Sometimes, I’m not going to lie, I want to quit this shitty job. Being a mom sucks hard… but then it doesn’t. There are other moments when it’s so amazing that I just want to smother mother the shit out of my kids as my helicopter parenting skills buzz above us because they are so freaking, heartbreakingly awesome. We’ve all been here, both here’s, right? But then there are other moments when I miss the hell out of Debi BC (before children), you know, that glorious broad who got to sleep in until she just woke up, roll out of bed and went to lunch with friends and got to eat actual hot food, pee alone and not worry about keeping anyone alive but herself? Oh that lucky lady. I’m so jealous of who I used to be, but then I couldn’t be who I am, the mother to two of the most amazing human beings I’ve ever known. Most days anyways.
When you have kids, your life doesn’t just change, your perspective on everything changes. You are living life looking at everything through mom goggles. That is where I am now and it’s where I’ll always be. Things that didn’t seem to register before (what school district I lived in) are now big deals, and things that were really important to me (having a night life with friends and being in the know) are so unimportant to me now that I could care less what’s cool and what’s not. I just want a good world for my children.
I want to raise good children and I want to be the best mother that I can be. You might be better or worse at being a mother but I’m trying my damnest not to measure myself against you because the truth is if we all measure ourselves against each other life is shit for all of us, especially our kids. I don’t want to make myself feel like a better mother by shaming another mother, I’d prefer to just do my own best to be a good mother in my children’s eyes.
I just had the pleasure of screening the movie Tallulah written by Sian Heder and all I can say is WOW!
No matter what kind of mom you are, aspire to be or thought you would be, you can relate. And better than that, you can get a little perspective by living a moment from the viewpoint of someone else’s shoes, while knowing a little about how they got that perspective in the first place. Honestly, there were three main characters; Margo, Tallulah and Carolyn; and I could identify with each one of them. I have been all three of them. I’m not sure what that says about me, but I found myself wanting to hug and shake and then hug again each woman.
Tallulah is the story of three very different women whose lives intersect through the impulsive and well-intentioned kidnapping of a child. It’s a story about motherhood, about looking for a mother and becoming a mother. But mostly it’s a story about humanity, about the blurry lines of morality and deeply flawed human behavior. It’s a story that has no clear answer or cut and dry solution, but instead makes you care about each and every person involved, no matter how wrong their actions seemed. It’s a conversation about responsibility.
Tallulah is a movie that lives on the fringe of judgment, that feeling that not all women are meant to be mothers. As a mother, we all have times when we feel like we are flailing and failing. But that doesn’t make us a villain or a bad mom. Tallulah doesn’t have good people and bad people. There were only people doing their best with the limited emotional tools that they had and often making bad choices. Lonely people. People whose families had failed them; who were looking for some kind of connection in an increasingly disconnected world.
Tallulah is about motherhood from different perspectives because no two mothers are alike, just as no two children are alike. We are all just trying to do our best. There is no time for shaming one another. We need to take that energy and direct it towards helping one another do our best for our children, not judging and condemning one another.
Motherhood is hard enough as it is without us judging one another. For better perspective, check out Tallulah.
Disclosure: This post made possible through the support of Cochlear. All opinions are my own.
Can you imagine a world with no sound? Never hearing your husband say, “I love you” or your baby’s first giggle? Can you imagine never hearing birds singing, wind blowing or waves crashing into the shore? Imagine never being able to hear the voice of your mother or your toddler whisper, “I love you, Mommy.” I can and the thought terrifies me.
You see, for years when I was a little girl, I suffered from chronic ear infections which led to permanent hearing loss in my right ear. It’s only considered mild hearing loss but it made things challenging for me, as a small child and, to some degree, even now.
For instance, it’s hard for me to hear people when they are not looking directly at me when they’re speaking. It sounds like mumbling to me. It’s a little like hearing through a window or listening under water. Of course, as time has gone on, I’ve acclimated to my deficit. Most of the time I don’t even think about the fact that I’ve lost some of my hearing.
But I notice that I feel the need to concentrate when I listen, so sometimes when people are talking to me it seems like I’m staring at them when all I’m really doing is listening. If you’ve met me in person, you’ve probably noticed this. My hearing loss happened over time but we found out the loss was permanent when I was 6-years- old. This led to 5 years of speech therapy in which I was taught to slow down, enunciate and listen.
I hated having to go to speech therapy when I was in elementary school because it made me feel like an outsider but honestly, it taught me valuable lessons about communication that I’ve carried with me for my whole life; valuable lessons that I’ve used in parenting my own daughters; the true value of not only listening but hearing what others are saying.
