Selfish Mom

Yeah, I’m judging this mom

Mar 30, 2011 What's Going On

Anyone who says that you shouldn’t judge other parents’ choices is probably referring to a difference of opinion about breastfeeding, or circumcision, or public vs. private school, or any number of topics where parents often disagree. Then you travel down that slippery slope of “I can’t believe they do this, but it’s a free country” topics, like child beauty pageants. Scraping the bottom of that topic is this mom. She injects her eight-year-old daughter with Botox. Because eight-year-old girls are known for having hideous, wrinkly faces that will doom them to a life of dark alleys and low-paying jobs where the world won’t be subjected to their ugliness.

The fact that the young girl’s regular bikini waxes aren’t the most shocking thing in the article is just messed up. And please note that the mother wants to get her daughter’s eyebrows and lips tattood as well.

What does this child think of the Botox injections? “They used to hurt, but now I don’t cry that much.” I’m not sure what an acceptable level of crying is for an eight-year-old who has just had internet-purchased toxins injected into her face, but I’m relieved that it’s not “that much.”

“I also want a boob and nose job soon, so that I can be a star.” Sigh.

So what’s the mother’s reason for all of this? It’s pretty much what you’d expect: “When she’s a superstar earning millions, she’ll always be grateful for what I did when she was so young.”

Yes. Because that’s what’s going to become of this. There’s no chance that this poor girl will instead wind up pregnant at fifteen, searching for someone who will love her for who she is.

Or maybe, she’ll just end up looking like this.

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. Amy also blogs at Filming In Brooklyn, Behind the Screen, and Momtourage, and podcasts with The Blogging Angels.

Tags: Botox, child abuse

Kate Middleton is a fruitcake

Mar 29, 2011 What's Going On

I almost wasn’t going to write this, because apparently there’s a rabid group of cake defenders trolling the internet looking for bloggers to beat up on. (Many thanks to Mom101 for pointing me toward one of the most entertaining comment strings ever.)

Or perhaps they were all Food Network cake design show lovers, in which case I might be safe from their wrath. Or more likely they all belonged to that strange subset of internet commenters who go out of their way to comment on posts to tell the authors just how little their opinions mean, thus giving the posts a gazillion comments and making the authors’ opinions mean more. I love those commenters.

But I’m about to insult fruitcake, and I can’t imagine it has many defenders. I’m also about to insult British people, but they’re all too busy drinking tea to read my blog.

It was revealed recently that Prince William has infinitely more sense and taste than his fiancée, Kate Middleton. She chose for her wedding cake a giant fruitcake. For a wedding. Wedding fruitcake. I still can’t quite get over this. I considered about half a dozen different kinds of cake for my wedding, and not one of them was a dense brick filled with dried fruit and nuts.

Here in the U.S. fruitcake is a common slang term for crazy person. It’s a joke food. Johnny Carson made fruitcake a running gag on The Tonight Show. Someone sent my mom this card one Christmas more than twenty years ago and it makes me chuckle to this day. There’s even an annual event in Colorado where you can get rid of fruitcake in the sanest way possible: by throwing it as far as you can. These are not indications of a respected dessert. (Then again, I hear that the British version of fruitcake has a lot of alcohol in it, which may explain things.)

Reading further I discovered that this is actually a British tradition, a fruitcake wedding cake. So it’s not Kate Middleton who is crazy, she’s just bowing to societal pressure. It’s actually England that’s a little nuts.

The weirdest part of the story, though, is that Prince William is having a groom’s cake. This is not a British tradition. It’s not even an American tradition. It’s a Southern American tradition. After living in North Carolina for three years and attending several southern weddings (as well as planning mine while living there), I was convinced of three things: 1) southerners need to lay off of the sequins when making wedding dresses, 2) everyone leaves southern weddings hungry and goes to a Waffle House for dinner, and 3) northern weddings don’t have enough cake by half. So at my wedding we had a groom’s cake, and it had the South Park characters on it. Oh, and it was carrot cake. Very non-traditional for a wedding. And I realize it weakens my position a little bit. But since it was sitting next to my big white-and-chocolate layered traditional wedding cake, that didn’t really matter. You can go crazy with the groom’s cake when you have the big flowery normal one next to it.

That’s our wedding cake (and yes, that’s my husband – he didn’t make me blur him out or anything!). I would have loved to post a pic of our groom’s cake, but I have no idea where it is.

But I haven’t even gotten to the best part of the future king’s cake: it’s a cookie cake. It’s a giant cookie cake, made up of 1,700 Rich Tea brand cookies. I have no idea what kind of cookies these are, but it doesn’t matter because they will be covered in 17 kilos of chocolate. For those of you, like me, who have no idea how much chocolate is in 17 kilos, it’s 37.5 pounds. Of chocolate. On one cake.

