Selfish Mom

When your child brings home something Fugly

May 31, 2012 Kids

I so wanted to be the mom who is able to celebrate everything my kids do, to see the beauty in their attempts, to set up shrines to their endeavors. But I’m not. I’ve gotten over it, so you should too – let’s get that out of the way right now so that I don’t have to roll my eyes at any comments about how everything a child does is a gift.

Because sometimes what kids do is produce butt ugly art.

I have to assume that some day Fiona will stumble upon this entry and be deeply hurt by her mother calling her brown, lopsided bowl butt ugly, but truth is truth, and when her kid brings home a papier mache horse that looks like it was spawned inside of a nuclear cooling tower, she’ll understand. Still, apologies Fiona. Feel free to get back at me on your own blog by telling people something embarrassing about me – you’ve got plenty to choose from.

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Tags: art, Kids

Holiday couch shopping: coasters

May 28, 2012 Gifts

It was a gorgeous day outside, about 85 degrees. The Ass took the kids to the park to ride bikes. I had the house to myself. So what did I do? Shopped online for coasters.

The men in my life drink a lot of ice water, which in sticky weather like this leaves huge puddles around their glasses. I got rid of our old, broken, ugly, cheapo set of coasters a little while back, meaning to get some before the hot weather hit. But naturally I forgot.

I slogged through hundreds of choices on Amazon, and I’ve posted my favorites below. Even if you don’t need coasters, they make great hostess and housewarming gifts, and there are enough choices that you can match the coasters to the personality of the recipient.

Warning: affiliate links ahead. But remember when I said I slogged through hundreds of choices to curate this list? Surely that’s worth making a few pennies off of your order. :-)

For Wine Enthusiasts
	Sparkly Wine Coasters Ooh, sparkly.
	Wine Label Coasters These nostalgic coasters are made out of absorbent sandstone and feature old wine labels.
	Butterfly Slip-On Wine Coasters These wine coasters slip on to the bottom of a wine glass. Great for parties.
	Flip-Flop Slip-On Wine Coasters These are similar to the butterfly coasters above, but they’re flip-flops. So, yeah. Maybe for your beach house? Also available in bright colors.
	Wine Cork Coasters We all know someone who could fill these coasters with corks in just a few weeks. Tell your wino friends you love them with this unique gift. You could also add a matching trivet set.
	Slip-On Stemware Coasters These pretty silicone coaster stretch to fit the bottoms of different sized stemware. Also helps your guests keep track of which glass is theirs.
For Game Lovers
	Puzzle Coasters These stainless steel coasters might be the world’s easiest jigsaw puzzle, but they’re still pretty cool. Plus, I’m guessing you could connect more than one set together.
	Rubik’s Cube Coasters Stacked together, these six coasters form the world’s most frustrating game. Add a Rubik’s Cube notepad for the superfan.
	Domino Coasters This set of six glass coasters is perfect for a friend who loves playing Dominos. Although you probably can’t get much of a game going with six dominos.
	Scrabble Coasters This set of 56 disposable bar coasters contains two entire letter sets, and comes in a cute tin. Goes well with Magnetic Scrabble Refrigerator Tiles.

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Tags: coasters, gifts, Shopping

My Crazy Sleep Experiment: Day eighteen

May 28, 2012 What's Going On

So I think I can call my crazy Everyman Sleep Schedule experiment a success, but only part-way. While I’m no longer tired (as long as I stick to the schedule), I’m finding myself rather unmotivated, which may be a result of the experiment, or possibly just my normal unmotivated self – hard to tell. :-)

(Also, sorry for the fact that the video goes out-of-sync a few times – I think my webcam slept in this morning, even though I didn’t.)

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.

Tags: Everyman Sleep Schedule, sleep

Bring your budding bloggers to the Digital Family Summit

May 27, 2012 Blog & Social Media Stuff

I’m so thrilled to be attending the very first Digital Family Summit in Philadelphia at the end of June, as a guest of the organizers. But it won’t just be me attending, it will be my kids as well – owners of a couple of websites that they can’t wait to get off the ground. And this conference is going to help them.

The Digital Family Summit is unlike any other blogging conference I’ve ever been to, because it’s about kids, teens, and families who blog. And it doesn’t stop at blogging – there will also be sessions on startups and entrepreneurship, creating games, animating, blogging for good, and more. Plus  you can learn about the legal and privacy ramifications of kids online.

My kids have attended several blogging and social media conferences with me so far, and while there were certain activities for them to do while I was in sessions, the conference wasn’t for them. This one is. The parties and meals, the sessions, it’s all family friendly and designed for kids 10-18 (that’s a rough guide – you know your kids).

The speaker list is absolutely astounding. It ranges from seasoned professionals to teens who are already at the tops of their niches, creating content and companies and blazing a trail for other young bloggers. Whether your child is interested in making money from a blog or YouTube channel, food blogging, travel blogging, starting a company, blog design, or photography, there will be sessions at the Digital Family Summit for your kid.

It doesn’t matter whether you and your kids already know how to blog, or are just interested – this conference is for you. There are some great guidelines on the summit’s faq page about who should attend, what kind of ticket each attendee needs, and what there will be at the summit for non-blogging kids. Everyone who attends is required to register, and each ticket includes six meals and three snacks.

There’s also a reduced conference rate at the hotel where the sessions are being held, but you have to hurry – that rate expires on June 7th, if it doesn’t get sold out first.

Plus, here’s an amazing deal for my readers: use the code Centsible when you register for the conference, and you’ll get 20% off the ticket price! (That code is from Kelly Whalen’s site, and if you check out her post about the summit before May 31st, you can enter to win conference registration for a family of five!)

