The Working Mom

There are a just few handful of foods I truly love, and would have to take with me on a desert island. Pizza is definitely one of them. Pillsbury makes a refrigerated pizza crust that helps you make your own home-cooked pizza even easier. Just roll it out, top with whatever you want, and only a few minutes later: fresh from the oven pizza. It’s so quick and easy, even the kids can get involved with minimal mess and it doesn’t add a lot of time to the whole cooking process.

We gave the home-made pizza making thing a try. I’m a fan of mushrooms – of course my kids are not – so we made half mushrooms, half pepperoni and everyone was happy.

Pillsbury, through MyBlogSpark, provided us with a free coupon to try their pizza crust. They also gave us a free copy of “Pictureka!” a fun “find it fast” game.

If you’d like to try making your own homemade pizza – visit this link for a coupon to save $0.40 when you purchase two packages of Pillsbury Pizza Crust!

I’m also giving away a “Family Pizza Party” prize pack like the one I recevied which includes a VIP coupon for a free package of Pillsbury Pizza Crust and the Pictureka! Game.

HOW TO ENTER THE “FAMILY PIZZA PARTY” PRIZE PACK GIVEAWAY

1) To enter the contest for the “Family Pizza Party” prize pack giveaway, please leave a comment on this post and share what activity you’d like to incorporate into your family pizza night. (Required. Value: 1 entry.)

Extra Optional Entries
2) Tweet about this post. (and leave a (seperate) comment here telling me you did). Click here to tweet now. (Optional. Value: 1 entry.)

3) If you have a blog or website, link to this post. (and leave a (seperate) comment here telling me you did) (Optional. Value: 2 entries.)

Contest ends April 28th, 2010 at 10pm MST. There is no purchase necessary to enter the contest. I will be using random.org to choose the winner. I’ll contact the winner via email, and he/she will have 48 hours to respond. After 48 hours, if I don’t receive a response, another winner will be chosen.

*Disclosure note: The VIP coupon, coupon link, information, and prize packs have all been provided by Pillsbury through MyBlogSpark.

As a working mom, dinner time is the worst time of the day for me. For some reason, even if I have a plan in place to make a specific dinner, by the end of the day, anything short of microwaving something for a few minutes, seems like more than I want to deal with. For this reason, when MyBlogSpark offered up a free sample of Wanchai Ferry dinner, I definitely wanted in. Wanchai Ferry frozen entrees are now available in the freezer case at Target and many other grocery stores. We tried the Orange Chicken and it was really quite good. It was also very quick and easy to make. The entrees are made for two people, so my daughter and I shared it. Her plate was completely clean when we were done. (And there were even veggies in there too! YAY!)

The MyBlogSpark was a nice package too, it came with a coupon for a free package of any Wanchai Ferry frozen entree, a set of asian-inspired rice bowls, chopsticks, bamboo placemats, a handful of flavored fortune cookies and a $25 Target gift card. Now, the best part? I will be giving away a prize package just like mine.

HOW TO ENTER THE “PERFECT NIGHT IN” PRIZE PACK GIVEAWAY

1) Leave a comment on this post. (Required. Value: 1 entry.)

2) Tweet about this post. (and leave a comment here telling me you did). Click here to tweet it now. (Optional. Value: 1 entry.)

3) If you have a blog or website, link to this post. (and leave a comment here telling me you did) (Optional. Value: 2 entries.)

Also – just FYI – there is a $1.50 off coupon available at http://www.wanchaiferry.com/. For meal tips to enhance your Wanchai Ferry frozen entrée check out their website at: http://www.wanchaiferry.com/MealTips.aspx.

Contest ends March 9th, 2010 at 10pm MST. There is no purchase necessary to enter the contest. I will be using random.org to choose the winner. I’ll contact the winner via email, and he/she will have 48 hours to respond. After 48 hours, if I don’t receive a response, another winner will be chosen.

*Disclsoure note: The VIP coupon, prize pack, and giveaway have all been provided by Wanchai Ferry through MyBlogSpark

I hope everyone had a good Hanukkah, Christmas, Kwanzaa, Winter Solstice or other holiday of your choice The last few weeks have been insanely busy with work projects, and various holiday projects.