So there you have it: England’s future queen will be presiding over a big fruitcake, and the future king will be presiding over a giant chocolate-covered cookie. I know which line I’ll be in.

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. Amy also blogs at Filming In Brooklyn, Behind the Screen, and Momtourage, and podcasts with The Blogging Angels.

Tags: Food, wedding

Cat 1, Humans 0

Mar 29, 2011 What's Going On

I was walking up the stairs this morning when I almost stepped in cat puke. My feet panicked, and I fell against the stairs with both arms, giving me two beautiful bruises. I couldn’t use my hands, because there was a cell phone in one and a Diet Dr Pepper in the other (I’m just glad I wasn’t carrying a laptop). The Diet Dr Pepper spilled all over the stairs.

To make it worse, when I went back to clean it up I discovered that the cat puke had been stepped in. And not by me, my socks were clean. I emailed my husband and told him to check his socks, but he was clean too. So one of my children is in school with a sock full of cat puke, which is now squishing around inside a shoe.

This is why I hate my cat.

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. Amy also blogs at Filming In Brooklyn, Behind the Screen, and Momtourage, and podcasts with The Blogging Angels.

Tags: Cats

The goofy kid trio from Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules

Mar 26, 2011 What's Going On

I’ve never really had a desire to direct anything – way too much work and responsibility. But if I ever do end up directing something, I really hope there are no kids in it, because I can’t imagine anything more difficult than casting children. Every time the right kid is matched with the right role, I think an angel gets its wings (conversely, every time a precocious show-biz brat turns in a mannered, snarky TV performance, a puppy dies).

Then, once you do get your cast together, you have to put up with shorter work days, hormones, zits, lost teeth, and everything else that goes along with being a kid, tween, or teen. And the most vexing thing of all: they grow. Jeff Kinney touched on this when I had the opportunity to attend a roundtable interview with him after seeing a sneak peek of the latest movie made from his incredibly popular book series. When asked if the kids in the book would get older, he responded:

That’s the thing that I really decided with the last book is that the characters are ageless. In the books, I never mention how old they are. I realized that I haven’t created literary characters, I have created cartoon characters. Just like Charlie Brown has a first day of school every year, that’s how they should stay in the books.

In the movie, of course, we have the unfortunate reality of the kids getting older. That’s really a different world.

I also got to interview Zachary Gordon, who plays Wimpy Kid Greg Heffley (on the right in the picture above), as well as Robert Capron (Greg’s best friend Rowley, on the left) and Devon Bostick, who plays Greg’s older brother and chief tormentor, Rodrick. Jeff Kinney had been involved in the casting of the first movie. Finding the right kids was a very long process, according to Mr. Kinney:

Greg in particular was very difficult to find because we had to find a kid who could be a bit of a jerk but was also likeable, and that was hard to do. I think that Zach Gordon was up for the task.

Rowley was easy. We found Robert and he was in.

However, when I spoke with Robert it became clear that even though the grown-ups knew pretty quick that Robert was perfect for Rowley, they didn’t tell him that.

It was about nine months, the audition process. During that time, I actually slept with the books under my pillows for good luck. It was really long, and I didn’t expect it to be that long. I auditioned for the movie in New York, and there were 50 kids at the audition. I remember thinking, “I am never going to get this.”

For Zach things were even hairier.

When I went in the room, there were eight high school kids in there going out for Greg. And I said, “Are you sure I’m supposed to be here, mom?” I went in the audition and I had these huge baggy pants on, this huge jacket and a long T-shirt and long hair. Originally, they said that I didn’t look like Greg, but I could deliver the lines like Greg.

I went through all these screen tests. Then I did something called boot camp, where they dress you up like the character, and then they cut your hair and do your make-up. It was crazy, because I had never had my hair that short before. I got to go to this hair stylist and everything, but they still weren’t that sure.

It was about four long months after that, then I was out of the process, then I was back in. It was down to four kids with Robert, and I did two screen tests with him. And then, they knew that we were the perfect best friends.

Zach is thirteen and Robert is twelve, so I was wondering how Devon (Rodrick) handled himself on set. Since he’s nineteen now, I asked him if he feels like one of the kids, or more like an adult, and he said definitely like one of the kids. But he added that the two main adult cast members – Rachel Harris and Steve Zahn – also acted like kids on the set.