I learned the importance of slowing down to tune in to my children, talking more with my daughters and taking turns to make sure that not only are my children heard but understood. I make it a point not to speak at my children but with them.
My experience also made me sensitive to my children’s speech when they were young. As a result of my hearing loss and years in speech therapy, I made it a point to be aware of my children’s social cues while communicating because some things were beyond their vocabulary. If I ever felt the need for concern, I would simply bring it up to their pediatrician in private.
All of this has built a foundation for trust and open dialogue with my daughters that I hope continues to grow throughout their lives. I don’t think I would be as attentive of a mother or informed about hearing and speech issues had I not experienced them myself and, for that, I’m grateful.
In the end, I may have some mild hearing loss but I didn’t have any learning disabilities or speech delays because of it but some children are not so lucky. Thankfully, technology has made it possible to help some children and adults.
Cochlear, in operation for over 30 years, is the global leader in implantable hearing solutions, providing products (cochlear implants, bone conduction, and acoustic implants) that are designed to treat a range of moderate to profound types of hearing loss. They’ve helped over 450,000 people worldwide have access to sound.
The amazing thing about Cochlear is their passion to connect with parents who want their kids to have access to hearing to help with language and development so they can live their lives without limits.
Cochlear knows communication is the crux of everything in parenting and an essential step in every parent’s journey is working on speech, language, and developmental milestones and they want to make that journey as successful as possible.
What would you do if the impossible were possible?
Disclosure: I’ve partnered with DiMe Media to share this important information about tuberculosis testing.
Health has been at the forefront of my mind recently, mine especially thanks to the year of medical issues that just keep coming but it’s also reminded me that my family is not bulletproof; none of us are safe from the effects of not taking care of ourselves.
Health is something most of us take for granted until we find ourselves sick and unhealthy but by then, it’s too late. All this has made me make health a priority in our house again. As my mom says, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure and boy, was she right.
As a mom, my children come first. When it comes to their health, I don’t want any surprises. I want simplicity so I can focus on what’s most important. That’s why I make sure that they get their immunizations and go to every well-visit. Everyone in our family gets yearly physicals. If any of us gets sick, we go to the doctor because I won’t chance our lives and health for the sake of saving a co-pay. That’s why the morning I thought I was having chest pains, even though I was pretty sure it was stomach related, I went to the Emergency room because I couldn’t chance it. Better to be safe than sorry. Also, better to be broke than dead.
There is now a blood test that can help diagnose tuberculosis infection that is a major scientific advance over the 110-year- old skin test. So, if there is a recommended test for tuberculosis for school-age children between the ages of 5-18-years-old that could prevent the onset of the illness, why would I not have my children take this simple blood test. Granted, I know taking drawing blood on a small child is traumatizing and quite horrifying to watch, for me anyways, if I’m being honest but so is the alternative.
Tuberculosis is not some obscure disease that no one contracts; it’s not like “cooties.”
It’s real and it can affect anyone sometimes there are no symptoms and you don’t even know that you contracted it and other times it can kill you. TB infection, also referred to as latent TB, occurs when a person has the bacteria that causes Tuberculosis in his or her body, but the bacteria are not causing any disease or symptoms. If you are diagnosed with latent TB there is a chance that the bacteria may cause disease in the future, so you are likely to be offered treatment to prevent this from happening. This is most likely what my grandmother had as a child.
TB infection is usually chronic and silent before it becomes active. This inactive carrier state can persist for weeks, months or years before developing into active contagious disease. The disease is an airborne, highly contagious, infectious disease caused by a bacterium, Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Most frequently, TB affects the lungs, however, it can also cause diseases in any part of the body, such as the lymph nodes, bones, brain, organs and eyes. It is an equal opportunity illness.
This is not some obscure disease of the past as many might think. It is a serious disease that kills about 1.5 million people each year worldwide. The key purpose of diagnosing latent tuberculosis infection is to identify who is at risk of progressing to active TB disease.
TB is a major health problem worldwide. Here are some staggering facts to consider:
30% of humans are infected
A new infection happens every 3 seconds
Every 21 seconds, someone dies of TB
Primary care physicians can and do make a huge difference in identifying and treating TB infection before it blossoms into active disease. 37 million lives have been saved between 2000 and 2013 through identification of infection and treatment.
My grandmother had tuberculosis when she was a child, only no one even knew about it until she developed lung cancer as an adult and then they saw the scarring. That’s scary. I don’t want to run that risk with my own children’s health.
