cookwith5kids

Power Snack: Quinoa Oat Muffins

2013-05-27T14:23:00.000-04:00

Happy Memorial Day everyone!
Just because I have not posted any recipes in a few weeks does not mean that I have not been cooking. It means that I have not had time to take any pictures or post recipes. School is winding down, life is crazy, but I am still cooking healthy.
Today's recipe was created by me because I am a snacker. I love to have healthy snacks that I can quickly grab as I am on my way out. These muffins are packed with powerful protein, are vegan, and are amazingly delicious!!
Use the ingredients you have on hand.
Make your quinoa in advance. I use my rice cooker. Put 1 and 1/2 cups dry quinoa and 2 cups of water in your rice cooker. Cook it on the white rice setting and then use it as needed.

Quinoa Oat Power Muffins
1 cup of cooked quinoa
1 and 1/2 cups old fashioned oats
1/2 cup small nuts and seeds ( I used sunflower seeds, crushed walnuts, and cashews)
1/2 cup dried fruit and chips ( I used vegan chocolate chips, golden raisins, and dry apricots)
1/2 cup peanut butter (I used 3 kinds to make a 1/2 cup, sunflower, better n PB and regular PB)
2 flax eggs (Mix 2 T flaxseeds with 6T water, let sit for about 15 minutes, till egg-like)
1/2 cup almond coconut milk
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp vanilla
Get two bowls.
Mix dry ingredients in one bowl (quinoa, nuts and seeds, fruits and chips)
Mix the rest of the ingredients in a separate bowl.
Then add both the dry and wet together.
Spoon the mixture into your muffin receptacle. I love my reusable silicone muffin papers.
Bake at 350 for 25 minutes.
Enjoy with some fresh strawberries!

Animal Kingdom Lodge- Kidani Village

2013-05-22T09:53:00.000-04:00

We are gearing up for a trip to Disney soon!! So much work goes on behind the scenes to get the family ready for a big trip like this. Disney really is the best place to take kids of varying ages. The teens like it, the tweens like it, and the 5 year LOVES it! There really is something that appeals to everyone.
If you have never heard of Disney Vacation Club before, you should really check it out. The DVC rooms are huge. Full kitchens, multiple bedrooms, and many other perks make DVC a family favorite. Last year we stayed at Animal Kingdom Lodge, Kidani Village. The family enjoyed the hotel so much we are headed back there again this summer.
We have a short video that will show you some tips and tricks for staying at Kidani Village.

If you have any DVC, Disney, or Animal Kingdom Lodge questions, please leave a comment or email me cookwith5kids@gmail.com.

This post was sponsored by MomTV. All thoughts, ideas, content, and cute kiddos belong to me. See you in Disney!

Real Parents Review: Now You See Me

2013-05-20T13:06:00.001-04:00

How do they do that? The art of being a magician is one that has been
passed down from ancient Egyptians through Houdini and on to the great
acts of today. Now You See Me is a movie that
takes you on an adventure through the world of magic by highlighting
four magicians with different specialties who team up to pull off some
of the biggest and best tricks of all time. They are being guided by
a shadowy figure who you never really know, a leader of an
ancient guild of magicians . They follow this figure's instructions to
pull off amazing stunts in an attempt to earn their way into
the elite group. For their first major trick they rob a bank in Paris
while doing their show in Las Vegas. This trick gets the FBI involved and
the movie goes from four magicians who can do amazing things, to four
people tricking the FBI and everyone else, while they complete their
announced trio of tricks. There are some great twists and turns
throughout the movie which all lead up to an ending we really did not
see coming.

If I had to compare this to another movie, I would have to describe
this as Inside Man meets Oceans Eleven. There are some great
performances from a variety of actors I really enjoy: Jesse
Eisenberg (as the leader of the magicians group), Woody Harrelson (a
mentalist who can hypnotize you in a matter of seconds), Morgan
Freeman (who makes his living exposing magicians and their tricks),
Mark Ruffalo (the FBI agent in charge of taking them down) and more.
There is very little in the way of sex (one scene where one of the
magicians is with a girl while she is getting undressed and he has to
leave - no nudity though), minimal violence and only a minimal amount
of bad language. If you have a child who likes magic at all, they will really

enjoy this movie. My 9 year old so attended the screening with me and he

cannot wait to see it again. This sleeper movie is such a pleasant surprise!

Real Parents Review: The Great Gatsby

2013-05-08T13:21:00.006-04:00

I attended a sneak preview of this movie last night and I was actually very disappointed. I think this movie will appeal to the Moms much more than the Dads. But, I was really looking forward to this movie, and I was expecting much more from a movie with Leonardo DiCaprio and Tobey Maguire.