I’ll just come right out and say that Devon is a complete cutie (hey, he’s an adult! I can say it!). With no shortage of confidence or swagger, he told us how he picked up the drums in three days while preparing for Rodrick’s band scenes. His career is at a different stage than Zach and Robert’s. Devon has been acting for nine years, and has been a little bit surprised by the direction it’s going in:

I did this artsy Canadian film, which was directed by Atom Egoyan, called Adoration. We went to Cannes for that and it was a super-serious film. From that point, I thought I would be going into serious films. But, it’s funny what comes your way, because then I did Saw VI after that, then, a zombie movie, George Romero’s Survival of the Dead. I did that one after Diary of a Wimpy Kid.

But even without Saw VI on his resume, it would be difficult for Devon to take himself too seriously with the Diary of a Wimpy Kid group. There was one time in particular on this last shoot when Mr. Kinney made sure of that. He called Devon, saying that he was from “New Hotness” magazine, and that Devon had made their list of the top 100 hotties – at number 98.

I’d rather not be on the list at that point. I wanted to be polite, so I kept the interview going until Jeff came in on his cell phone, asking if they could take a picture for the magazine.

It’s clear seeing the three boys together that they all get along, and had a great time making the movies together. From Zach peeing on Devon (it was fake, of course), to Zach going face first into a cake, to Devon getting to live out his rock-star fantasies with his character’s band, to Robert hamming it up in…well, just about any scene he’s in, they’re a delight to watch on screen and really fun to talk to in person.

Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules opened yesterday. My nine-year-old son Jake says that you should see it because it’s “full of hilarity.”

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. Amy also blogs at Filming In Brooklyn, Behind the Screen, and Momtourage, and podcasts with The Blogging Angels.

Tags: Diary of a Wimpy Kid, Interview

Jeff Kinney makes me the Best Mom in the Universe

Mar 25, 2011 What's Going On

I was on a panel not long ago with my friend Katja Presnal, and she commented on how even though making a living is the goal of many mom bloggers, sometimes the experiences we have are worth much more than money. And when our kids are involved in those experiences, they’re just priceless.

I was already a big enough hero to my kids last week when I let them skip a half day of school to see a press preview of Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules. But when they got to meet Jeff Kinney, author of the Wimpy Kid books, I basically became the greatest mom in the universe.

Getting to interview Jeff Kinney at a post-screening round-table was exciting for me as well, despite the fact that I’ve never read any of the Wimpy Kid books. My son Jake is obsessed with them. He’s read every one probably a dozen times at this point. He can recite whole passages. So when I found out from Jeff Kinney himself that he never intended to write the books for kids, I was floored!

Jeff Kinney could easily be mistaken for a Mormon missionary if you happened upon him outside of a press junket. Soft spoken, gentle, humble, and still a bit bewildered by the entire phenomenon, he was one of the most pleasant people I’ve ever talked to in my life. The hero of elementary and middle school boys everywhere (and their parents who want them to be enthusiastic readers), Mr. Kinney was asked about his status among tween boys:

I think that they would be disappointed if they saw me in real life. I really didn’t write these books for kids. I was trying to write one big fat book for adults. I worked on it for about eight years. And then, my publisher said that they thought that I’d written a children’s series.

It was kind of a shock to my system, after working for that long. For the book to go out into the world as a kids’ series, and for it to be successful has been…it feels like the Truman Show. Nothing feels real to me.

I was interested in how much he had to change the books from his original concept, a Wonder Years-like nostalgic look back at childhood, when they were going to be published for kids instead. Surprisingly, he said he didn’t have to change much at all.

My sensibilities are very G rated anyway. I’m obsessed with not creating anything bad in the world. I’m shocked that I couldn’t see that I was writing for children all along.

There’s a great Steven Wright line where he says, “I wrote a children’s book, but I didn’t do it on purpose.” And that’s what happened to me, too.

Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules is all about family relationships. The oldest brother torments the middle brother, the middle brother is trying to survive at home and at school, and the little brother just annoys both of them. Mom is doing her best to get the two older siblings to get along and become friends, and dad…well, dad seems to think they’re all a little nuts. Jeff Kinney talked a bit about how his childhood and his own sons influenced the books, how much was autobiographical and how much is pure fiction.

I can’t even tell myself anymore. There’s definitely a lot of my own experience baked into these stories, but then it’s been through the wash so many times that I can’t even really remember what’s true and what’s not. Then, you have screenwriters who are reinterpreting things a little bit. So, it’s a real mix of fact and fiction.

I look at my sons. While they’re playing their Nintendo DSs, they’re lying across each other on the couch, and I think, “This is either the seeds of a great relationship, or it’s going to be a disaster later on.” They seem like a really good match and that’s exciting to see as a parent.