The TB blood test is the only available method of testing for TB with completely objective results. Other tests, such as the skin test, are subjective and open to visual interpretation. In contrast to the TB skin test, the TB blood test allows you to get accurate results in just one visit leading to meaningful benefits – more ease, more time, more certainty.
This new tuberculosis blood test is an easy and simple process that gives accurate results, so why wouldn’t we do it for our children?
Mother’s Day is right around the corner and as we all know, every mother like every child, is a snowflake and picking just the right gift can be a daunting task if you forget that the only thing moms really want is something from the heart. That’s all it takes to make any of us happy really.
But if your mom is a techie, like myself, there may be some things that might make her high tech heart smile just a little wider than say a crockpot. But hey, if mom’s in to easy to make, on the go crockpot dinners, a new crockpot might be the best gift ever. Me, I prefer tech.
Here is a list of some of the hottest tech gifts this Mother’s Day:
The Huawei watch
The Huawei Watch Jewel & Elegant is at the top of my list. It’s inspired by the timeless style of feminine beauty. It’s elegant form complimented by smart technology, seamlessly blends in full functionality with flair. It’s more sophisticated and beautiful than the competition and can be outfitted in a number of different styles. It’s all the beauty of a fine timepiece and all the function of a high-end smart watch.
Powered by Android wear, the Huawei Watch makes keeping active and reaching your health goals effortless. A high-accuracy motion sensor keeps track of your activity and knows when you are walking, running or climbing.
Now, I wouldn’t normally put a scale on a Mother’s Day gift guide but I have to say, I have one and it really is one of my favorite things. The Qardio Base is a smart scale that provides weight and full body composition feedback. It works with an app and provides your weight, BMI and fat percentage. Multiple users can use it and there is even a pregnancy mode that accounts for expectant moms.
Want to know if you’re burning fat and gaining muscle? Or whether you’re actually losing weight not just water? Qardio Base smart scale makes it possible.
It allows you to set your goals and track your progress with clever charts & graphs and it even has a pregnancy mode. It’s the first scale that let’s mom know her body, not just her weight and that makes a difference.
Whether the mom in your life is an enthusiast or full-auto photographer, the ZS100 delivers the upgrade in image quality a 1-inch sensor affords with just enough zoom lens for a lot of framing flexibility and the capability to be sufficiently fast enough to capture kids and pets in action. Plus the ZS100 supports 4K video for the sharpest video capture possible. It has everything the professional or novice photographer mom could ever want.
Shield TV is a top-of-the-line Android streaming device from NVIDIA. From its sleek, angular design and the world’s largest app ecosystem to exceptional speed (34x faster) and 4k resolution – Shield TV is packed with ultra-modern features to deliver the ultimate entertainment experience by centralizing your favorite shows, movies, games, music and more in one place. With options for all ages – from PBS Kids to ESPN – and the ultimate Android gaming platform, Shield is the must-have travel essential for family trips.
With amazing Google voice capabilities and microphone-equipped remote, you can now find exactly what you want on Netflix or YouTube without seemingly endless clicks as you scroll through libraries. This means mom can pull up her favorite titles, instantly and virtually hands-free. No matter what she’s doing.
Portability, great quality and ease of use, the Olloclip 4-in-1 lens system has it all. It delivers the best-looking images. Your mom the smartphone photographer will get a fisheye, wide-angle and two macro lenses using a mount that works with both front and rear cameras of Apple’s two newest smartphones. All of this comes in a kit that offers great image quality while still being easy to carry. The system takes just a second to attach to her phone and stows away neatly in a pocket or bag using the included cloth pouch.
The Moleskine Smart Writing Set may be one of my favorite things ever. It is a 3-part system that includes a Paper Tablet, a Pen+ and the free Moleskine Notes iOS app. This system allows mom to turn anything she writes on the tablet into a digital file. No scanning required.
The Pen+ and its built-in camera picks up the code embedded in the pages of the Paper Tablet and uploads it to the Notes app. It is the perfect gift for moms like me who still like to take written notes. What can I say? I’m old school and I like tangible.
These gifts are sure to make the tech-loving mom in your life smile. I know they’d make my techy heart happy.
What’s at the top of your Mother’s Day wish list this year?
Disclosure: Some of these gifts on this Mother’s Day gift guide were provided to me for review purposes but all opinions are my own.