Having read the book back in high school, I was very familiar with the basic plot, but had forgotten many details. . I intentionally did not want to go back and refresh my recollection for the movie so that I could experience the story anew.

The story itself is obviously one of the great classic of our times, which almost everyone will read at one point or another, but in my opinion, this movie version did not do the story any justice.

While the visuals for this movie (and sets and costumes) are outstanding, there is no reason for it to be in 3D. The mansions that Gatsby and Buchanan live in are right out of the 1920s, complete with ornate decorations and kingly room set ups.
The sets and designs were fabulous, but the storytelling didn't match up with the grandiosity of those houses.

The scenes from the parties that Gatsby throws are everything you would expect to see in a giant Vegas casino. Bands, dancing, drinks, hundreds of people enjoying themselves......all to the tunes of Jay-Z. What? There was no rap music in the 20s you say?
The story is set in the roaring 20's in NYC - a time of big bands, yet in various points throughout the movie we are subjected to heavy JayZ and Beyonce songs. I'm a fan of Jay-Z from way back, but I am also a big jazz fan and this was a missed opportunity to introduce a whole new generation to big bands and the music of the 20s. Having Jay-Z provide multiple songs to the movie was distracting and took me completely out of the story since the songs were so out of context with what we were seeing visually. They did such an amazing job of physically recreating everything about that period of time, but then destroyed the entire mystique with a really poor choice of songs for the soundtrack. I'm not sure I've ever had songs in a movie distract me as much as these did. This one choice dragged you from a gala blowout party from the Roaring 20s and pulled you right back into this century. Very poor choice.

Leonardo DiCaprio gave a good performance but he lacked big supporting performances opposite of him, especially by Tobey Maguire who I thought was all over the place. Tobey kept making the same wide-eyed dopey face we saw in Spiderman and Seabiscuit and vacillated from cowering friend to over the top bullying (especially in the scene where Gatsby first meets Daisy). Carey Mulligan, who played Daisy Buchanan, was the real star of this movie for me. I felt her pain in the beginning as she struggled to keep her marriage together and later her love for Gatsby, after the two finally meet again after 5 years apart. She doesn't overdo it on either end and her scenes really drive the movie. You can't wait to see her back on the screen after her scenes are finished.

I think my date for this movie enjoyed it much more than I did. This movie will appeal and resonante better to the females in the theater than it did for me. This movie probably falls into the "chick flick" category which means it will probably do very well both in the theaters as well as afterwards in DVD sales, but its not going to show up on many people's "best of" lists for 2013. If you can ignore the out of context music and focus on the visuals, you will enjoy it more than I did. But, you might want to lower your expectations just a little from the ridiculously amazing trailer that got me interested in seeing this originally.

As a parent I was glad I did not take my kids along to this movie. There is no sex, minimal violence (people fighting with each other) and very little bad language. So, you would be safe bringing your kids along to this movie, but I think your kids would be very bored and they would not enjoy it at all. The kids might actually enjoy the JayZ songs more than I did. Leave me a comment if your kids enjoy it! I would love to hear what they think about it.

Real Parents Review: Ironman 3

2013-05-08T13:05:00.002-04:00

Iron Man 3 is the 3rd in the series of movies which highlights Marvel comic book hero Tony Stark/Iron Man. The story picks up after Iron Man has finished defeating Loki (Thor's brother) along with the other members of The Avengers in the movie of the same name. This battle has affected Tony in a significant way and his anxiety is shown in very real ways throughout the movie. The movie introduces a new villain from the comic book series - Mandarin played by Ben Kingsley, who is depicted as an evil terrorist and is bent on taking down the President and destroying the US of A. Tony decides to take on this bad guy by challenging him and giving him his home address much to the chagrin of Pepper Potts, Tony's companion. The Mandarin accepts the challenge and off we go.

The movie also borrows elements from Warren Ellis's Extremis story arch, and to do so, director Shane Black, begins the movie by taking us back to 1999 where we find the drunken playboy Stark pursuing a young, female scientist who's on the verge of a breakthrough in the field of medical regeneration. In his abrupt manner, Tony dismisses another aspiring scientist thereby setting the wheels in motion for the weaponization of the Extremis program that Mandarin uses to great affect.

The movie has violence aplenty, as all of the movies in this genre do, but, it is generally of the slapstick/comic book type. There is absolutely no sex and very few offensive words to offend your children. The villains in this movie are not very scary and I don't think there is anything that would be overly scary for most children. There are some great comedic moments throughout the movie and Robert Downey Jr does his typical good job of bringing the snark to Tony Stark. My recommendation on this one is that this movie is appropriate for children 10 and over with the possibility that your younger child who have seen other comic book movies would also be able to enjoy this one as well. There have been other reviews of this movie, and they were disappointed in the storyline or the lack of other Avengers or how they portray the Mandarin, but in general, if you can just enjoy this movie by itself without comparing it to the other films in the Marvel group, you will have a great time. We have seen Ironman 3 twice in the first week and plan to see it one more time!!

