Cent Saving Saturday: Healthy and Cheap

Okay, maybe cheap is a poor choice of words.

Cheap makes me think of hookers and this post is NOT gonna be about hookers (maybe next week!).

I guess the word I’m think about is inexpensive.

Healthy and inexpensive.

That’s what we’re going for today.

Because over here at Casa de Dummies one of the main obstacles for purchasing more health conscious items is the fact that I’m a sugar-addicted food whore who would sell her eggs for a chocolate chip cookie cost.

I know that the few cents I save by buying something less nutritious could easily wind up costing me more in health care, and worry, and years off of life in the future.

But still, I’m a natural born bargain hunter so I sorta get the shakes when I make myself grab for the more expensive, albeit more healthy option, especially when the transfer priced item is sitting right there on the shelf, lookin’ all sexy, calling my name.

Except when it comes to shoes.

And handbags*.

Anyway, point is, I have been trying to make more health conscious food selections for myself and The Dudes even if it does mean the items I choose aren’t on sale at the Club Card price.

‘Cause it’s worth it, you know?!

So, a while back, I got this cool book that you all have probably heard of by now: Eat This Not That! for Kids! I take it to the store and spend hours trying NOT to buy all the crap food we like.

And, last year I participated in this healthy food campaign with Loony Tunes.

But, lately I have noticed that I’ve fallen off the healthier-food-choices wagon.

The holidays and winter ALWAYS do that to me.

When I’m confined to the house for long periods (aka 10 straight freakin’ days) I can seriously go days without eating anything other than cookies or cookie like products.

I feel all nasty and fat afterwards, and I make all kinds of New Year’s resolutions pertaining to the pack of hot dogs I’ve sprouted on my back, but every year I do it anyway and hope that I can trash talk myself into making a change.

So, that’s what I’ve been doing lately (for what ever reason I respond better to self put downs than I do to self motivation); trash talking myself into action.

I’ve been back and forth; one week I work out consistently and stay away from the cookies and the next, not so much.

At the moment I’m forth (after being back in celebration of Snowmaggedeon) and I have been exploring some waist friendly, but still remarkably tasty items that even The Dudes enjoy without griping, gagging, or begging for mercy.

For example, instead of regular juice boxes we have tried H2Organics Kids Nutrient Enhanced Water. We received a sample of it from the company and we liked it enough that I bought a box of it for them (they liked the Orange Tangerine and the Strawberry Apple, but the Grape Berry one did fall into the things-that-make-dudes-gag category) to take to school and practice.

We aren’t usually drinkers of flavored water (they like unflavored water just fine), but these work out because we’ve failed at the reusable plastic bottles (they always lose the tops), and the disposable ones too (when I send regular water bottles with them to school they break probably because they are like little tornados on their backpacks for some reason).

Another one of the Dumb Family’s current faves are the frozen Yoplait Smoothies.

Holy delicious snack option Batman!

The Dudes freakin’ love these things, and I’m a bit of a converted fan myself.

Initially I didn’t even try them because I’ve never been a fan of yogurt to drink, but they looked so good I decided to give it a go.

And, yeah, they’re pretty awesome.

They are super easy to use (just pop them outta the freezer, add milk, and blend) and you can add stuff to them (like bananas or strawberries or rum other stuff) to jazz ‘em up a bit, but they really don’t even need it.

We got to try these courtesy** of Yoplait and My Blog Spark.

They sent us a coupon for the smoothies and a cool single serve, portable blender (that I use for frozen coffee drinks, too!). See…

Pretty sweet, eh?!

So sweet in fact that you are sitting over there at your hizzouse right now getting all jealous thinking of ways to end Dumb Mom and her unstoppable ascent to the top you wish you had yourself a fancy, schmansy single serve portable blender for making Yoplait smoothies in, right?

Well I don’t want to disappoint you so hows about a giveaway?!

All you have to do is go to the Yoplait site and tell me which of the three flavors you think you will like the best, leave a comment here with your answer by Friday (2/26), vote for my picture toe win the Intel Access Your Core Contest using the button on the top left and wait to see if you’re the big winner next week.

Easy peasy.

And just like that you could win (what you see pictured below) and forever be in my debt as someone who has saved cents courtesy of Dumb Mom.

Stick with me people… I’m the way of the future!

*I’d rather be cute than healthy any day!***

**Courtesy means free. You’d think people would realize that, but for whatever reason I have to spell it out. SO here goes: courtesy means F-R-E-E.

***Let me rephrase. I’d rather be cute than healthy which is why I’m a tub, but I will sacrifice my cute for my kids’ health. I swear it I will.

Saturday Swag-urday

It's Saturday again peeps and I have a sweet little down home (she's from the South) stationary company to share with you all.

Duck Duck Goose Designs is owned and operated by Wendy, a mom to four little ones under the age of 5!

Not sure how she finds time to create such gorgeous stuff, but she does it, and they are so stinking cute!

You know I'm a sucker for some cute stationary and she has so many original designs, like this one that she sent to me to try out.



Cute, right. And, in case you are that stalker that's been lurking around here creeping everybody out, my name is not Jessica Hinton, it's just an alias to throw you and all your crazy friends off my trail. Brilliant (rubs hands together all sinister like).