Ever been afraid that maybe you were having a heart attack? Seriously. I’m not trying to be funny but I’m overweight and out of shape. A heart attack is a real possibility. I’m a fat woman. I have a BMI of 33 and I recently spent 4 months sitting on my butt. Honestly, you can look healthy and still have a heart attack. They don’t call it the silent killer in women for nothing.
I’ve seen the commercials citing that 1 out of 3 women will have a heart attack our symptoms are different than men. In fact, I know a friend who had a heart attack and didn’t even realize it until afterwards. I also have a great Aunt who spent the day with us touring the Biltmore Estate and had a heart attack. None of us knew until she told her doctor and he checked her, a week later. Ladies, that scares the ish out of me. I don’t want to die of a heart attack. I want to live to be 103. That’s my expiration date. It’s non-negotiable.
Anyways, last Friday morning; I woke up at 5 a.m. with a ridiculous pain in my actual stomach (not my intestines) and it would not go away. It woke me from my sleep and the little voice in my head, recited the commercial about the mom who thought she had indigestion but instead ended up dead because she was actually having a heart attack and TUMS ain’t got nothing on that.
I got up and took some Mylanta (because I always have it on hand since the first and only stomach ache I’ve ever had). It didn’t work. Then I took some TUMS. They didn’t work. Then I took a Xanax because I’m under a shiton of stress and maybe I was having a panic attack. Nothing. I waited half an hour. Still horrific pain. Now it was from my stomach to my right side of my rib cage.
Were these the symptoms of a heart attack?
You always hear of women thinking they had heartburn and it was something else; something more. I took my blood pressure with my portable Bluetooth QardioArm blood pressure monitor and checked it right there in the app on my phone and saved it to show the hospital. As moms, we are so focused on everyone else, we neglect ourselves. Don’t do that. It could mean the difference between life and death.
SHIT! I’m having a heart attack, so I took an aspirin because blood clots and strokes. At 6:30 a.m. when everyone else woke up, I texted my husband that I needed to go to the hospital. He assured me that it was heartburn from the Mexican food at Bella’s birthday dinner from the previous night.
Firstly, I’ve only had heartburn once in my life and this wasn’t it. Secondly, it felt like acid and a severe, prolonged heart cramp. I just knew I was dying but I kept it cool for my kids. We dropped them at school where I gave them extra long goodbye hugs and kisses, without divulging anything to them, and then we proceeded on to the Emergency room. I hate the emergency room.
Long story short, after 5 hours in the Emergency room, an EKG, an ultrasound (twice in one week, lucky me!), several blood tests and worrying myself into an absolute tizzy. We found out that no, I did not in fact have a heart attack but the doctor was glad that I had come in rather than ignore my symptoms. We found out that I have gallstones, 2 of them (they go perfectly with the 3 fibroids they found last Wednesday) and upon further questioning they found out that from the prolonged ibuprofen usage for the swelling in my broken leg, I have actually made the lining of my stomach sensitive.
The sensitive stomach and high cholesterol, high fat, highly greasy Mexican food did not enjoy one another’s company. My stomach became irritated which in effect affected my gallbladder (with it’s two stones). I had a gallbladder attack. It was not pleasant and I don’t recommend it.
They intravenously administered an antacid for my stomach, some Zofran so I wouldn’t throw up and a dose of happy, I mean morphine, for the pain. They gave me strict instructions to take Zantac, especially if I planned on continuing on with the ibuprofen regimen (which I have not) and to stay away from high cholesterol meals. I quit Ibuprofen cold turkey and have been reading labels because 103-years-old, people. My expiration date is 2075, not 2016.
The moral of the story is that when you think you might have something seriously wrong with you; trust your gut (pun intended). Maybe I wasn’t having an actual heart attack (but I could have been) but I did have something wrong with me and it needed medical attention STAT. I’m not sure that would have happened if I suffered through it at home or went to a walk-in clinic. I needed tests, not a Band-Aid.
When I think of food, I think of love. Not like, my food loves me but I associate food with the feelings of being cared about by someone who loves you; like my mother making me a grilled cheese after school on a cold winter day when I was a small child or how she made me that same favorite grilled cheese when I was overcome with morning sickness when I was pregnant with my first child. There is something comforting and beautiful about a food made with such love and caring as a mother providing food for her child.
I think most people think of food in this way. That’s probably why we have that old saying, “A way to a man’s heart is through his stomach.” Maybe there is something to it. Most people celebrate the big occasions in life with food because it’s a way to share a special moment with family and friends, punctuated by the warm, permeating smells of something delicious baking in the oven.