Vegan Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins

2013-04-28T14:29:00.000-04:00

One of my kids is a fairly picky eater. He likes very few foods. But luckily the foods he likes are healthy. We just made an awesome smoothie together.
We just threw in the vitamix
pineapple
blueberries
strawberries
chia seeds
kale
an orange (peeled of course)
a banana
about 1/4 cup hemp seeds
Blend it all up and enjoy a cup of healthy deliciousness!

But my picky eater never knows what he wants for breakfast. So on the weekend we try to create some healthy muffins to eat throughout the week. Here are the muffins we just made, hot out of the toaster oven.

Vegan Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins
Can be made non-vegan as well. Those substitutions are in parentheses.
1/3 cup white flour
1 cup sprouted grain whole wheat flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 cup applesauce
1/2 cup pure can sugar
1 flax or chia egg (2 egg whites are a good sub)
1 tsp vanilla
1 banana mashed
1/4 cup chocolate chips
Preheat oven to 350.
In a bowl combine flours, baking powder, and salt. In a large bowl mix together applesauce and sugar. Stir in the flax or chia egg or egg substitute and vanilla. Mix well. Slowly pour in flour mixture and the mashed banana. Stir in chocolate chips. Do not overmix. Pour batter into muffin papers or disposable muffin tins. Our batter made 10 muffins. Bake 16-20 minutes. Cool and enjoy.
Add some protein to these by spreading on some peanut butter. Enjoy!

Real Parents Review: Oblivion

2013-04-20T14:54:00.000-04:00

My husband and 14 year old son attended a sneak preview last week of Oblivion, a new Sci fi movie starring Tom Cruise. Cruise's character (Jack - Tech 49) is a part of a two person crew assigned to a post-apocalyptic Earth where the Moon has been destroyed by an alien invasion and much of the planet is destroyed. While the invasion was halted, the planet became mostly uninhabitable and Earth's residents are all moving to Titan, a moon of Saturn. Jack and his partner, Victoria, are staying on Earth to fix the drones that protect the machines that are collecting all of Earth's sea water to create energy. There are aliens remaining on Earth who are still roaming the planet's surface and attempting to sabotage these plans. Jack and Victoria's minds have been erased so that they have no memories of the atrocities that happened, but Jack has some repressed memories of Earth from before the invasion, that continue to bubble to the surface. This leads Jack to be curious about the world he now inhabits and he uses his mission time to explore the areas of the planet that are not affected by radiation. While on one of these missions he stumbles on to something he did not expect to see.

Based on the trailers we had seen, we were very much looking forward to seeing this movie. We both were pleasantly surprised at how much we really enjoyed it. We have read some other reviews which commented on the lack of exploration of feelings between the main characters, but as you get into the larger plot you understand why these criticisms are not really valid. Oblivion is not a chick flick where we want to see Jack be conflicted by his feelings for two different women. Its a Sci-fi thriller which is exploring an apocalyptic event and how people can survive. There are a couple of great twists in the plot which we will not reveal here (and we would recommend not seeking them out, as knowing them will really spoil the movie for you), These twists are on the scale of Sixth Sense type of surprises. We were able to see the screening for this movie in IMAX, and visually, the movie is amazing on the big screen with the enhanced audio. The movie itself has many elements of other sci-fi/apocalypse movies such as Planet of the Apes, Matrix, Wall-E, and others and at times appears to pay homage to them in a variety of ways. Keep an eye out for the Statue of Liberty which shows up in all of these types of movies, but has only a brief cameo here.

The movie is rated PG-13, but we didn't find anything too objectionable for children 10 and up. There is one scene where the main female lead goes for a swim, but there is no nudity (except for a brief view of her backside which is all dark and in shadow). The violence is minimal except for a scene at the end where there is plenty of shooting by drones at people (although we don't recall seeing anyone hit by the drones). All in all its a fun movie with some good plot twists to keep you in the story and it is all done in stunning visuals. We recommend this for anyone over 10 who likes exciting action packed movies.

Ridemakerz #xtremecustomzparty recap

2013-04-08T11:52:00.000-04:00

Yesterday we were lucky enough to host a MommyParty sponsored by Ridemakerz. The Ridemakerz line is aimed at boys 5-7 years old. I can tell you after a few guests called in sick, our girl party attendees stepped up and LOVED the Ridemakerz cars, just as much, or more than the boys did!

