Mommin' It Up!

March 26, 2014March 25, 2014

In Which I Eat ALL THE THINGS

udis gluten free 1 — I participated in this program on behalf of Udi’s and The Motherhood. All opinions are my own.

As you may know, I’ve been eating gluten free since November of 2012, when I developed an allergy to wheat. I don’t have celiac disease, so it’s not specifically gluten that causes me a problem, but wheat – and where there’s wheat, there’s gluten, so I avoid wheat by eating gluten free (wheat makes me itch and feel like I have THINGS crawling all over me. It’s terrible!) It’s been a fantastic lifestyle change for me, and we’ve had Jonah off gluten since January 2013 because he has an intolerance that manifested itself in anger – fits and tantrums that ceased almost immediately after we took him off gluten and have never returned.

Going gluten free has it’s challenges, and there were definitely certain foods I missed a LOT. But happily, now that more and more people are going gluten free for health reasons (whether medically diagnosed or not), there are now a lot of food options to help us feel “NORMAL” – which is very important! One of the first gluten free brands I ever tried was Udi’s – when craving a cheeseburger, I was finally able to have one again at a cookout thank to an Udi’s bun! And over the past 14 months I’ve also become fans of their breads and cookies, too! Jonah eats a piece of their cinnamon raisin bread every day – he loves it. And I love their Ancient Grain Millet-Chia bread. It makes a terrific grilled cheese sandwich!

Recently I got to participate in a webinar with Udi’s and some other great bloggers and learned a lot more about Udi’s and their mission to help gluten free folk like me and Jonah feel normal. It was great to hear about their history and their dedication to making new products for us g-free peeps to love! And lucky, lucky me, I also got not one but TWO boxes of some fabulous Udi’s products to try!

The granola bars, vanilla crunch muffins, and salted caramel cashew cookies are amaaaaazing!! But the piece de resistance, my friends, are these:

{cue angels singing!}

These things are so amazingly good, that after I stuffed half a bag into my face in one sitting, I checked the label to make sure they did not contain something highly addictive like say um…crack cocaine. JUST KIDDING Udi’s, I know you don’t put illegal addictive drugs in your chips, but OH MY GOSH they are ridiculously delicious! And the “Sea Salt Crisps” flavor is also outstanding!! You have gotsta get yourself some of these, gluten free or not. My gluten-eating husband also LOVED them. And may I say, it truly shows my love for him that I shared these with him. Because I’m probably not going to share them with you if I’m not legally bound for better or for worse.

One of the other things I learned about Udi’s is that they have a great commitment to being a part of the gluten free community. They have 250 brand ambassadors in North America, attend 500+ celiac disease events every year, and are actively conducting consumer research and product testing to make their products better and better for those of us who cannot eat gluten.

I’m awfully thankful for these products for me and for my little guy and I’ve loved having the chance to expand my Udi’s knowledge.

Have you ever tried any Udi’s products? What are your favorites?

March 25, 2014March 24, 2014

Review: Shark Rocket Ultra-Light Upright Vacuum

A month or so ago, I got an email asking me if I wanted to check out the Shark Rocket Ultra-Light Vacuum.

I was like, “Let me tell you about the dog hair in my house.” (Dog hair is #2 on the Top Ten Things I Hate About Having a Dog list that I’m going to publish as soon as I make an underground shelter to hide from the angry mobs wielding pitchforks that are bound to follow.)

An eight-pound vacuum with the power of a full-size Dyson? That I needed to see.

I’ve used it a number of times now, and I must say – I am impressed. It is just as light as advertised, and the “swivel steering” makes it easy to get around and under furniture or whatever is in the way. It has two levels of suction – one for a deep clean on carpet, and one designed for bare floors or area rugs.

It also picks up pieces of broken balloon like it’s nobody’s business.

But get this – I went to Shark’s Facebook page tonight to find a picture to use in this post, and I came across this shot.