I think I probably learned this as a small child watching my mom cook for my father and the six of us children. Some of my fondest memories as a child are centered on our kitchen table as we all shared a meal. I want that for my children. The meal is about more than just the food, it’s about gathering together and talking about your day. It’s about listening and caring. In a word, it’s about love.
This is why my family has dinner together every night and on weekends, all meals are eaten gathered around our dining table after we spend the prep time in the kitchen together. Those cooking stand at the stove while those not sit at the island, watching and learning. We’ve done this with our girls since they were very small.
They’ve always had an interest in cooking and want to learn the recipes we’ve had handed down from our mothers and grandmothers. I always get a warm fuzzy feeling when they ask, “Mommy, when I grow up, will you teach me how to make your enchiladas/ secret recipe meatloaf/lemon Greek soup?” My standard answer is, “Yes, of course,” then I whisper, “ It’s all on the blog.”
Of course like most kids, they love anything I cook or bake even more so if they have a hand in it and I think it’s important to encourage them to experiment. I want it to be a fun experience not something I take so seriously that I yell at every imperfection. I just breathe and remind myself that there is a special beauty in the imperfections and these precious moments are few and fleeting the older they get. Pretty soon, I am sure they will both be better cooks than I am.
There is one thing that they love to bake together as often as possible, Pillsbury™ Grands! Cinnamon Rolls. Maybe, like my mom’s grilled cheese does for me, it holds some special part in their heart. All I know is that if they see them in the refrigerator, they always get a little sparkle in their eye because they know that we will be together in the kitchen baking them.
There is just something special about biting into that first bite of a warm, gooey cinnamon roll especially when someone you love made it. For Valentine’s Day, I thought a fun way to surprise the girls was with a batch of Pillsbury™ Grands! Cinnamon Rolls. Each bite reminding them of how much their mom loves them. This is so simple but something they will remember forever and might someday do for their own children. It’s quick, it’s easy and what’s more special than waking up to the sweet smell of cinnamon rolls on a cold Midwestern morning?
Disclosure: This post was sponsored by General Mills through their partnership with POPSUGAR Select. While I was compensated to write a post about Pillsbury™ Grands! Cinnamon Rolls, all opinions are my own.
Discosure: This is part of a sponsored collaboration with DiMeMedia and Shutterfly, however, all opinions expressed about photo books are my own.
How important is a photo to you? They say a photo is worth a thousand words. When I think of the most precious possessions I own, I immediately think of the people I love. These people that I am honored to call family and friends, they mean everything to me. They say that a picture is worth a thousand words and every single photo I own holds a memory of someone I love. This is why I love to give and receive photo gifts.
In the past, I’ve made mugs with our girls’ smiling faces on them for my husband. I’ve filled countless frames with photo collages for grandparents. This year, I decided that I wanted some special photo gifts for ourselves because nobody loves and adores those two little faces more than I do.
I made a photo book to keep on our coffee table filled with pics of our family adventures and important moments from the past year. I’ve decided that this is going to be a new tradition. While I’m at it, I decided to do one for my dad too.
My dad shares my passion for family and photographs. Since I was a small child he was documenting all of our special moments on film. These days he’s retired and spends about 6 months of the year in Mexico, his homeland. Spanish is his first language, He’s spent my entire life adapting to us, learning to speak our native language. He has always been thrilled when we make the effort to speak in Spanish to him.
So you can imagine how excited I was to find out that Shutterfly mi vida now offers an easy, creative and convenient way to share family milestones. Now, it’s even easier to share these with my papi with the new Spanish applications (complete with ñ’s and accents). This makes this gift even more precious for me to give and him to receive.
I took me a couple hours to go through the photos and organize the book but in the end, the result was priceless. My copy is sitting on my coffee table for anyone who stops by to pick up and look at all of the beautiful adventures we lived this year’ our trip to Nashville and the week at the beach in Maine. There are photos of the first day of school, new ballet shoes and first communion. Every moment that touched my heart this year made it’s way into that book.
It makes me smile to know that while I’m here looking at my photo book, my dad can be in Mexico looking at his when he misses us. Somehow that makes us all feel closer. Thanks to “Mi Vida Shutterfly” he can cherish those moments in his native language.
What’s your favorite photo of and who would you like to share it with?
Disclosure: This is a compensated campaign in collaboration with National Dairy Council Fuel Up To Play 60 en español and Latina Bloggers Connect.