So our party was a total success and the Ridemakerz cars were easy to put together. The kids basically did all the car building themselves. Very little help was requested. The cars were really cool. Each set of wheels, the front and the back, could pop up or down (adjustable suspension we learned), depending on what kind of car racing you wanted to do. A simple push of the red button helped you raise or lower the front or back wheels.

Choosing which car they wanted to build went smoothly. The Ridemakerz come in so many options, superheros, police cars, corvetter, mustangs, and camaros. Something for everyone!

We built cars in less than 5 minutes, then we raced them and raced them some more.

We ate some popsicles and donut holes and raced our cars some more.
Thank you MommyParties for sponsoring this awesome party.
If you have a child age 5-7 a Ridemakerz Xtremecustomz car would make a great gift! The one car that won almost every race was the Commander, third from the left, in the photo below.

Disclosure: I was sent a package of cars by MommyParties and some literature and suggestions in order to host my party. All thoughts and ideas are my own. The kids had an amazing time and are still talking about their cars today.

Vegan Muffins with Jelly

2013-04-03T15:28:00.002-04:00

Happy last day of spring break everyone! This spring break really sucked. Most of the family was sick throughout the vacation. I held on and somehow did not get sick until 2 days ago. The fever, the coughing, and the headaches were quite annoying. Everyone is on the mend now, so that is good.
My big kids go back to school tomorrow, Passover ended last night, and the little baking assistant(Diane) is at school. Jake decided it was the perfect day to make some muffins.
Jake loves to cook. It inspires him to eat more. So today we quickly whipped up some delicious and healthy vegan jelly muffins.

Vegan Jelly Muffins
1 cup milk (we used almond, you can use soy or coconut too)
1 tsp apple cider vinegar
2 T cornstarch
1 and 1/2 cups flour
3/4 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt
1/3 cup applesauce
1/2 cup sugar
2 tsp vanilla
1/3 cup jam (we used strawberry)
2 T powdered sugar

Preheat oven to 350. We love the silicone muffin holders, so that we do not have to throw away the papers, or lose some of the muffin inside the paper :)
In a measuring cup mix together your milk, vinegar and cornstarch. Mix well and get out any lumps.
In a large bowl combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon and salt. Make a well in the center. Pour in the milk mixture slowly. Add in the sugar, applesauce and vanilla. Stir well. Put your batter into each muffin liner and then plop some jelly on top. The jelly plopping is a great job for kids! Do not overfill your muffins. The jam sinks to the bottom while baking. Bake for 21-24 minutes. Cool completely on a wire rack and then set uncovered overnight in a cool dry place. This will make the tops slightly crispy, like a donut crust. Using a sifter, sprinkle the tops with powdered sugar and serve with a nice cup of tea. Or, eat the muffin right out of the oven and burn the roof of your mouth like Jake just did.

More Pizza Please

2013-03-24T14:44:00.002-04:00

My kids love pizza. Most kids do! So this recipe is healthy but at the same time it is delicious. Since we have some vegans in the house, this recipe can easily be made vegan. Daiya mozzerella cheese and unsweetened almond milk are easy substitutions.
Here is the recipe, Mom's stir and roll pizza!
1 cup white flour
1 cup sprouted grain whole wheat pastry flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1/4 cup coconut oil
2/3 cup your favorite milk
Add all ingredients into a bowl and stir till combined.
Press dough onto pizza plate.
I love this pizza pan and these parchment papers. Makes a super easy cleanup!
Add your favorite sauce, cheese, and toppings (oregano is awesome) and then bake at 420 degrees for 10-15 minutes. Watch carefully that you do not burn it!

Three More Recipes, all oil free and vegan

2013-03-19T10:37:00.002-04:00

The second recipe I demonstrated was Mushroom Stroganoff.
This recipe is really easy, vegan, and has no oil, cream, or butter, but still tastes rich and creamy!
1 onion, chopped
8 oz cremini or other wild mushrooms
8 oz sliced white mushrooms
4 cloves garlic, minced
4 T whole wheat flour
3 T balsamic vinegar
1/2 cup almond milk(unsweetened)
thyme, 2 pinches
16 oz cooked whole wheat pasta

Cook onion in non-stick skillet on high heat for 3 minutes. Keep moving them around. Add all the mushrooms and garlic. Keep stirring as the veggies get brown and release juices. Sprinkle flour over mushrooms. Stir continuously with spoon until the flour is dissolved. Add in balsamic vinegar, and almond milk, sauce will thicken. Add in thyme to taste. Add in your cooked noodles and eat immediately. Sprinkle on some nutritional yeast for a "cheezy" taste.

We also made 2 desserts.
Strawberry Mousse
1 pkg extra firm silken tofu
1/3 cup maple syrup
1 pkg frozen strawberries, 8 oz
zest from one orange
Blend all ingredients in a blender, food processor, or vitamix. Chill for one hour. Enjoy with some granola or by itself.

