Crackle Nail Polish Review

This is a sponsored post, but the opinions and content are my own.

So, I bought some OPI Crackle nail polish last Spring, and it has been sitting in my medicine cabinet ever since.  Why, you ask, would I spend $8.00 or so on a bottle of nail polish then allow it to languish in a dark, medicinally scented space for months on end?  Well, I have to admit I had a somewhat traumatizing experience involving the misguided application of said product while on a plane heading for Boston.  A very bleached blond with an unfortunate nose and Austin Powers teeth was very good naturedly adoring our baby girl from between the seats of the row in front of ours.  While this didn't faze me in the least, as our baby girl is very easily adored, what gave me pause (and a few heart palpitations) was the grotesquely colored talons protruding from the ends of this young woman's fingers.  Apparently her manicurist, in her eager desire to show off the new Crackle polishes, had encouraged this young woman to pick out a couple of colors and try out this fun new product.  Unfortunately the young woman chose a lime green for the base coat and gold crackle for the top layer.  The resulting effect was that of a diseased lizard.

Now OPI has always been one of my favorite cosmetics.  I find the quality of their product to be consistent and their polish tends to chip, peel, and bubble alot less than other polishes I have tried.  So, with my sense of loyalty to the brand having recovered sufficiently after several months of respite, I decided the Halloween season would be the perfect time to crack open my bottle of Silver Crackle polish.  In the spirit of the Holiday, I started with a base coat of black polish (courtesy of Revlon), allowed that layer to dry, then applied a single layer of crackle polish.  As the crackle layer dried it did, indeed, begin to crack, revealing the underlying polish color.  With the black paint peaking through the silver, the effect is pretty cool, but I can't imagine it would be a look I would want for every day.  I think the key to getting a good effect out of this product is to choose your colors and your occasion well.  Green and Gold...no go.  Black and Silver, good for the Halloween season, affecting a Rock Star aura, or reverting to Goth-hood.  I also thought a deep red with either Silver or Gold would be a good effect even for the Winter Holiday season.  Regardless, I don't think this is a look likely to become a fashion staple. 

Let Them Eat Cake!

I have created a monster. It all started with my and my brother's annual joint-birthday dinner. I purchased a box of ultra fancy cupcakes from a local bakery, and proceeded to share said cupcakes with my 19 month old daughter. Apparently the appeal of delicious dainties isn't limited to the refined tastes of adults, who knew?

Now, she will occasionally request, "cake?" in the sweetest little voice you can imagine. My heart melts, and through a veil of guilt, I think frantically of ways to provide the requested cake as expediently as possible. I realized, just this morning, as I gave my baby girl Eskimo kisses, I could give her cake and not have to nominate myself  for the worst parent of the year award. Heck, I could even use cake as a way to sneak a few extra veggies past my girl's yuck-detector!

I give you my grandmother's Chocolate Zucchini Bread!

Mix all ingredients together:

3 eggs
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla
¼ tsp baking powder
1 tsp soda
1 cup vegetable oil
2 cups grated zucchini
1 cup nuts, chopped (usually walnuts, but almonds or pecans work well)
2 cups flour
2 ounces unsweetened chocolate, melted
1 tsp cinnamon


Pour the ingredients into 2 well greased and floured loaf pans, and bake at 375 until a toothpick inserted into the bread comes out clean.

To make this recipe even healthier use a cup of no-sugar-added apple sauce (not sugar-free as that implies they added some yucky fake sweetener). The oil in these types of recipes is really only there to provide moisture.

You now have TWO loaves of delicious "cake" chock full of veggies, antioxidants (courtesy of the real chocolate), and even a little protein and healthy fats from the added nuts! If you want, you can freeze one loaf for later, or you could always share it with the neighbors...might earn you some free babysitting brownie points.

