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Years ago I read something that totally changed the way I napped. Sometimes, when I couldn’t keep my eyes open anymore, I would lay down for a nap, and wake up groggy a couple of hours later. Or, I’d set an alarm for 15 minutes, supposedly the right amount of time for a power nap, and then be jolted awake and feel sleepy for an hour afterwards.
But once I learned about the “caffeine nap” I found that I could lay down for about twenty minutes and wake up totally refreshed. I’ve become a regular caffeine napper, often grabbing one before the kids get home from school.
I saw this tweet today and thought it would be a good time to explain how and why to take a caffeine nap:
So, this is for Cecily and everyone else who, like me, could really use a pick-me-up in the afternoon and isn’t ready to try cocaine.
How to take a Caffeine Nap
Step 1: Drink some caffeine. I’m guessing for most of you that’s coffee (or maybe a Red Bull for Cecily?). For me it’s a Diet Dr Pepper.
Step 2: Set an alarm for 20-25 minutes from now.
Step 3: Sleep.
Here’s what should happen: caffeine takes about 15-20 minutes to start taking effect, so the goal is to have it wake you up before the alarm goes off. You’ll be waking up in stage two (out of four) in the sleep cycle, when you’re not in a really deep sleep yet. That, combined with the caffeine, should keep you from feeling groggy.
Researchers at a British sleep center found that out of all the things you can do when tired and driving, a caffeine nap was the most effective in waking you up. Keep that in mind on your next road trip when your eyelids start to droop.
Originally posted on Selfish Mom. All opinions expressed on this website come straight from Amy unless otherwise noted. This post has a Compensation Level of 0. Please visit Amy’s Full Disclosure page for more information.
I’ve wanted curly hair longer than I can remember. I’ve gotten more perms than I can count. I’ve purchased at least ten curling irons in my lifetime. But have you ever seen me with curly hair? Rarely. Even the irons that do work take so long – I have a ton of hair and hate to do anything to it besides throw it in a ponytail.
Then along came Sarah Potempa. She’d been telling me for a while that she and her sister were working on a revolutionary new way to curl hair, and now it’s here!
I bought Sarah’s new BeachWaver Rotating Curling Iron the day it went on sale on QVC. I played with it a little bit last night, but took it for a real spin today – and video taped the whole thing! It took me only twenty minutes to do all of my hair, less than half of what it took with my old iron. But, I was doing it without a mirror! I could barely see myself in the little camera monitor. I bet with a mirror I could get this down to under fifteen minutes, easy.
I’m thrilled with this purchase, and can’t wait to wear my sexy hair to an event or a party or…the grocery store! Anywhere!
Check out this before and after:
Soft, easy curls that don’t look like they’re trying too hard. And that was without any product what-so-ever.
Watch my video to see how easy this was. Trust me: if I can do it, anybody can.
Originally posted on Selfish Mom. All opinions expressed on this website come straight from Amy unless otherwise noted. This post has a Compensation Level of 0. Please visit Amy’s Full Disclosure page for more information.
So there are six days left in the DietBet blogger contest and I’m happy to say that I’ve met my goal of losing 4% of my body weight in four weeks! But, I can’t really stop trying to lose because I want a buffer for the weigh-in. I am exactly at the goal, and what happens if I wake up bloated on the final weigh-in day? Or the clothes I wear that day are heavier than the ones I wore during the first weigh-in? Or my hair grew so much in a month that it adds a few ounces to my weight?!? Clearly I need to lose a couple more pounds to feel safe.
Luckily I’m still going strong on my weird diet plan after six week. I had a hiccup on Tuesday, though. I was going out to lunch with the nice people from visit Raleigh (huge thanks to Molly Gold for inviting me!) at a southern food restaurant on Ninth Avenue, Tipsy Parson. One look at the menu online and I knew I would be eating most of my 1,400 calories at lunch! Sure enough, we started with Fried Green Tomatoes (yum) and Fried Pickles, and then I moved on to a bowl of scrumptious Mac & Cheese.
And this was all OK, because I proved at CES (where I lost two pounds) that I could eat pretty much what I wanted for a meal as long as I didn’t eat a ton the rest of the day. So, each day in Las Vegas I would do Slim Fast during the day, and then eat at the cocktail parties and dinners. And it worked great!