How can we motivate our children to stay active as the winter months are fast approaching? In the summer it’s easy because who doesn’t love to be outside? We live for spending summer days riding bikes, jumping on trampolines, swimming at the pool, riding the zip line and doing flips in the back yard. But winter is something different entirely.
Once the temperatures start to drop, the outside just doesn’t seem as appealing. In autumn it’s great because you still can go for bike rides, walks and jump in the leaves. You can do everything you would do in the summer months, only more comfortably because the weather is better. I don’t know about you, but my family prefers being active when the air is a little crisper and there are fewer bugs to contend with. What can I say, I have girls and bugs are not our favorite of God’s creatures.
But once it starts snowing and hitting below freezing temps, we all prefer the comfort of the indoors. Truth be told, we like to gather around the fire inside and play board games. I like to think of these as the mental acuity months. December through February, those are the months we like to pump up our brains and give our bodies the winter off, but that’s not really sensible.
I mean, sure snuggling by the fire while sipping on hot coco with your favorite people sounds like the perfect afternoon while the snow is falling all around you, but is it really good for your body? No.
There are certainly things you can do during the cold weather months to keep yourself and your children active. Believe me when spring and summer creep back up on you, you’ll all be glad that you kept the physical momentum of the summer going. Your body will thank you.
That’s where programs like Fuel Up to Play 60 come in. It’s the largest in-school health and wellness program founded by the National Dairy Council and the NFL, in collaboration with the USDA, which empowers today’s youth to lead healthier lives. It encourages all students to live healthier lifestyles through good nutrition and physical activity. Fuel Up to Play 60 knows that one in four children in the U.S. is Latino and they want to ensure that this dynamic and fast‐growing group receives the best tools to help them succeed.
Fuel Up to Play 60 playbook offers several tools for families to make healthy changes in both the way they eat and how they can add activity into their lives liek smarter snacking or joining the 100-mile club. It also provides online resources and hosts events with NFL players to inspire kids. Even better, the recently launched Fuel Up to Play 60 en español extension made possible with the help of PepsiCo.Foundation, now offers Spanish language resources, aimed at getting Hispanic parents and communities involved in health, nutrition and fitness inside and outside of the classroom.The Spanish-language Fuel Up to Play 60 playbook can inspire parents with ways to lead an active lifestyle at home
Here are some other things you can do with your kids to keep you both healthy this fall and winter:
Rake the leaves all into a giant leaf pile and take turns jumping into it. Rake. Repeat. This can go on for hours.
Go to a pumpkin patch/ corn maze and walk all the mazes. Walking a pumpkin patch looking for the perfect pumpkin and exploring the corn mazes can easily and almost unnoticeably eat up 2 hours of activity time.
Once the snow starts coming down is when the real fun begins. Here are a few of our family favorites:
Get dressed in all of your snow gear and head to the neighborhood golf course and tube down the hills. Getting dressed and walking around in 10 pounds of snow gear will burn a lot of calories on its own, but the walking up and down the hills will definitely put a dent in your daily caloric burn.
A family snowball fight or snowman building session will definitely burn some calories while making great memories.
Another great family activity is cross-country skiing throughout the neighborhood or ice-skating.
And if the kids are complaining of being bored, there is always the tried and true, no fail calorie burner…shoveling snow, but I think if given the choice, the kids would much rather build snowmen.
Just because there is snow outside doesn’t mean you need to stay inside and not move. If you are inside, why not try roller skating, indoor swimming or just really fun family game of Just Dance?
The point is that it doesn’t matter what you do, as long as you do something with your children so you’re all around for a long time to keep on making all of those awesome memories. In fact, you can have unforgettable ones by going on a skiing trip to gorgeous resorts like the Tamarck Resort close to McCall.
This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of National Dairy Council and Latina Bloggers Connect. The opinions and text are all mine.
Disclosure: This post was sponsored by FiberOne through their partnership with POPSUGAR Select. While I was compensated to write a post about FiberOne Streusel Bars, all opinions are my own.
It’s been a crazy few weeks. The summer was spent busily planning for my sister’s wedding, traveling and meeting deadlines. It was chock-full of some of life’s great things, but sometimes even the best things in life can leave you exhausted and overwhelmed, whether it is planning a wedding, bringing home a new baby or taking your dream vacation. Sometimes, you just have to stop and breathe to fully enjoy everything. A moment of quiet “me” time to regroup and rejuvenate can make the world of difference in the midst of all the chaos.