Searching for Snacks

As a member of our modern society I have come to realize that alot of what drives us is convenience.  We want quicker everything, and we are certainly willing to pay for this convenience, monetarily at least.  The question, however, is in what other ways are we paying for convenience? Well, the answer couldn't be more glaringly obvious: our health.  With over 70% of our Nation's populace being considered over weight, and the concurrent increases of weight related illness; diabetes, heart disease, arthritis, cancer, it becomes apparent we are paying a much higher cost than we really like to admit.  What frightens me the most, though, is that as adults we can make these decisions for ourselves.  We can choose to sacrifice nutrition for convenience, but what about our kids?  Stop to think for a moment.  The food choices we make for ourselves are also the food choices we are making for our kids, the food choices we are training our kids to make for themselves.  Now, don't get me wrong, I am as guilty of this as the next person.  I am starting, though, to make small changes here and there to try to get my family back on track.  If you've been keeping up with my posts, you will notice that I have become a strong proponent of home cooking.  No, I don't mean opening up a box of hamburger helper.  I mean getting back to our roots and making real food.  Granted, I am still a slave to modern convenience, so I am not going to make my own pasta or tomato paste, but the point is to try to get as close to scratch as possible.

So, today, I am going to share a recipe that my mom discovered in a 2009 Good Housekeeping magazine.  At first, I have to admit, I thought these would taste like cardboard, after all, there is hardly anything in them to add flavor besides natural ingredients!  Who'd have thunk it?

Granola Bars
adapted from Good Housekeeping

Ingredients

• 2 cup(s) old-fashioned oats (I like the rolled oats from the bins at Whole Foods, they are heartier and chewier than the overprocessed quick oats)
• 3/4 cup(s) toasted wheat germ
• 3/4 cup(s) chopped walnuts (or whatever, I know some ppl are sensitive to walnuts)
• 3/4 cup(s) dried cranberries (or cherries, pinapple, coconut, just try to get dried fruits that are sugar and sulfate free, yes they are more expensive, but SO much better for you)
• 2 tablespoon(s) packed light brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon(s) ground cinnamon (you may omit this if cinammon won't mesh well with your fruit choice)
• 1/2 teaspoon(s) salt
• 1/2 cup(s) honey
• 1/2 cup(s) vegetable oil
• 2 large egg whites

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.  Spray 13" by 9" metal baking pan with nonstick cooking spray. Line pan with foil, with ends extending 2 inches over short sides of pan; spray foil.
2. In glass pie plate, spread oats; microwave on High, in 1-minute increments, 4 to 5 minutes or until fragrant and golden, stirring occasionally. Cool to room temperature.
3. In large bowl, combine oats, wheat germ, walnuts, cranberries, brown sugar, cinnamon, and salt. Stir in honey, oil, and egg whites until well mixed. Transfer to prepared pan. Using wet hand, press into even layer.
4. Bake 32 to 35 minutes or until dark golden. Cool in pan on wire rack.
5. When cool, use foil to transfer to cutting board. Cut lengthwise into 6 strips, then cut each strip crosswise into thirds. (You should have roughly 4 1/4" by 1 1/2" bars.) Store in tightly sealed container at room temperature up to 1 week, or in freezer up to 1 month.

Okay, so I LOVE these, and they keep really well.  I have also tried mixing up the flavors a bit.  My personal favorite at the moment is to get dried pinapple, shredded coconut, and chopped macademia nuts and make Hawaiian style Granola Bars, just leave out the cinammon if you are going to make this combo.

Happy Snacking!

Options for Healthier Eating?

So, it seems my last post on the potential hazards lurking in the foods we feed our kids hit some nerves out there in the e-world. We are all desperate to find ways to keep our kids healthy, and we are all trying to make ends meet while rushing from one commitment to the next.   So what is a caring, responsible, well-informed parent supposed to do to keep our kids from becoming toxic waste dumps?  Well, I hate to say it folks, but we are going to have to start, gulp, cooking!  The ONLY way to make any sort of dent in the amount of toxic crap our kids are exposed to is to ensure we are giving them the best quality food items available to us.  Now, don't think for a minute that this in any way guarantees our kids will be toxin free.  After all, we have ensured that no source of nutrition is safe since we have thoroughly polluted our environment, but we can do as much as possible to mitigate the damage.