Oil Free Vegan Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies
1 cup peanut butter
1 cup brown sugar
2 T chia seeds, mixed with 6 T water, stir together and let sit in fridge for 15 min.
1/2 cup oats, whole or quick
1/2 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 cup vegan chocolate chips
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp salt
2 T crushed walnuts
Preheat oven to 350. Use a cookie sheet with parchment paper to prevent sticking.
Mix peanut butter and brown sugar together. Stir in your 2 chia eggs. Add in flour, baking soda, cinnamon, salt, vanilla, and oats. Stir in walnuts and chocolate chips. Scoop out cookies with a 2T measure. Press cookies down with the back of a spoon. Bake for 12-14 minutes. Enjoy with a nice cold glass of almond coconut milk. Or, if you do not want to bake the cookies. This makes an incredibly delicious raw cookie dough, with the bonus that it is safe to eat! We have been munching on the raw dough all day, it is amazing!

Chia Egg Tip: Anytime you see a recipe that includes eggs, you can veganize it by making a chia or flax egg. Use 1T of either chia seeds or ground flaxseeds. Add in 3 T of water. Stir it up. Let sit in the fridge for 15 minutes and you will be amazed at how egg like it becomes!

I Did It!

2013-03-19T10:17:00.001-04:00

So what did I do last night?
I taught a cooking class at Whole Foods. I attempted to post here on my blog that my cooking class was coming up, but every time I sat down to write a post about it, I got more and more nervous. Then time raced by as it always does and it came and went. I think it went really well. All the people loved the food we made, asked for seconds, and one person told me it was the best cooking class she has ever attended! This absolutely made my day!
Gina and Wendy, who both work at our local Whole Foods, have been asking me for a while to teach a cooking class. I attend many different classes and I cook every day in my home kitchen. But cooking for other people is a whole other game. Plus, you have to hold a microphone, while sauteing your onions, YIKES!

I was lucky enough to have two helpers during my hour long cooking presentation. My little girl and my husband. They were both amazing assistants and I could not have done it without them. Wendy did an amazing job setting up all my ingredients and reassuring me that I would do a good job.
I have not posted enough recipes on my blog lately so here are the 4 recipes I made last night. The class was a part of the Engine 2 Diet 28 day challenge group. My class was called "How do I live without Refined or Extracted Oils?"

Here is the calendar on the wall of Whole Foods. It was really official!
My class loved the recipes I made and I hope you will too.
Steel Cut Oats for Breakfast:
I prefer making the oatmeal in my rice cooker. Use the porridge setting and set it up the night before if you have a timer on your machine. You can also put the ingredients into your crock pot and cook it at low for 3.5 hours.
1 1/4 cups of steel cut oats
3 cups of water
Once your steel cut oats are ready, you need to add some toppings. These are our favorites!
bananas
strawberries
blueberries
goji berries
raisins
peanut butter
maple syrup
ground flaxseeds
chia seeds
almond milk
cinnamon
pine nuts
If fresh organic fruit is not available, buy frozen, it works perfectly when you add it to your hot oatmeal!

Real Parent Review of The Croods, Oz the Great and Powerful, GI Joe and Olympus has Fallen

2013-03-17T17:36:00.000-04:00

This month has been filled with new movies for us. Movies are a great way to get the family out of the house. Even better when we have free passes to go to an early screening of said movie. Most of this month's new movies were awesome too! Here is a quick rundown of the last four movies our family watched.
The Croods in 3D
We attended a screening of this movie and we were surprised at how empty the theater was. This does not bode well for this cute animated movie. I brought my 5 year old daughter and her four year old best friend and Mom with us. The movie felt a bit long towards the middle and my daughter got restless and a bit scared at parts. I think the 3D part made this movie quite difficult. The two little girls took off their glasses five minutes into the movie and never really put them back on. Without the glasses the movie was very blurry and I cannot believe the girls enjoyed it that way. The 3D effects were really cool. The first scene with different flying items had the girls reaching out and trying to touch the objects. It was so much fun to watch their reactions. The story of the Croods, a typical family was cute. Nothing earth shattering happened but many of the voices, (Nic Cage and Cloris Leachman) were fantastic. I laughed a lot and enjoyed the strong girl character who loved to show her Dad she was the boss. If your kids will keep their glasses on, I think your family will really enjoy this movie. I will add though, that my little girl, who does not go to many movies, did have 2 nightmares last night, even though she did not seem scared during the movie. Our feeling was that this movie is good for kids 3 and up who will keep their 3D glasses ON!
You can watch the trailer for the Croods here:

The next real parents review we have for you is Oz the Great and Powerful.
Our family gives this a 5 star, instant classic rating. The 3d was the best in ANY movie we have ever seen. The opening credits alone, are so visually stunning, that you cannot imagine how the movie will get any better, but somehow it does! James Franco plays this movie as "old timey" with all the mannerisms and acting and he is awesome! The movie was very true to the original Wizard of Oz. It begins in black and white and switches to color when he lands in Oz.