And, she doesn't just make cards. She makes stickers, and bag tags, and t-shirts, and all kinds of other totally perfect stuff that can be personalized (or not) for you if you like.

Wanna win a set of 10 persoanlized cards like this one for yourself?

Of course you do, silly, because free stuff is awesome.

All you have to do is head over to Wendy's Etsy shop, hang out there for a bit, check out all of her awesomeness (don't steal anything!), and then come back here and tell me which design you would like if you could choose any one you wanted.

Contest starts now and runs until midnight on Friday July, 31st.

The winner will be announced on my next Saturday Swag-urday post.

So hurry up and enter already so you can start sending out handwritten thank you cards to all those people in your life that truly deserve them!

If you want to increase your chances of winning just:
1. Follow me here(b/c you totally love me, right? You do, don't you? Huh? Huh? Don't you love me?!). 1 extra entry

2. Follow me on Twitter @thenagainphoto (b/c you totally love me, and you can't get enough of me!). 2 extra entries

3. Tweet about this giveaway (b/c you totally love me, and you want the world to know about me too!). 3 extra entries (1 tweet per person/per day and make sure you Tweet it to @thenagainphoto so I will be able to find it!)

Thanks for looking and feel free to add your own giveaways, contests, and reviews to the Mr. Linky thingy!



PS: Want to order from Duck Duck Goose? Wendy has offered PBD readers a 10% off coupon! Just enter "dumbmom" as your coupon code when you check out to take advantage of this special offer!

Let's Go, Mystics

Don't know who the Mystics are?

Don't feel bad because I didn't either.

When I was contacted about taking the dudes to a Washington Mystics game at the Verizon Center I thought, who are the Mystics? Is that the Hockey team? 'Cause I hate hockey.

Nope. It's the WNBA team that calls Washington D.C. it's home.

I almost said no thanks.

I don't want to take the Metro (even though #2 thought this was the best part), stay out late, deal with the crowds, crap, crap, crap.

And, in case you can't tell (although I think my thighs are pretty good about giving this one away), I'm not much of an athlete.

Even in the days before my thighs (and my butt, and my stomach, and my back, and my floppy arms) told the story, I was more of a rah-rah-shish-boom-bah type of chick.

And, I don't mean the back-handspringing-college-scholarship-seeking-competitive rah-rahs. I mean the OMG!-Becky-look-at-her-butt-do-I-look-fat-in-this-skirt-I-think-he's-checking-me-out-OMG! kind of rah-rahs.

So, needless to say I'm not too into basketball, particularly not when played by females. Really, just not my bag.

But, then I thought why not?

The dudes might like it, and I'm not one to turn down stadium food (if you're wondering, while I'm far from being a sports enthusiast in any sense of the term, I am a huge lover of snack bars, so I will attend any live sporting event, even hockey, provided there are concession stands offering various unhealthy, deliciousness in close proximity) so, what the heck, let's go!

And, go we did, along with two of our favorite people:

BFF (lookin's all cute and stuff)



And, Bruncle (aka Brother Uncle, my brother, their uncle, who has so much in common with the dudes, they used to think he was their brother, hence the name Bruncle).



He's the one hiding in the back of the photo. Yep, that's him, the one with the cheesy (and by cheesy I mean dorky) smile.

I'm so glad we said yes to the wonderfully generous people over at the Verizon Center who run that team because we had a blast!

We enjoyed watching the game (they beat the Chicago Sky 75-64, and since I'm such a bandwagoner it's a good thing or I totally woulda been rooting for the opposing team).

We had some great snackage (hot dogs, chips, soda, popcorn).

The kids got a free bag filled with all kinds of Mystics fan gear including the most annoying funnest set of maracas which they played for the duration of the game (luckily these "prizes" didn't show up until like the 3rd quarter).

And, there were even celebrities in the house: Cedric the Entertainer, some Denver Broncos football player everyone recognized, me.

Kidding!

That football player wasn't even a celebrity.

We even got to meet potential WNBA Rookie of the Year, Marissa Coleman (who, incidentally is a blogger, too!).



I had a pretty good time, despite being nearly struck by lightening on the way there (seriously, it touched down like 10 feet from me, I peed a little it scared me so much), and completely drenched to my soul, leaving me to smell like raw steak for the entire game.

Dumb Mom Tip #1: Do not attempt to pull off a car seat transfer during a torrential down pour or an electrical storm. You could die. And, apparently, if you wait like five minutes it passes and leaves you standing, soaking wet, looking like an idiot, in a sun drenched parking lot. Just sayin'.

Both of the dudes (we left dude #3 at home w/Dumb Dad to prevent me from having to run across the court in hot pursuit of a naked 1 year old, because we all know that's how it would go down for me) gave the experience a thumbs up, too.



Good, old fashioned, family-friendly fun. Who knewthe WNBA even existed it would be so fun?!

And, it's not too bad in price (except for the snack bar, can you say rape?!). A family of five (like mine) can get in the door (at the Verizon Center) for about $75 (not much more than a movie, really) and the nose bleed that accompanies these seats is free!