One recent experience I had while making cupcakes brings this idea to the forefront and demonstrates just how simple this solution really is.  Instead of making everything from scratch, I had purchased a cake mix and a tub of frosting from the grocery store.  I had splurged too, no store brands found their way into my cart that day, no siree.  I bought name brand everything.  The cake turned out somewhat less than ideally, as it was a lot less dense than I would prefer, but it would suffice.  The frosting, on the other hand, was atrocious!  I could taste the chemical afterburn in what should have been a simple vanilla flavored frosting!  Ugh, yuck, spew, nasty!  Even though I had planned on sending the majority of these cupcakes with my husband to his officemates, I couldn't do it.  I didn't want my reputation as a decent cook to be tarnished by the gruesome chemical aftertaste of that frosting!  So what is a girl to do, you ask?  MAKE YOUR OWN DAMN FROSTING!  Seriously folks, how hard is it?  So I softened up some butter (yeah, butter, have you read what is in margarine?  can you pronounce any of it?  do you really want to eat it?),  I grabbed powdered sugar off the shelf, and I took some REAL vanilla out of my cabinet and whipped up a batch of frosting in about 3 minutes.  Wow, that was a real investement in time wasn't it?  NOT! 

After reading about cellulose, a common ingredient found in baked goods as a replacement or filler for flour, which is nothing more than a wood pulp byproduct...mmmm, we are eating trees...I decided to read the boxes of cake mix I have on my shelf, and guess what?  Cellulose, yep, they are filled with cellulose and other crap that has no place in your kids' stomaches!  Go ahead, open your cupboard and see what other evils lurk therein.

Let's start a revolution, or perhaps a devolution as this is how our parents and their parents cooked, let's get back to scratch.  Let's tell Archer Daniels Midland that we are sick (literally in some cases) of them pretending they give a damn about our health, and hit them where it hurts.  Restock your cabinets with the things our mothers and grandmothers kept: flour, honey, molassas, sugar, whole oats, real grains, cocoa powder, vanilla, butter, eggs.   Let's stop eating the crap they put into those shiny, pretty packages and make our own food!  After all, the packages probably have as much real nutritional value as what's inside them!

Besides, what kid doesn't like getting up to their elbows in flour and licking the beaters?  Who knows, you may just discover that the most fun you have with your kids is in the kitchen.  After all, it used to be the heart of the home.

Carcinogenic Kids?

If you, like me, tend to read alot you have probably come across at least one article filled with warnings about the potentially carcinogenic additives with which the food industry is filling our bellies.  The truly frightening aspect of this, though, is just how many products produced specifically for kids are chock full of these risky chemicals.  Food dyes, preservatives, flavorings, and additives put in to change a food's texture or to make it more palatable for kids are filled with things we, as parents, would never knowingly feed our kids.  For example, natural citric acid is harmless and is added to all kinds of things, but what about artificially made citric acid?  Apparently it can contain sulfuric acid, molds, and sulfites that don't get fully filtered out during the production process.  Scary huh?  What about artificial sugars? Researchers indicate that the new wonder-sweetener, Splenda, is now being found in our water supplies because it isn't broken down in the body and is a potential environmental hazard.  Crazy, right?  Think that's scary, look in your pantry right now and see how many items contain Caramel Coloring.  If the carmel coloring in your food item is made from sugar, it's not a big deal, but since many companies are opting to reduce the cost of their production lines because of our slow economy, they might be replacing the more expensive Caramel Coloring with an artificial one that is potentially carcinogenic and they don't have to specify whether they are using natural or artificial Caramel Coloring on their ingredients labels.