The mom in the movie totally reminded me of, well, me. She comes up with a very sincere, well-meant plan to help her boys get along, and even though everyone else can see that it’s going to be a disaster, she believes in it 100%.

Rachael Harris does a great job as the mom. She’s sweet and misguided in some ways. Some of my ideas for Diary of a Wimpy Kid come from my own wife. We’ll plan a big birthday party with all of my son’s friends, then my wife will send out a note to everybody that says, “No toys, please, but you can bring a book.”

I’m sure when my son gets a stack of books on his sixth birthday that he will be thrilled with that. That’s something that [the mom in the movie] definitely would do.

While Mr. Kinney insists that most of the time his life is completely ordinary, with cub scouts and dog poop and his day job (he’s the creator of poptropica), he does occasionally get to step into this alternate universe of movies and awards and publicity. It was interesting to hear that mombloggers aren’t the only ones who struggle with exposing their kids to the public.

People Magazine came by and did a profile. They wanted to take a picture of my kids, and I think about the mom blogs and the parenting blogs that say K1 and K2, which has some strangeness to it. But, I said to myself, you know what? I have kids. It’s a fact in my life that I have children. They have names and they have faces.

It was a real pleasure to talk to Mr. Kinney. Diary of a Wimpy Kid 2: Rodrick Rules opened today, March 25th. My son proclaimed it to be better than the first movie and the first five books combined. If that isn’t a whopping endorsement, I don’t know what is.

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. Amy also blogs at Filming In Brooklyn, Behind the Screen, and Momtourage, and podcasts with The Blogging Angels.

Tags: Diary of a Wimpy Kid, Interview

Randomosity, garlic breath style

Mar 23, 2011 Randomosity

I’m writing this with possibly the worst garlic breath I’ve had in a while, but it was totally worth it. I got a very nice shout-out on a post about a Hidden Valley Ranch event my friend Nicole and I both attended a little while back, and included in her post was a simple and fantastic-looking recipe for Ranched-Up Hummus Dip (and check out the picture of Fiona up on the counter with Hidden Valley Ranch celebrity spokesmom Angie Harmon!). Since I had all of the ingredients I made some, and since I love garlic I doubled it to two cloves. And wowee was that a lot of garlic in one little recipe. Next time I’m going to use one clove like the recipe said!

And I will definitely make this recipe again. It took literally five minutes start to finish. I could whip this up for a surprise guest, put out some pita bread, and look really impressive. I only had a few spoonsful because I had just eaten some more of the delicious Cauliflower-Potato Mash I made yesterday – that one is going into my permanent rotation of recipes. The rest of the dip will be eaten throughout the afternoon with pita wedges, baby carrots, grape tomatoes, and blanched green beans, followed by half a bottle of mouthwash before tonight’s PTA meeting.

It felt like a “grazing day” when I woke up so it was pure serendipity that I came across this recipe today!

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I’ve had this video open in a tab on my computer for weeks, just because every few days or so when I need a laugh I watch it again. I’m not sure what my fascination is. I guess because Darth Vader doing anything other than being menacing is automatically funny (search “Darth Vader funny videos” sometime), and Can’t Touch This was just awesome. Put them together? Comedy gold.

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I have no idea if this story is real and the video authentic. If it is, it’s just delicious: guy steals laptop and takes it home, records himself dancing, and laptop owner is able to access the files remotely. He posts dancing video on YouTube, causing thief to beg him to take the video down.

And if it isn’t real, well then, it was a genius attempt at a viral video and still very funny. Thanks very much to my friend (and fellow Blogging Angel) Rebecca for tweeting the link!

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I love pretty much everything Aaron Traister writes in Redbook. This collection of the 18 most annoying male habits, explained may actually be a public service though, heading off a couple of fights between me and my husband. And it’s hilarious.

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I wrote a post last week about my daughter’s fatalistic attitude towards her future in light of the recent earthquake/tsunami tragedy in Japan. A commenter very helpfully put this link in the comments about how to talk to children after a tragedy, and I’m finding it really useful and realistic. So thanks very much to Tracy for the link!

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I gave some laptop buying advice to my friend Nikki a while back and she found it useful enough to turn it into a post! Hopefully you’ll find it useful too.

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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 14 (Hidden Valley Ranch). Please visit Amy’s Full Disclosure page for more information. Amy also blogs at Filming In Brooklyn, Behind the Screen, and Momtourage, and podcasts with The Blogging Angels.

Tags: Angie Harmon, funny videos, Hidden Valley Ranch, Recipes

Mashed cauliflower & muesli–but not together!