I wasted this Summer looking forward to the finish line instead of enjoying the moments as they were happening. I had so much to do that instead of just enjoying all the great adventures and life changing milestones, I found myself just trying to get through them. I wanted to survive until the next chance for down time. I think all of us do this from time to time. Life is hectic and it’s hard to fully enjoy the moments when it all begins to feel like a chore.
A week ago, I was counting the days until I got to finally rest. Honestly, it was one day until my sister’s wedding and all of our scheduled plans for the Summer would be complete. After the rehearsal dinner, after all the commotion and stress of the day were washing over us and every one else had gone to bed, my baby sister and I sat there in her living room, lit by twinkling lights, and just talked about nothing in particular. This was one of the best moments of my entire Summer.
Right in the middle of the monsoon of wedding chaos, the biggest day of her life, we just took a moment to sit still and talk about everything and nothing all at the same time. It was the perfect act of combined “me” time. She had been stressing for months with planning and wedding details. I haven’t had the chance to catch my breath all Summer. This shared moment of quiet sisterhood was something we both really needed. Alone time allows me to regroup, but sister time has always allowed me to recharge because I know I have my sister to lean on, to share with and to understand and listen as does she with me. It’s different than “me” time but, for me, it is equally as important.
We sat on that couch beneath the twinkling lights, listening to ‘80s love songs that we used to include on our “sleep tapes” when we were in high school, and reminisced. We got hungry, so we ate strawberry streusel Fiber One® Bars while we sipped on wine and laughed about all the crazy, great times we had and those which are still to come. It was the perfect marriage of the sweet things in life and an unforgettable “we” moment. It was one of those perfect sister moments that mean nothing and everything, all at the same time.
After an hour or so of talking about everything that flew into our minds and out of our souls, we crawled into bed together, like we did when we were children, and talked some more until one of us fell asleep from exhaustion. The last thing I remember hearing as I drifted off to sleep was my little sister’s laugh, as we giddily discussed her wedding day and made plans for our happily ever afters. My heart is still full just thinking about it.
The next morning, I woke her up by serenading her with “Going to the Chapel of Love” by the Shirelles. We both started our day in a great mood and then we grabbed a couple more Strawberry Streusel Fiber One® Bars to take with us on our errands, and even though it was pouring rain out, we were transported back to sitting beneath those twinkle lights and everything was perfect.
As you might remember, for about a month and especially the week prior to my first ever BlogHer, I was quite the hot mess mentally. I was overthinking everything. I wasn’t necessarily nervous about going to the conference and being a newbie because I am not a newbie. I have been blogging for over 4 years and I was mostly having some anxiety about whether or not I would live up to what people were expecting. I know it sounds so high schoolish when I say it out loud. It is. High school is exactly what the anticipation of my first BlogHer felt like. Luckily, it was nothing like that.
[fusion_builder_container hundred_percent=”yes” overflow=”visible”][fusion_builder_row][fusion_builder_column type=”1_1″ background_position=”left top” background_color=”” border_size=”” border_color=”” border_style=”solid” spacing=”yes” background_image=”” background_repeat=”no-repeat” padding=”” margin_top=”0px” margin_bottom=”0px” class=”” id=”” animation_type=”” animation_speed=”0.3″ animation_direction=”left” hide_on_mobile=”no” center_content=”no” min_height=”none”]This is me, the first night of BlogHer13!
I am lucky because I have the good fortune of knowing a lot of people online and even more fortunate that they extended invitations to me to hang out in person. I will always be forever grateful for Tracy Beckerman for inviting me to a dinner on Wednesday night with a wonderful group of men and women that are not only funny, they are some of the most wickedly down-to-earth, awesomely humble rock stars I have ever met.
I was afraid that even though we’ve “known” one another “forever” online, they were going to take one good look at me and ask “Who the fuck are you?” Surprisingly, they did not. Each one grabbed my neck and hugged my genuinely and pulled back with a knowing smile and instead of feeling like an overwhelmed newbie, I felt like I was at a reunion, returning to my blogging home. I mean these people GET.ME! They.Really.Get.Me and let’s be honest, they know more about me than most people who I see everyday. I don’t give people I know the url to my diary. It doesn’t happen. That set the tone for my entire experience. It only took one hug.
Then my roomie showed up; the phenomenon that is Jenni Chiu; Vlogger Extraordinaire and wickedly awesome wordsmith. She got in late Wednesday night. I was asleep but promptly woke up when she walked in. The first thing I saw was her smiling face (now that I think of it, she was probably laughing because I was most likely snoring like a boss). She hugged me like a long lost sister and we talked into the wee hours of the night. We were instant best friends and it only took one hug.