So what is the solution?  Spend more money.  Unfortunately, feeding our kids healthier options is expensive.  Look at the difference in price between GoGurt and YoBaby yogurts for example.  GoGurt is generally half the price of YoBaby yogurt, but I pay it.  Why?  Look at the ingredients lists.  GoGurt is filled with dies, artificial flavorings, and additives designed to change the consistency of the yogurt, whereas YoBaby is made from Organic milk, Organic fruit purees, beet juice for coloring, and live active yogurt cultures.  Another food item I really like in place of the kid-hyped snack bars are Lara Bars, which are made of ground dates, natural spices, and nuts.  How can you go wrong with that, and they taste like candy bars!  If you watch for them, they often go on sale at your local grocery store, our Smith's has them on sale right now for 10 for $10.  Granted they aren't cheap, but they are filling and they reduce the overhead of mom-guilt you might be feeling when you give in to your kids' desire for a cartoon character sponsored fake food.

Another option, is, of course to feed our kids only fresh, homemade foods.  This is probably never going to happen, though, as most of us live a very busy lifestyle and convenience is important to us.  All we can do is work to make sure we give our kids the best we can and avoid as much poisonous food as possible.

Desert Dinotopia

Don't laugh.  I am a total Dinoholic.  I love everything Dinosaur.  When I told my mother that the Jurassic Park series was one of my all time favorites, she spent the next half hour reading off a list of movies she felt were much more worthy of my adoration.  Seriously.  Hey, I told you NOT to laugh!  Oh, well, I guess I asked for it.  Admit you are a total geek, and you get what you paid for, sigh.

Well, the point of all this is that my poor stepkids and my daughter are doomed to be forced into sharing excursions involving good old fashioned dinosaur hunting.  So, I guess we are super lucky to live in the Southwest.  Just today I read there is a paleontologist by the name of Mark McMenamin who believes he has discovered the lair of the mythological Kraken!  And guess where?  Right here in Nevada!  Color me totally psyched!  Apparently Mesonychoteuthis, otherwise known as the colossal squid, was a critter that hunted the seas that covered northwestern Nevada during the Triassic period.  This beast would have been over 100 feet long, more than large enough to gorge itself on the Ichthyosaurs, Nevada is famous for.  Which, surprisingly I did not even know about until I read the article about McMenamin's Kraken.

The Berlin Ichthyosaur State Park lies 443 miles north of Las Vegas in Gabbs, Nevada.  While this is a VERY long drive, I think it will make an excellent road trip for the family on some future three-day weekend.  Or, since my stepson has suggested we rent a Camper for a family vacation some time, perhaps we could take in the Ichthyosaur park on our way north toward the California Redwoods, or up to Lake Tahoe.  I don't really care how or when it happens, but this is definitely going onto the family vacation must do list!

Falling

At the beginning of this week my husband and I spent the afternoon playing in the swimming pool with our baby girl.  It was a cool day for Las Vegas, barely 100 degrees!  The pool, however, was a luxurious 85 degrees, and our daughter giggled hysterically as her daddy whooshed her around the pool, both of them screaming "weeeee," as I doggy paddled close by and smiled beatifically.  So imagine my shock and surprise when we are suddenly thrust into Autumn...Fall has fallen, and while I will miss daily soakings in the pool, I am super excited to get back to my favorite season.  After all, who wants to spend much time outside when it's over 110 degrees?  Now the daughter and I can wear our cute Fall jackets to the park, we can cook and bake without melting, and we can now buy those specialty items that only come out this time of year!

One of those specialty items I have come to adore and tend to stock up on I discovered when I was pregnant with my daughter.  I was diagnosed with gestational diabetes, and while this wasn't a huge deal for me, as I was happy to make adjustments to my life to ensure my baby would be healthy and happy, it did force me to rethink and reinvent some of the flavors of Fall.  One of the delights I had come to look forward to was Carribou Coffee's Carmel Apple Cider.  If you have ever had one, though, you know as I did that this concoction was chock full of a diabetic's worst nightmare; sugar, sugar, more sugar.  So, having grown up in a household where my father was diabetic, I hit the grocery stores searching for the sugar free apple cider's we had often had when I was growing up.  Imagine my surprise when I couldn't find it anywhere.  I was so heartbroken, it was Autumn and I wanted my hot apple cider!  Miraculously, the Tea Gods were smiling that day, as someone had placed a package of Bigelow's Apple Cider herb tea on the shelf right next to where the Sugar Free Cider packages should have been, so I thought, ok I will give this stuff a try.  I bought the box of tea and found some sugar free caramel syrup in the coffee aisle and went home with not a little trepidation, but I was desperate.  Imafine my surprise then when I discovered that even without the added caramel syrup, this tea was AMAZING.  Since then, every year I search out the Bigelow tea display praying that they have again created their apple cider tea.  I always buy several boxes since good teas need not be limited to a single season! 