Mar 22, 2011 Cooking & Baking

When I travel I tend to not worry at all about how I eat. That’s not to say I necessarily eat worse than I do at home, it’s just that I’m not thinking about healthy eating at all. I order what I want, since I enjoy it so much when other people are making food for me. And when I encounter a buffet, don’t get in my way: you could get trampled.

But after days of hotel, restaurant, airport, and fast food, I’m usually craving something made by my own hands. So it was no surprise that I made two different homemade dishes today, the day after getting home from a working vacation at Disney World (where the food was awesome, by the way!).

The first was mashed cauliflower and potatoes. People have been telling me for years that I would like this, and they were right. Actually, they were telling me I should mash plain old cauliflower, but I wasn’t ready to make that jump yet, so I did roughly half and half, potatoes and cauliflower. It was so very tasty! I think next time I might up the amount of light ranch dressing and put in less butter, or maybe even no butter – it was the ranch taste that really made this dish rock and I want to bring that out more. I also probably would have added a little milk, but didn’t have any at the time.

Mashed Cauliflower and Potatoes

• Peel a pound of potatoes and cut into 2” chunks. Boil until soft.
• Steam a pound of cauliflower florets until soft.
• Mash together with a potato masher.
• Add 2 tablespoons butter and 4 tablespoons Hidden Valley Ranch Light Ranch Dressing.
• Add salt and pepper to taste.
• Whip with hand mixer until smooth.
• Serve hot.

Next was a really quick and simple breakfast recipe that I learned from “Chef Gary” Jones, Disney World’s dietary specialist. I met him a few weeks ago when I was down in Disney World for Disney’s Princess 1/2 Marathon. Afterwards, while I was still aching and very hungry, he taught our press group how to make Birchermuesli, a Swiss  cereal concoction. Since I didn’t have any milk in the house until mid-afternoon I made this for a snack, but will be eating the rest for breakfast tomorrow.

This turned out very well and is so adaptable. I’m giving you the original recipe as it was given to me by Chef Gary, but I made a few changes today: I used only apples (I didn’t have any pears), and I left out the dried fruits (didn’t have any and I’m not crazy about them anyway). I used 1% milk, non-fat plain yogurt, Quaker oats, and chopped walnuts. I even had an actual lemon on hand. It was incredibly yummy. Next time I’m going to try adding a little coconut – I think the flavors would go well together.

Birchermuesli

Servings: 10

Ingredients

• 2 cups Oat Flakes (Raw Oatmeal)
• 2 cups Skim Milk
• 1 cup Plain Low Fat Yogurt
• ½ cup Dried Blueberries
• ½ cup Walnuts, Chopped
• ½ lemon
• 2 Apples
• 1 Pear
• ¼ cup Brown Sugar

Directions

1. Soak the oat flakes in the milk and yogurt for about 15 minutes

2. Add the dried blueberries and the chopped nuts. Mix.

3. Squeeze and juice the lemon into the bowl and mix.

4. Shred the apples and pear on a cheese grater and stir into the mixture.

5. Add the brown sugar and mix.

6. Taste and adjust to your own preference.

Hints and serving suggestions:

• Instead of pears and apples, you may use any fresh fruit available at the market.

• Instead of whole milk, you may use buttermilk, whole or reduced fat milk, soy milk, almond milk, oat milk, goat milk, Lactaid, rice milk or other to meet your individual needs.

• You may also use Kefir instead of yogurt.

• The choice of dried fruits and nuts is totally your preference.

• Each item can be modified to suit your individual taste. The Birchermuesli will last approximately 2 days in the refrigerator after which oxidation of the fruits may make the product darker in color and less visually appealing.

There you have it! Two easy, tasty, and healthy recipes. Between the cauliflower mash, the muesli, and the fact that I went on the treadmill this morning, I’m feeling like superwoman.

Originally posted on Selfish Mom. All opinions expressed on this website come straight from Amy unless otherwise noted. This post has Compensation Levels of 7 & 8 (1/2 Marathon trip) and 8 (Hidden Valley Ranch). Please visit Amy’s Full Disclosure page for more information. Amy also blogs at Filming In Brooklyn, Behind the Screen, and Momtourage, and podcasts with The Blogging Angels.

Tags: Disney Princess Half Marathon, Disney World, Food, Recipes

If you don’t have the bra, don’t buy the shirt

Mar 22, 2011 Around NYC

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. Amy also blogs at Filming In Brooklyn, Behind the Screen, and Momtourage, and podcasts with The Blogging Angels.

Tags: clothes