Oz the Great and Powerful is a new movie from Disney which is a prequel to the classic tale of Dorothy's trip, The Wizard of Oz. Growing up I remember watching the Wizard of Oz every year and how fantastic the story was with the Wicked Witch, the flying monkeys, the Munchkins and all of the characters from Dorothy's home in Kansas who showed up to help her out. Trying to make a movie that would could compare in any way to that ultimate classic would be a tall task indeed, and nearly impossible. In this case, they succeeded.

The story starts off by following Oscar Diggs (Oz) as he works his magic at a carny show in Kansas. He is a charlatan in every way. He tricks girls into working with him and being with him and is inconsiderate to all around him as he lets his selfish ways run his life. As he is escaping in his balloon from someone he has wronged, he gets sucked into a tornado and brought to the Land of Oz. As the screen goes from black and white to full color you see the beauty that is the Land of Oz. I don't want to reveal too much more than this about the plot since I think the story is wonderful (and try to avoid any reviews which give away too much). I will tell you that many elements of the original movie show up in this prequel such as his friends in Kansas show up in Oz only slightly different than he remembered them. We also learn why he is the man behind the curtain and how the witches became so bad.

I would recommend seeing this in 3d (and/or IMAX) since this was the best use of this feature in ANY movie I have ever seen. I have read a few reviews which pan James Franco and his acting. My analysis couldn't be more divergent. James Franco plays this role as "old timey" and intentionally overacts with the mannerisms of a vaudevillian star and to me it worked perfectly.
While we have seen some reviews that have been less than stellar, we have to tell you that when we left the theater both my son and I agreed that the movie was incredible. There was no sex or sexual scenes at all and the violence was minimal. There were a few scary parts when the flying monkeys appeared out of nowhere, but we both thought this was not as scary as many of the villians we have seen in animated Disney movies. We highly recommend this movie to anyone with children or anyone who enjoys classic movies. We suggest this movie for kids 6 and up. You can watch the trailer for Oz the Great and Powerful Here:

Olympus has Fallen VS GI JOE Retaliation:

Last week we were able to preview two new action movies which were different in almost every aspect aside from the expected action and violence. We enjoyed both movies, but their intended audiences and how they portrayed their stories were far different.

Olympus Has Fallen is an action movie in the vein of Die Hard and Under Siege, in which they follow the path of a lone hero who has to fight superior numbers to save something they care deeply about. In this case its Gerard Butler who is a Secret Service agent who is relegated to desk duty after serving for the President for many years. His new position means he is not actually in the White House when the terrorists begin their attack and he eventually finds himself in the thick of the action saving the President and the entire country with his actions.

The action in this movie is spectacular, but completely inappropriate for younger children (depending on your child probably 13 or older). There are multiple killings as Butler's character works his way through the White House and there are also multiple scenes of civilians and military people being killed on screen. The opening scenes of the movie (after the prologue in Camp David) where the terrorists take down the White House are exciting and thrilling. The action is non-stop for a good 20 min...... and then it gets exciting.

We really enjoyed this movie, but it is as far from a chick flick as you can possibly get and it has a well deserved R rating for the violence. I felt comfortable watching this movie with my teens, but you will probably want to take the younger ones to see the Croods or something else more in their range.You can see the trailer for Olympus has Fallen here:

GI Joe Retaliation is the second in a series of comic book turned into a movie starring The Rock, Dwayne Johnson (who I will refer to from now on only as the Rock). This was originally slated to be released last summer, but was pushed back to turn it into 3D (which apparently helps with the overseas box office). The premise for this one, is that Cobra has infiltrated our government at its highest levels and use that, to destroy the GI Joes (the MOST elite fighting force we have). With the Joes out of the way, Cobra can destroy the USA and take over the world.

Again, the action is this movie is exceptional and there are far fewer "killings" that you witness compared to Olympus (which allowed GI Joe to have a more kid-friendly PG-13 rating). Much of the fighting is done hand to hand and those sequences are really well done and very exciting. The extra time they took to work on the graphics clearly pays off and you see this in many scenes (including the destruction of a major city and a chase along a mountain cliff). The story itself is very much a comic book story, where the plot is over the top and oftentimes unbelievable. If you see this movie you should be prepared to let those plot issues go, and just enjoy the ride that The Rock and team are going to take you on. Bruce Willis even shows up at one point, but he doesn't put in a great performance, just his usual squinting, looking tough routine.