I would love to see you and your kids in Philadelphia. I can’t tell how excited my kids are to not just be tolerated, but included and welcomed at a conference. And who knows, maybe some of the kids who attend the conference this year will be so inspired that they’ll be teaching sessions next year! :-)

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.

Tags: Blogging, Digital Family Summit, Kids

Organizing my life with AboutOne

May 24, 2012 Paid/Sponsored Post

[The following post was commissioned by AboutOne.com]

I’m kind-of a disaster when it comes to organizing some things. OK, most things. My kitchen is really the only part of my life that’s organized, and it always stays that way – the spices are alphabetized, every single plastic container has a matching lid, and everything has a place. But that’s it. The kitchen. Everything else – from our health records to receipts to financial info – is in piles around my house, when it exists at all.

When I first heard about AboutOne I knew it was for me. It was started by a mom who couldn’t gather the info she needed when she needed it (man, that sounds familiar). So, she invented a place where she could get organized.

AboutOne gives me a place online to organize and store so many different aspects of my life. You start out by entering basic info about your family, your house, doctors, schools, etc. (earning points along the way).

That info is then used to populate various functions on the site. Here’s a sample:

Babysitting Instructions – Leaving your kids for the evening? Quickly and easily print out an instruction sheet for the babysitter with contact numbers, doctors and insurance info, allergies, medications, and more.

Education and Health Histories – Filling out forms? The info you need is at your fingertips.

Home Inventory – This may be my favorite feature. If we were ever to get robbed I’d be at a loss as to what was missing. So, using the awesome AboutOne Windows Phone app, I went around my house today photographing my stuff and making notes. In the future, I can add a snapshot of a receipt right when I buy something, or a url to warranty info or an online manual.

Volunteer Hours – My kids’ school has a volunteer requirement for graduation, and this is where I’ll be keeping track of their hours.

Home Maintenance Info – For someone who lives in a really old falling apart house and who’s been renovating for five years, you’d think I’d at least have my act together about home maintenance and improvements. I’m hoping AboutOne will make this a reality. And if we ever sell our house we’ll have a record of what we’ve done. Plus, I can store appliance info.

Newsletter – As you go about your life, talking pictures of activities and milestones, entering them into the AboutOne app allows you to instantly produce a family newsletter. How great would it be to just automatically send something like that to the grandparents?

There are several pricing packages to choose from. The Essentials Package is free and gives you access to a wide range of features. The Premium Package includes everything in the Essentials Package plus a lot more storage and a family calendar function. Eventually there will also be a Premium Plus Package, but the features for that one haven’t been announced yet.

Here’s the great news for my readers though: Since the site is still in beta and not all of the features have been rolled out yet, you get a HUGE bonus for signing up right now: a free year of the Premium service! The features are being added monthly, and they should all be out by the end of the summer, which will give you plenty of time to enjoy your feature-packed free membership! Just visit AboutOne with this link and and sign up, and you automatically get the Premium service for a year!

I’m so excited to be getting started with this site. My goal is to take just a few minutes each day and see what I can add. By the end of the summer I plan to be ready for school forms, ready for any disasters that hopefully won’t befall my stuff, and ready to keep my family up-to-date on what we’re doing over here in our corner of the world. And I’m so happy somebody else went to the trouble of organizing it all for me.

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 13. Please visit Amy’s Full Disclosure page for more information.

Tags: family, organization

Middle School: taking a chance

May 24, 2012 Around NYC

It’s middle school selection time in NYC, and with our oldest being in 5th grade this is our first time going through the process. Without going into too many specifics, it’s looking like our choice will come down to two public schools, which couldn’t be more different: Giant & Established vs. Tiny & Brand Spanking New. We have no idea what to do.

I’ve been going over the pros and cons of each school. The first has its own building and contains 1,800 middle school students. It has every in-school and after-school extracurricular activity you could name (and its teams do amazingly well in competitions). It is long-established in its neighborhood and universally well-regarded. Despite its size it does not seem crazy or disorganized at all. There’s an accelerated program, yet the more average kids don’t get forgotten. A large number of students go on to elite NYC high schools.

Jake took a tour and absolutely adored it. However, it would be a bit of a commute for him – 20-30 minutes door-to-door. He’d be taking the subway. He could possibly get lost in such a huge student body, especially if there’s a subject he’s not crazy about and just wants to coast through. If he’s doing after-school activities in the winter he’d be coming home after dark. And the wonderful principal recently left, so that’s a big unknown.

The second school is being started by a group that has a great track record of starting similar schools. I love the principal. Being new, there will be plenty of supplies and an enthusiastic staff. It will be very small – no hiding! And did I mention, it’s on our freaking corner? No commute at all – an extra hour a day is nothing to sneeze at. Plus it will be super convenient for other activities and performances. The principal is taking the kids on a retreat over the summer – she’s really invested in getting to know them and starting off right. The transition from the local elementary school he’s been at for seven years would probably be easier at this small school. The first class will get to help the school find itself, choose activities, etc. – something that really excites Jake.

But, of course, the entire school is a great unknown. It’s in a building that it will share with an elementary school. We have no idea what the student body will be like – often new schools get stuck with kids who aren’t wanted anywhere else. Past success doesn’t guarantee a great school.

The great thing is, I think the odds are in our favor whichever we choose. But the experiences will be so different for Jake. And which one we choose could severely impact where he goes to high school. And I have to admit, I’m excited about getting in on something new and all of the advantages that come with that. Then again, plugging him into a place that is running already would be the easier choice.

Thoughts?

Tags: Kids, NYC, school

My Crazy Sleep Experiment: Day Eight

May 19, 2012 What's Going On

It’s getting harder – I’m more tired – but that’s what’s supposed to happen. So I’m pushing through.

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.