I was able to do the Hanukkah presentation for Rachel’s class with minimal problems. My plan to talk “off-the-cuff” as little as possible worked. I read a book. We sang a few songs (many of them the students already knew from previous years of my coming in there), I had the kids play dreidel, and then I brought in latkes. That was probably the biggest challenge. Due to health laws – I’m not allowed to bring in homemade food, so the latkes had to be store-bought. So the first challenge was finding a store that would make them. I convinced the local Harmon’s grocery store to make them for me in their deli department, but then at the last minute they decided they were too busy to actually do it. (I can’t even tell you how pissed I still am at them for pulling that stunt). The one good thing that came out of it was that they told me that they thought that Whole Foods might make them. Which was true – and I didn’t even have to twist their arm and beg. In fact, when I explained what I needed the latkes for, they offered to make up a special batch for me of “smaller” latkes for the kids (their “normal” size was HUGE – their “smaller” size is closer to what I would have considered “normal”). But the the problem was that they refused to give them to me heated up. And I wasn’t given access to the school’s cafeteria, so I had to heat them up on warming platters in the class. They were still on the “cooler” side, but they still tasted good. All the kids seemed really excited to try them.

Christmas went well too. The kids were spoiled rotten, although there were a fair share of present fails – I think Santa is beginning to look like an idiot. (Well, at least he’ll take the blame for a few more years until the kids figure it out). Rachel got a “designer nail” kit – which apparently was only an “add on” to a larger (more expensive) kit – which she doesn’t have. Oops. Zachary got a Wii game which is totally too difficult for him to play. He also got a computer game which doesn’t work on his computer. Oops. There were other presents that didn’t suck, thankfully – Rachel got a few Harumika sets, a Miley Cyrus CD (which she has been playing over and over and over and over again. Ugh.) Zachary got a few Bakugans and a marble tower building thing.

And me? Between Hanukkah and Christmas (and Thanksgiving) – basically a month+ of holidays and food… I am sitting at a good 5lbs heavier than when the holidays started. I know I’ve been “bad” – but the holidays are difficult on a diet. I wanted to enjoy them without worrying so much about every calorie. I knew I would gain, but the deal I made with myself was that as quickly as I could afterwards I would get it back together again. So here I am. Again. For the millionth time. But that’s what it’s all about.

I tried the LoseIt! iPhone app before – but I do like being able to enter stuff into the computer as well as the iPhone. Sometimes, if I have A LOT of stuff to enter, the iPhone’s interface becomes a real hurdle. So I end up skipping an entry… and one thing leads to another… and you get the idea. So I’ve signed up again with MyFoodDiary. It’s still a little overkill for what I want, and some things I still find annoying and wish I could turn off, but it has the main important features I want – iphone accessible (they have a mobile version of their site) and the ability to enter via computer as well. It’s too bad I don’t get a “referral kick-back” for the number of times I mention them on this site, but I don’t. I just like their service.

Our New Year’s is always quiet, so I shouldn’t have too much to worry about there – so today is my first day back on track.

Holidays are especially rough when you don’t live near family. You look out the window and see that everyone’s driveway in the neighborhood is full with visitors. Meanwhile, your house is nearly empty. Just a tad bit depressing. My parents know this, so whenever they can, they try to spend some of the holidays with us. So I’m really glad they’ll be coming for Thanksgiving this year. They won’t be able to stay too long, just the long weekend – but I’ll take what I can get!

My mom usually cooks dinner – even if it’s at my house. I don’t mind. I’m not the greatest cook, so my daughter and I act as her “sous chefs” But because they won’t be here until the night before Thanksgiving, I’ve been tasked with going out and getting all the ingredients. As fate would have it – I just haven’t had a ton of time to get out and do this task and have scheduled to do it tomorrow morning. Wednesday. The day before Thanksgiving.