Overall, we enjoyed both action movies, but Olympus was definitely a much better movie all around. If you want to see a movie with your older kids (ages 10 and up) we can recommend GI Joe. Just realize that the story is weak, but the action strong. I would not recommend Olympus for young children due to the very graphic violence and R rating (which is well deserved) even though there is absolutely no sex or nudity at all. If you would like to watch the GI Joe trailer, here it is:

Hope you have a great time at the movies with your family! There is definitely something out there for everyone.

Real Parents Review Jack the Giant Slayer

2013-03-05T13:28:00.002-05:00

Lots of great movies coming out this month!
We were lucky enough to receive passes to see Jack the Giant Slayer in 3D.
Wow, was this movie surprisingly good!
As adults we found it very appealing and entertaining. Older children and teens will most likely love it as well. It is really way too scary for the under 6 year old crowd. A four year old girl sat next to us and she spent the whole movie with her coat over her head, pleading with her family to leave! Leave your younger kids at home and get out and enjoy this fantasy soon.

Jack and the Giant Slayer is a fun take on the traditional story of Jack and the Beanstalk. It was beautifully shot and presented on the big screen. The story itself is very true to the original with some slight additions to make this a genuine long form movie. The story begins with the telling of the legend that Jack and all the children of the kingdom have been told for generations. The story they are told is about a land of giants in the sky which came down on a giant beanstalk to conquer the kingdom below and were eventually stopped by a great king who formed a magic crown which enslaved the Giants. After Jack grows up he finds himself in possession of the magic beans which he has been given in exchange for his horse which he was told to sell to buy thatch to fix their roof. He has been warned not to get them wet, but through a series of circumstances one of them drops and gets wet. The incredible beanstalk grows and Jack is off on an adventure to save the Princess and the entire Kingdom.

We were very pleasantly surprised by this movie and enjoyed it greatly from beginning to end. This movie reminded me very much of The Princess Bride in many aspects especially as it relates to the story and how it is told (thats a VERY good thing, by the way). The retelling of the original fairy tale is done in a way where they add elements to the story which extend and expand the legend and the overall theme without going overboard. It all fits together very nicely. The acting is very well done and the scenery and filming are exceptional. The Giants were very realistic looking even though they were completely done with CGI. You never felt like the "people" were performing in front of a green screen with the giants pasted in afterwards.

There was no sex or sexual situations in this movie at all, aside from some minor kissing. There is a considerable amount of violence between the King's men and the Giants, but there is very little that is graphic in the violence. You see Giants picking up men to eat, but you don't actually see the Giant eating the person. They do show the Giants being hit with arrows and falling from the Beanstalk to the ground, but again its not overly graphic in nature. There are some scenes which would be scary for younger children (when the Beanstalk first grows, the Giants in general and some of the scenes with Giants fighting) and if you have a young child that scares easily you may want to consider that before taking them. We recommend this movie to any child 6 or over. But remember, you know your child best, and there are many children 6-10 who would be very scared at this movie.

Come back tomorrow for a real parents review of Oz the Great and Powerful!

Luna Bars on sale at Whole Foods- Today only!

2013-02-28T12:47:00.000-05:00

Today is the last day for an awesome sale at Whole Foods! I know, the words Whole Foods and great sale, are not usually said in the same sentence.
At my local store, they do not require that you cut out the coupon. They have the coupon at the register and they just scan it for as many bars as you want to buy.
This deal is so easy!
Choose the flavors of Luna Bars that you like. There are tons of different flavors, and many have chocolate, coconut, peanut butter, lemon and blueberry, just to name a few!
Buy a minimum of two bars, and a maximum of as many as you can eat before they expire!
Ask your cashier to scan the coupon, which is $1.50 off of every 2 bars. Plus, the bars are on sale for .99 each!!
Hurry, this deal expires when your Whole Foods closes tonight!

Escape from Planet Earth Real Parents Review

2013-02-10T16:12:00.002-05:00

Escape from Planet Earth is a movie about 2 brothers, both aliens, whose jobs are to save their fellow aliens when they get in trouble around the galaxy. One of the brothers (Scorch) is the hero who flies around and saves the alien babies who have been abducted and does his job with great "style" (think - Buzz Lightgear). His older brother (Gary), who happens to be much smaller and smarter, stays back at Mission Control and helps his brother get out of the messes he makes while saving the galaxy - the brains behind the brawn. The tables are turned when Scorch gets captured on Earth and Gary needs to be the hero and save him. There are a number of great actors who provide their voices for this movie including: William Shatner, Brendon Frasier, Rob Corddry, Jane Lynch, George Lopez, Jessica Alba, Sarah Jessica Parker, James Gandolfini and more.