But know what doesn’t work great? Trying to flip that schedule around. I can deprive myself during the day and then let loose in the evening. What I can’t do, it turns out, is have a huge lunch and then a salad for dinner. It simply doesn’t work with my brain. I ordered pizza for dinner, had two huge slices, and then some leftover mashed potatoes, and then some Thin Mints!
So, to salvage things, I made Tuesday my cheat day – I get one a week. Which means it will be a long time until my next one! But I’ll survive. And I’ve learned a lesson: the will power I have during the day, when I’m busy and looking forward to dinner, completely leaves me in the evening, when I’m with other people and watching TV and being lazy.
The other thing on my agenda today is playing with my new BeachWaver rotating curling iron. It was delivered yesterday and even though I wasn’t going anywhere, I just had to try it out! I mean, it’s not cheap, and I took a big chance buying it without actually seeing if it would work with my hair first. But I trust its creator Sarah Potempa, who has cut my hair a couple of times thanks to a contest I won a while back. I figured she knew my hair, and if she said it would work, it would. So I bought it, and it totally works! I only did a quarter of my hair last night, but it was gorgeous, and so quick. So today I’m going to do all of my hair, to see how long it takes (curling my entire head used to take about 40 minutes). I’ll be sure to post pictures and a video!
In the meantime, here’s a video of Sarah curling her own hair with the BeachWaver.
I’ve been on a weight-loss kick lately. I started out by losing ten pounds with Slim Fast, then moved to a diet that I devised myself, and I’ve lost an additional twelve pounds in the last six weeks, for a total of twenty-two since October. I’m now officially one-third of the way to my goal of weighing 140 by the time I turn 40! More importantly, I’m still going strong. There were a couple of days last week when I really wanted to quit, but I didn’t.
One of the keys to my success has been eating salad. I eat salads whether I’m trying to lose weight or not because I love them, but they’re totally different salads. Before, the lettuce was only an excuse for hardboiled eggs, cheese, croutons, and half a cup of dressing. Now, I make absolutely delicious and filling salads for around 100 calories each.
Today is going to be a two-salad day. Why? Because I had a salad for lunch, and while making that I packed another one to eat at tonight’s PTA meeting. I will not be tempted by the pizza they serve at PTA meetings!
I’m really excited to be working with Hidden Valley again this year as part of their Love Your Veggies program. They recently sent me a couple of their new Farmhouse Originals dressings to try, so today I cracked open the Italian with Herbs. Despite only using a tablespoon, it made my salad taste fantastic!
So besides great dressing, what’s my secret to a delicious salad that doesn’t bust my calorie bank? I make it a chopped salad. I don’t know what it is about chopped salads, but they taste totally different than the same ingredients in big pieces. And because it’s easier to distribute the dressing in a chopped salad, I can use less while still getting lots of flavor. I use one of these to chop most of the ingredients.
The salad that I packed for tonight has Hidden Valley Light Ranch Dressing in this very cool Glad-To-Go container that I found in a gift bag at some point, I don’t even know when. I love these containers – your dressing is right there, without having to take a separate container, because the little dressing bowl fits right into the big lid. And since you don’t have to mix the salad ahead of time, it won’t get soggy!
Amy’s 100 Calorie Chopped Salad
3 1/2 ounces green leaf lettuce
1/2 ounce shredded carrot
1/2 ounce onion
1 ounce tomato
1/8 cup chick peas
1 TBSP Hidden Valley Ranch Farmhouse Originals Italian with Herbs Dressing
Chop all of the veggies into tiny pieces, then toss well with the dressing. The flavors will all mix together so well in every bite, you won’t believe that this big salad is only 100 calories!
On Sunday night The Ass and I headed into the city with the kids for dinner and a show. I was fortunate to receive tickets to Godspell on Broadway from Mama Drama, a wonderful organization that promotes Broadway shows to moms.