I know, I know… it’s going to be insanity at the grocery store. I’m just hoping that everyone else in this town is more organized than me (which is probably not too far from the truth). I DO at least already have the turkey! It’s been sitting thawing in the Fridge – so I’m not completely out of my mind. (I already made that mistake one year. If I recall correctly – we had to try to “quick” thaw the turkey with hot water. NOT an easy task with a huge turkey!!) But the rest of the ingredients are staples that I just can’t expect to suddenly disappear from the shelves. Green beans? Sweet Potatoes? I don’t really want all this food sitting around my house until we need it. We don’t have room!

Maybe this will be another year a “lesson” is learned. I’m hoping not. Either way, the available time just isn’t there.

In any case, I’ll be enjoying company the next few days. (Hopefully with all the food we have planned! LOL!) Hope you all have a Happy Thanksgiving!!

For the past few months, I’ve been doing a pretty good job of maintaining my weight loss. I relaxed and ate fairly healthy and comfortably. I kept an eye on my weight more to make sure things were staying where they were supposed to. The lowest it got down to was 127.6 – but would usually average around 130. That’s right around where I should be. 125 is the lowest I can really go. But more recently the average of where it’s fluctuated has been 131…132… It’s not a lot, but I’m going to track calories again until it goes down a few pounds.

I still think MyFoodDiary.com is great, but I want something more simple. I know that fats and carbs play a role, but what I found to be the most significant issue was plain old calories. (It’s important to note this will be different for different people – and even for me, there was a time I was more concerned with carbs than anything else. Right now I think I have the carbs under control – but really just want some help watching the straight calories). So I’m going to give that “Lose It” (free) iPhone app a try. I’ve heard people rave about it – and if just watching calories is what you need to do – then this program seems pretty good. For the foods that it has in the database, it does include additional nutritional info (Fat, Cholesterol, Sodium, Carbs, Protein). But entering in your own custom foods doesn’t entail a long form to fill out. Just enter the name of the food, the serving size, and the number of calories. Done. This is perfect for what I want to do right now. (An additional note: For those people that want to track those other items, the simplicity of Lose It probably isn’t a good thing as I could not see a way to enter that additional nutritional data in for custom foods if I wanted to) figured it out: you can track these other nutrients, you have to just turn that feature on if you want it.

Anyway. Back on the wagon…

If you’d like to try Lose It too, here’s the link on iTunes. (It’s free)

Why do all the parenting magazines I get focus on food presentation? As, if I make the carrot look like a caterpillar, my kid will suddenly be interested in eating it.

REALLY? I mean does any kid really fall for that? Mine doesn’t. I’m so desperate to get Zach to eat vegetables, that I even bought that book Deceptively Delicious. Even if he can’t see the vegetables, even if can’t taste the vegetables, he still somehow always knows when they’re there. It’s like he has Veg-dar or something. If he sees so much as a microscopic green parsley leaf in his food he has to pick it out. (oh, and whine about it, too)

How did I end up with a kid that hates vegetables this much? I love vegetables. I’m not exaggerating – I could sit and eat a head of lettuce, just like that, with no dressing. Just pick off the leaves and munch them like they were potato chips. (Spaghetti Squash may be the only vegetable I really don’t like).

But then the parenting magazines will take things too far. They’ll make cupcakes look like little turkeys for Thanksgiving.

REALLY??? This is one thing that doesn’t need to be dressed up. We don’t have any problems getting the kids to eat cupcakes. While it may be FUN to dress up a cupcake to look like a turkey, it doesn’t need to be done, he will eat it anyway, and my time is probably better spent trying to make the turkey look like a cupcake so he’ll eat that. (He’s not big on meat either. I honestly don’t know how he survives.)

As I posted on Twitter – I told Zach if he ate asparagus, it would make his pee smell. He thought that would be really cool. It almost worked. In the end, he chickened out.

I think what we need is more Popeye’s. I remember as a kid, watching Popeye cartoons, I was encouraged to eat spinach. Of course, I don’t know why. It’s not like I really wanted to look like Popeye. Zach does like that “party in my tummy” song – it so cracks me up. (If you go to that link, and get the song stuck in your head, you can thank me later) But it’s not enough. I think the real solution is that we need more vegetarian super heroes! (and less turkey cupcakes!) Captain Cucumber saves the day!!!

Or maybe not.