Sure, there were parties, events, dinners and meetings but it all boiled down to one thing for me; being myself and leaving myself open to getting to know a whole lot of amazing women. Putting faces to voices, seeing the knowing in their eyes, people who know all your secrets and still read you and want to meet you is a beautiful thing.
There were a lot of awesome people and amazing things. I won’t name them all because honestly, I don’t want you to be jealous of all the fucking amazing women I got to spend 5 days in Chicago with. My experience is not your experience and yours is not mine and I am sure you had your own amazing women you spent your 5 days with.
But I did learn a few things:
Don’t over pack! Dear Lord, did I ever. Seriously, you don’t need to take 15 outfits for 5 days. And don’t pack more than 3 pairs of shoes but pack loads of undies because these are some funny people.
Unless you are photography blogger, leave your ginormous DSLR at home.
You do not need your laptop. I am a pen and paper kind of gal.
Bring lots of water.Lots.Of.Water!!!
Take more photos! I got so wrapped up in meeting people that I completely forgot to capture the moment in photos, which is good because they had my full attention but bad because now, I have no photos of their gorgeous faces.
Do not attend everything you are invited to. Honestly, I was triple booked every day all day long. I had to miss a lot. Pick what is a good fit for you and your blog and then focus on a few more intimate gatherings. Believe me the conversations that I had with women in the middle of the night in hallways and lobbies were awesome.
Swag is nice but it is NOT the reason to attend a conference. I prefer hugs and smiles, long conversations with new old friends over anything else.
Don’t drink too much. There were a lot of people trying to summons their liquid courage; it ended with dancing like Elaine from Seinfeld, slurring to complete strangers that you love them and crying in the bathroom. I don’t recommend it. I hear the morning after hangovers were epic.
Go to VOTY! It is the most important part of BlogHer. It is what we are all about; the writing. I hope.
Wear comfortable shoes!!! 5-inch heels have no place on the expo floor. Well, unless you are one of those awesome broads who has no feeling in her feet and can do that sort of thing. I, myself, have a tendency for my feet to mutiny and hyper-extend. Even in wedges, I wake up with punishing Charlie Horses in the middle of the night.
Give feedback! Don’t be a complainer, give BlogHer constructive feedback. For instance, I feel there should be an even more advanced track for bloggers who have been doing this for a long time. I also feel that a couple of my sessions that I really looked forward to, fell flat and were disappointing because the speaker didn’t focus on her topic. That was frustrating after a paid all that money to learn something particular and the speaker failed to share her knowledge in a helpful way.
Don’t be afraid to join the conversation. Say hi! None of us bite. I think by nature most of us are a little bit introverted (we work online from home, we are not the most outgoing people) but I swear, I will hug the shit out of you if you come up to me and tell me it’s nice to meet me, you read me or you follow me. Just ask Nicole.
Embrace the fan girl. We all have one and we all are one, on some level. We write online. For me, I write completely openly and honestly because, in my mind, I am alone on my computer but that actually creates a connection with my readers (your readers) as I found out this past weekend. So when a fan of your work comes up to you and squeals and squees about how great you are…grab that girl and hug her out do.not.give.her.the.blank.stare. If you do, you are the asshole in this scenario, not her.
Take time to make people connections, it is NOT all about the swag, or how many “famous” bloggers you can meet and cross off your list (even though FULL DISCLOSURE, I did go completely FAN.GIRL. on Ree Drummond. It’s embarrassing but I may or may not have completely body checked her when we were going into VOTY. Sorry Ree!)
Be yourself!!! OMG, the best thing said to me at the entire conference was a blogger who told me that I was completely the same person online as I am offline. I hope that was a compliment. Either way, I am taking it as one. Of course, she may think I am a complete asshole online:)
Bottom line is BlogHer is for connecting; faces and voices with blogs was the connection I wanted to make and I did. I tried to see everyone I promised to hug and if I missed you, I am sorry. I honestly, loved meeting each and every one of you, even the woman who said hello, threw a card at us and ran away. Come back! I don’t bite. I might hug you hard and kiss your cheeks but I do not bite.
Thank all of you who I met for making BlogHer an unbelievably amazing experience. I feel renewed in my blogging. I don’t feel like I am alone in a room anymore because I know there are people out there, connecting with me and to my story and they care. All this started from one hug.
What was your greatest take away from BlogHer13 or any blogging conference you have attended?[/fusion_builder_column][/fusion_builder_row][/fusion_builder_container]
