I'm like, oh, that's cute, so maybe you could even branch off into the baby yes, well, and she needs a best friend.
Speaker 3:So the next book is gonna have a best friend oh, I love it, yes, I just cannot wait to see where this goes I claudia is gonna be a household name oh, yeah, oh for sure, at least louisiana house, and I love that she, claudia, goes with you to I mean not claudia, audie, audie, thank you.
Speaker 4:Audie goes I do it too to this book signings and stuff like what is she? So? The little crawfish is based on your niece, cousin, cousin, cousin. Yes, she's really like your niece almost you know, or my daughter, my granddaughter. I love her to death yeah, what does she say about all this? She's down for the ride, or oh?
Speaker 1:absolutely. I don't know if y'all saw the video of her seeing the new book for the first time, because whenever I was drawing it out, I was like you want to see, you want to see. And this was her best friend, paul Whitney was her best friend, so I was like I'm almost done, you want to see? I finally got his face right and she's like no, I want to wait, I want to wait. And so I recorded her seeing the book for the first time and it's just, she's like he's perfect.
Speaker 4:Aww, it was not about her. Down to the hat and the shirt and everything.
Speaker 1:Yes, his little blue pen he always had a blue pen in his pocket. Yeah, Look the frisbee, I love it, Tanya. So yeah, we miss him a lot, but this is just going to keep his memory alive and she's never going to forget him. You know, she was kind of young when he passed away and sometimes you forget, but she's never going to forget him because I'm not going to allow it.
Speaker 3:And you are bringing your story to so many others. You know what I'm saying. So, people who they missed out on it, you know they missed out on learning the language. You bringing that to us because we missed out on it. Yeah, we're the lost generation.
Speaker 1:That's what they call us Because I know my daddy. He was spanked in school for speaking French and his parents didn't know English, so he wasn't helped. Did he graduate high school? He was 21 because he didn't know. Didn't know English, so he wasn't helped. Did he graduate high school? He was 21 because he didn't know anyway, so I was not taught. I didn't teach my kids. Like I said, when I left Louisiana, I thought I'm not coming, no reason to come back, yeah, and so I didn't teach my kids, anything, and I could just kick myself.
Speaker 1:so that's what these books are for is to bring it to those that are actually interested now, now that there's a resurgence in A resurgence.
Speaker 3:I love it. Thank you so much for doing this for us and for everybody. It's such a like, it's a service you know, and it helps us to learn. We're able to do this with our kids and they're enjoying the book. I cannot wait to get my hands on my second book. I can't. But thank you so much. You want to give us your website information, so if anybody listening wants to get some Claudia stuff.
Speaker 1:So all of the books, the coloring books, my little stuff, crawfish everything is on the website and it's TanyaArdoincom. It's that simple. Spell it for them. Spell it T-A-N-Y-A-R-D-O-I-Ncom. Perfect. So yeah, t-a.
Speaker 3:Yeah, we'll put that in the bottom part on this podcast so you can see if y'all want to get any of this Crawville stuff. Like I'm obsessed with this this is so cute it is.
Speaker 4:Anyway, yeah, we can't wait to see where this takes you, because this is just the beginning. Thank you, so much.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, thank you for having me.
Speaker 4:I really appreciate it.
Speaker 3:You guys are just the sweetest oh, you know, we love when we get to talk with you. She's becoming a household name between us too, yeah exactly good.
Speaker 1:Hopefully I'll be a household name around the world around the world, around the world man can you imagine?
Speaker 4:oh, today we're gonna have on good morning america, tanya or duane with her crawfish themed children's book line I don't know if they would say or duane, I'm pretty sure they say or duane or like they said in basic training Arduin, arduin, arduin.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I corrected him one time. Oh, never again.
Speaker 3:Never again.
Speaker 1:No, I had to run three miles saying my name is Arduin.
Speaker 3:Oh Jesus, oh yeah. That's the type of stuff why we can't speak French these days.
Speaker 2:Yeah All right, y'all Well thank y'all so much.
Speaker 3:Thank you so much for coming and hanging out with us, but thank y'all for listening. Um, we are going to end out our episode by thanking our grand sponsor, which is Acadia Harvest Country, acadia.
Speaker 4:Cajun Harvest Country okay.
Speaker 3:I almost got it. Almost. You think I would know it by now. I know well, it's a long way of saying Acadia Tourism, but yes, acadia Cajun Harvest Country. You think I would know it by now. Huh.
Speaker 4:I know Well, it's a long way of saying Acadia Tourism.
Speaker 4:But, yes, acadia Cajun Harvest Country is our official sponsor for September and we want to make sure that you all know about the Grand Rive Acadien that's coming October 18th in Church Point. It's a celebration, it's a party for all things Acadian and we're going to have live music, we're going to have food, we're going to have a French mass at Our Lady of Sacred Heart Church. There's going to be a market too, with a lot of handmade goodies and stuff. It's just going to be a great celebration of our heritage and our culture.
Speaker 4:So come, come learn, come have fun.
Speaker 3:Come learn, come have fun. There's going to be some coming in from Canada, from other parts of the United States, lafayette I mean it's just going to be a great time and it's not going to be, hopefully, so hot.
Speaker 4:Yeah, hopefully not. Middle October is usually nice weather, so prayers for great weather for the glory day.
Speaker 3:And thank you all so much for being our sponsor this month. Acadia Cajun Harvest.
Speaker 4:Country Acadiatourismcom.
Speaker 3:Okay.
Speaker 4:For all the information and details about the Grand Rive and anything else going on in Acadia Parish, that's where you need to go. Thank y'all so much. All right, see y'all next time.
Speaker 2:Thanks for joining us on Coffee Talk with the Cajun Mamas. We hope you enjoyed your cup of coffee and our chat. Don't forget to subscribe and share with your friends. Until next time. Keep the coffee brewing and the conversation flowing.