The best part, of course, is that this is an herbal tea.  No caffeine means I can sit in front of a crackling fire in the evening and sip my tea without fear or being kept up all night.  It also means I can have more than one cup and not get the jitters.  Best of all it means I can give some to my daughter every once in a while with no guilt, and guess what?  She loves it even without the caramel syrup! 

And, no, Bigelow isn't paying me for this plug...I just really love this tea...in fact, I'm sipping (ok, slurping) some as I type.

Halloween the Prequel

Every year I wander the aisles of grocery stores, craft stores, big discount warehouses and big box stores looking for fresh ideas for my favorite holiday, Halloween. What other time of year offers as many opportunities for reckless self-expression and creativity?  Last year was my daughter's first halloween, and prior to that I had always gone with the standard halloween trick-or-treating fare; chocolate bars, suckers, etceterras.  With a new little one prepared to dress up in her fuzzy green and purple monster suit, though, I started having sugar-pusher guilt.  What else do you give the little ones who come calling on Halloween that won't get you pegged as a wicked witch or get your house egged?  Luckily our discount warehouse had Disney playing card decks last year featuring classic kids card games, so I picked those out as our non-sugar gifting option and they were a hit.  The kids loved comparing who got which game and which favorite character.  I caved, too, though, and also provided a candy treat to go along with the card game.  This year I was thinking of doing something similar and have been perusing options on the internet.  I came across a site selling cheap stuffed animals, and thought this might be an option.  I realized just how much I spend on candy each year, and figured I might as well offer somthing a little more substantial and permanent instead!  Besides, who can feel guilty about giving out stuffed animals?

Another important part of Halloween, of course, is the decor.  You have to set just the right scene for your Holiday guests.  I have to say our neighborhood does a great job on this one.  There are always the giant inflatable Halloween decorations, skeletons dangling from trees, ghosts hovering over yards, and spiderwebs everywhere.  Decorating can be super expensive, though, so I usually try to buy stuff on sale at the end of the season, but then I run into the problem of having a lot of mismatched stuff, or I don't get the decorations I really wanted since they are already sold out.  Again I have turned to the internet for some help in this situation, and found some great Halloween decorations clearance!  I especially like the Skull with the 8 part brain model...not only is it fun Halloween kitsch, but it's educational to boot!  My husband will probably kill me, but I just can't say no to cool Halloween decorating ideas so this one is definitely being added to my stash.  I also really like the prepacked decorating sets, as they give you alot of stuff to dress up the house and you don't have to think too much.

Finally, the most important aspect of Halloween?  The costume, of course!  This year, my daughter and I have been reading alot of Olivia books, and that crazy pig gets into some fun jams, so I am thinking that maybe I'll dress up the little one as Olivia, so tell me what you all think of this Olivia costume.  I think it's super cute, and since the ears are on a headband I might actually be able to get the baby to keep them on for long enough to take a picture.  Other options I have been considering are Rapunzel, since the baby is obsessed with that movie, a fairy, or a Transformer (yes, she loves the Transformers too, cuz they are more than meets the eye!)  The hubby and I will probably just dress up as boring old parents this year, but who knows, maybe I'll keep cruising the internet and see if I can't find something inspiring!

Anyway, Happy Halloween planning!  I'll let you all know if I find any other nifty places, ideas,or  inspirations for the greatest Holiday EVER!