We started out with dinner at Ellen’s Stardust Diner, just a block and a half from the theater. If you’ve never been (we hadn’t), it’s a good warm-up to seeing a Broadway musical. The entire wait staff takes turns singing selections from Broadway shows. This is not Monica from Friends standing on the counter singing over her big fake boobs, either. This is for real – these people can sing. In fact, last year the diner lost eleven waiters and waitresses to Broadway shows, including one to Godspell! One waitress even dazzled the diners with “Glitter and Be Gay” from Candide – she wasn’t messing around.
We got to the theater early and checked out the cast info. I absolutely love Hunter Parrish on Weeds, and he plays Jesus. Fiona immediately recognized Anna Maria Perez de Tagle from Camp Rock. And I was struck by the fact that six members of the cast were making their Broadway debuts (as is director Daniel Goldstein).
The Circle in the Square Theater is a really great space. I don’t think there could be a bad seat in the house. I’ve always thought there’s something magical to theater-in-the-round: once you’re not playing on a traditional proscenium stage, everything else should be messed with too. Rules should be broken. I wasn’t disappointed. From the way the band is scattered throughout the theater to the different surprises in the stage, this production is innovative. I mean, how can you not appreciate a show where a fatted calf plays the cowbell?
I mentioned in the title that the cast could sing the phone book, but only if it were set to music by Stephen Schwartz, who is responsible for both Wicked (one of my favorite musicals of all time), and The Hunchback of Notre Dame, the most underrated and overlooked of all the Disney musicals – I’m still waiting for it to get the Disney Broadway treatment.
The most interesting thing about this production is how topical it is. There are tons of references to politics, pop culture, etc. and if this were a movie it would be dated in about ten minutes. But judging by the Mitt Romney joke that had to have been added within the past few days, they’re keeping it fresh, and it totally works.
This is probably a good time to mention that I’m an atheist. My husband was surprised that I wanted to see the show. I pointed out that I’m not really a fan of murder and cannibalism either, but I’ll go see Sweeney Todd any day. A good show is a good show, whatever the subject. Godspell is based on the gospels of Matthew and Luke, and the lessons are brought to life in the same way that reading Shakespeare can be dry, but a good production is totally understandable and riveting.
The first act is definitely more joyous and, in my opinion, better than the first. But that’s not really anybody’s fault. The betrayal and crucifixion of Jesus is kind of a downer, even when sung. It’s all handled really beautifully, but still, things are solemn for a long time, and I imagine younger kids could get bored during the second act. I had to put my hand on Fiona’s program a couple times to make her stop playing with it. The show runs two hours and fifteen minutes, and in retrospect a matinee might have made more sense, but she loved it and is excited to listen to the soundtrack, which I bought the next day.
Jake is a tougher customer. He wasn’t all that enthusiastic about going in the first place, but I feel like kids should be exposed to theater as much as possible, and was really hopeful that he would get into it. Several times I glanced over at him and saw him playing air drums and clapping. He told me after that he gave it a 7.5 out of 10. Considering he would’ve otherwise been at home playing video games, I was more than happy with that.
My husband gave it the highest praise he could: if you like that sort of thing, it’s really good and definitely worth seeing. I was fooled in the beginning, when we were first dating: he went to every musical I wanted to. But, in the same way that I no longer shave my legs for him, he no longer pretends to like musicals just to please me. I’m sure that he would rather have been on the couch next to Jake, also playing video games, so I appreciate his sacrifice. :-)
There was a drawing after the show for two audience members to go back stage and get a tour, and I’m not sure who was more disappointed not to win, me or Fiona. This is the first show in a long time that I’ve wanted to see again right after it ended. If you are anywhere near NYC and your kids are about seven or older, I would highly recommend Godspell, especially if they’ve never seen a Broadway show. You can get a very big discount on tickets to Godspell through this link, using code GSMDR79.
Also, be aware that there’s something called Talk Back Tuesdays, where after the Tuesday show (through March) a different cast member talks about his/her role in the show, audition, etc. If I see the show again it’s going to be on a Tuesday. :-)
Thank you to photographer Jeremy Daniel and the Godspell website for use of the production photos, and to Mama Drama for this great night out.
Originally posted on Selfish Mom. All opinions expressed on this website come straight from Amy unless otherwise noted. This post has a Compensation Level of 1. Please visit Amy’s Full Disclosure page for more information.
For more blog posts on Broadway’s Godspell visit MamaDrama.