{Insert screeching record sound} Hold the phone. It does what?

I had somehow missed the fact that the middle section of the vacuum could be taken out. I had to try it myself – and sure enough, it snapped apart and right back together, and made vacuuming the stairs (something I hate only slightly less than dog hair) quick and easy.

Wanna know what else it does?

It becomes a hand-held vacuum.

AND it has a Dust-Away attachment that sucks up the dirt and debris you can see and a microfiber pad to get the tiny dust particles off your hard floor.

All that comes in the standard package, and there’s also a Deluxe Tool Pack with all sorts of crazy attachments – including one that sucks dirt from under your appliances.

Like I said, I am really impressed with the Shark Rocket, and I love the versatility. None of us needs 42 different vacuums around the house – we want one that can do everything, and do everything well. The Shark Rocket fits the bill, and it’s priced right at $179. The only slight asterisk in my “two thumbs up!” is that the canister is rather small – vacuuming my stairs filled it up. But (there was a ton of dog hair), it’s easy to empty.

To learn more about the Shark Rocket, check it out on their website, Facebook page, and Twitter feed.

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March 24, 2014March 23, 2014

Such a Turn-Off

I’ve always been a kind of “everything in moderation” Mom, so what I am about to say may shock you.

A couple of months ago, I stopped letting Jonah watch TV. Like, at all. For awhile previously I had him down to one show a day, and used that mostly as a reward for potty training. But soon I realized even that was too much. Even though he was only allowed to watch one a day, he obsessed over that one show, and he talked about it all day long. He has a really good memory, and he’d memorize parts of shows and walk around reciting those parts instead of talking and interacting with me and our family.

For a language-delayed kid, this is just not healthy.

So, we pulled the plug. We knew it would be hard, and it was, at first. But it wasn’t hard for very long. I was surprised at how soon he just stopped asking to watch. I was also surprised at how soon we saw an improvement in his language. Very, very soon we were able to see that we’d made the right decision. After a couple weeks, Jonah stopped talking about his shows and started talking about the world around him. Instead of re-living scenes from a Leap Frog adventure, he reminisces about our special “Mommy-Jonah” speech time we have together every day, or about what happened at school. And he observes and comments more on what’s happening around him as it’s happening.

It’s been kind of a bummer for the big kids never to be able to watch TV or play Wii upstairs in our living room, so we created a play area for them in the basement where they can do those things (on designated days). When Jonah’s older and past his delays, we’ll all be able to do those activities together again one day, and I hope then we can keep it moderated.

Because now, honestly? It’s really nice. Sure there are some days when I have a TON of work to do and I WISH I could just plop Jonah down in front of Netflix and buckle down, but the truth is, and I have SEEN this with my own eyes, that even doing that once in awhile is not ok for Jonah. Whatever work I have to do, or think I have to do, what’s best for him is vitally more important. And so I work around the inconvenience of not having a digital babysitter. I make it work. I stay up later, work in small spurts instead of one nice big chunk if I have to, and I hustle hustle hustle when he is at school. I make it work. We make it work as a family.

Bobby was more hesitant at first, he said to me, “I feel like we are taking away everything he likes.” (Because some other things that had a screen, even electronic kids books on kindle or an app, were also a problem). And he was right. But even he agrees that we immediately saw results – and now Jonah has NEW favorite things that are better for him.

I certainly don’t think screens are evil – like I said, my big kids still use them. But I don’t think they are good for kids with language delays, and I DO think they are probably used too much among kids under 5 today.

I wanted to share this with you because this is working for us. It was a hard decision to make, but I am SO glad we did. Jonah still watches a movie with us when we have family movie night, but other than that, he doesn’t watch TV at all. And it’s pretty great!

So, if this is a decision you’re mulling over in your house, I encourage you to commit to it and give it a try. It may not be what’s right for every kid, but it sure was the right thing for ours!

Have you ever done a no TV experiment? What were the results in your house?