Check out your local team here, you may be surprised by how affordable these tickets actually are.

And, isn't it worth it to see a face like this?

PR Nightmare

As you all know, there are occasions in which me and the fam receive products from companies or PR people or wherever. I get numerous offers a week, but only accept the ones I think we are really interested in trying.

When this happens I generally designate a small amount of space on the blog to discuss my opinions regarding the particular product.

I make sure to include my personal opinions about it, and I always write these in my own words (as in they don't tell me what to say, if it's awesome I say so, and if it sucks, I say that too.)

On other occasions we (I guess, me really) are approached to write reviews (for cash) about various products and places.

Generally, in these instances the company usually includes blocks of words and/or links that they require you to use in your post. Sometimes, the chunks of required words are small, or consist of a couple of links. Other times they are essentially paragraphs that set the tone and (pretty much) opinion of the post and the item.

I DO NOT do these types of shameless product propaganda reviews.

I NEVER write reviews for items I haven't tried or places I haven't been.

And, I don't write reviews for companies that want to tell me what to say in my review. You know how I feel about bullies.


Not even for cash.

Some people do this.

I'm not one of those people.

Not because I can't use the cash; 'cause I totally can.

It's just something I'm not comfortable with.

It feels a lot like lying to me. They tell you what to say, and the tell you how to say it, and they give you the proof to support what they are telling you to say. And then, they tell you, "Oh, and we don't want you to say we gave you money to do this, 'cause, you know, that might make people not believe you."

I'm all for lying when necessary (ie. Hubby asks, Did you finish the cookies?". I say, "No, the kids did.". Or, kid asks, "Do you have any more cookies?". I say, "No, Daddy ate them.". See, necessary lying.).

This sort, that really doesn't benefit me at all, is just not necessary. I'm not even really a "review site" (although I'm not 100% sure what I'm considered).

I do reviews that fit into my overall theme (which, in case you didn't know is Awesomeness and how to be it) because I like the product (or thought I was gonna like it before I actually tried it).

I do reviews on items my family uses regularly, or places we go, or things we do.

And, I do these because I like to.

I like getting free crap (who doesn't it?).

And, since I generally only accept crap I know I'm (probably) gonna like or use, I don't mind writing about it.

Plus, I like to share things that I think you guys might be interested in.

Do I care if you buy it?

Nope. (PR suicide, perhaps.)

Do I get any benefit if you buy it?

Nope. 'Cause if I did, I might care, right?!

That's my opinion and I'm sticking to it.

And, I may be chocking on it soon since I inadvertently probably ticked off some other (way more popular) bloggers about this opinion.

Apparently, this topic is a source of major debate over on Mom Dot at the moment.

They (among others) are planning a full out PR Blackout (for various reasons that I won't get into here since I'm not sure I fully understand and I think I've done enough to make them hate me, so yeah. But if you wanna know, click on the link) sometime in August when they will not be talking to any PR people at all.

I got in on the debate (which I didn't realize was so heated since I didn't read the initial post, or the responses, or anything. Just did the whole speak before you think (or research) bit) and accidentally (on purpose) pitted myself (or at least my opinion) against the head honcho over there.

I'm not too concerned about that, since she probably won't even notice little ole me and my big mouthed, uninformed opinion, but I am concerned that this whole thing is such a huge issue.

I just don't understand why people are so up in arms about it.

I don't get why anyone cares if I want to spread my bloggy legs like a $2 hooker for PR reps and companies pushing their free stuff on me.

I'm not gonna go the route of the review-anything-for-a-buck-flashing-in-your-face-buy-me-buy-me-buy-me-ad blogs (sadly, no one wants to advertise here anyway), and I'm not gonna sell out to "the man" (always wanted to say that!).

But, if you want to do that, and it works for you, and your readers are down for it, rock on.

I don't think I'm awesome enough to have a blog focused entirely on myself, or what I buy, or like, or do, to garner any support from any where.

I'm pretty sure you all come here because you like to read about the dudes and sympathize with them for having such a underachieving-uncreative-largely-misguided-pig of a mom.

And, possibly to laugh at me having near death experiences with playground equipment.

But, I plan to continue doing the occasional review/giveaway (I know you guys like free stuff to, right?!). And by occasional I mean pretty much every Saturday. Some of them are of free stuff I got from companies, some of them will be stuff I bought (or want to buy like this cute bag)

So if you hate my reviews (and apparently, someone hates me for some reason b/c I lost a follower. Didn't know people ever actually quit following someone. I mean, if I got fed up, I would just not read anymore, but apparently, this person was so annoyed/irked/irritated/or possibly disgusted by me, that they went through the trouble of un-following me. Obviously this event has upset me because I really like to know why people hate me. Not so I can make improvements or anything, just so I can talk crap about it on my blog, encourage people to disagree with the Dumb Mom naysayer, and in turn, rebuild my confidence which is so easily bruised by the mean people of the world), do yourself a favor and don't visit on Saturday.

But, be sure to come back on Sunday (if you like pics of the dudes) b/c I'm gonna be doing Photo of the Day every Sunday, just 'cause I want to:)