I think this movie is aimed at young children, possibly in the 3-7 year old range. There is no swearing at all. No sex or sexual situations. Good cast and a plot that the kids can easily follow (although parents might not find it too stimulating). The aliens in the movie are not scary at all and even in a theater full of kids, I heard nothing but laughter throughout the movie. Its not the best animated movie I have seen, but it was also far from the worst.

Many jokes are multilevel and can be appreciated by parents whose children may not get the references. These jokes go right over the heads of the children. The only complaint I had, was that there were far too many product placements once they landed on Earth - 7-11 stores, pop chips, etc. I would also recommend that you NOT see this in 3D unless you really feel like spending a few extra bucks. There were very few scenes that even used 3D and those were more of the contrived sort (a paddleball where the ball keeps coming right at you). We took our glasses off and did not need them shortly after the movie started.

We took two kids with us to see this movie. One is 8 and one is 14. Both of them were very lukewarm about the movie. They both give it 2 stars out of 5. I am not sure who this movie is aimed towards. We did bring anyone in the under 8 category, so maybe that is the target age. Leave me a comment if you go to see it, I would love to know what you think of it!

Language Stars Open House and Ipad Mini Giveaway

2013-01-08T11:04:00.000-05:00

Languages are varied in our household. English of course is spoken by all of us, but Spanish and Hebrew are often heard sprinkled throughout our day. Songs, homework, and daily requests, I never know what language I will hear.

Language Stars is a new play based learning center that has opened in the Chicago and DC Metro areas. Language Stars is a play-based, full-immersion foreign language class that opens children's minds to new worlds. Toddlers, pre-schoolers and K-5th graders benefit from an early start, during a unique window of opportunity, when their young brains absorb the magic of another language and culture easily and rapidly. This full immersion type program really works! I have seen it myself with my older children. If you have ever considered teaching your child a second language I suggest you check out this awesome new program.

FunImmersion classes are taught by a native speaker and your young child will soon be speaking and understanding a new language.

You are not too late to visit Language Stars!
Open House weeks are taking place January 14-27th.
There are 7 locations in the DC metro area including Alexandria, Bethesda, Fairfax, Falls Church, Gaithersburg, N. Arlington/McLean, and Reston.

* Take a Tour of your local Language Stars center
* Come and Meet the international teaching team
* Come and Learn about the Window of Opportunity and why NOW is the best time for your child to learn a foreign language
* You will receive a special Open House gift to take home for you and your child
* Everyone can Enter our Open House Weeks Giveaway for a chance to win a brand new iPad mini!
Any new family that signs up during Open House week will get $100 off their tuition!

Reserve your spot for Open House Weeks today! Fill out the form at http://www.languagestars.com/openhouse2013 or call 866-55-STARS.
Already enrolled? Receive $100 OFF your tuition for every family you refer who enrolls through January 27, 2013.

Keep up with Language Stars DC on Facebook too.
And now for the Ipad Mini Giveaway!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Note: This is a sponsored post. All opinions are my own.

Just a Spoonful of Yogurt helps the medicine go down

2013-01-07T14:05:00.002-05:00

My little girl, who is not so little anymore, has always hated to take medicine. When she was a baby I would try to stick the dropper in the side of her mouth as she slept, dispense the teeniest drop, and she would wake up immediately and turn her head and spit.

When she had the flu at two years old and her fever was 105 for days straight, I tried everything I could think of to get her to take some tylenol or motrin. Nothing worked. I was so worried at midnight on day 3, with the 105 fever, that we went to a nighttime pediatrics place. The nurse took her temperature and said, oh my god, we need to give this girl some Motrin immediately. Thanks for not worrying me nurse! So she left the room, came back, and said to me, I have been a nurse 25 years and I have never been unsuccessful at getting a child to take medicine. I got excited and hoped that the nurse would come home with us. Alas, she poured the medicine into the side of her mouth and the poor lethargic kid turned and puked it all right over the nurses clothes and feet. The nurse ran out of the room and I guess we were written down as the first person to not take their medicine.

I have read many articles about fevers, and many of the articles tell the nervous Moms, not to worry, and even not to give medicine unless the fever is over 103. So this Mama tries not to worry.
Over the past few years, whenever her big brothers are sick, we make a big production over how nicely they take their medicine. They love to take medicine. This medicine show does nothing. She is not convinced and honestly she does not care.

My little girl has been mostly healthy now for years. It must be my nightly prayers, or the 20 times a day hand washing we practice. I have been dreading the day when she would be sick and need to take some medicine.

Fast forward to this past Friday night. My sweetie pie could not fall asleep and finally said to me, my ear hurts. It hurts very bad, way deep inside my ear. I think I need to go to the doctor. The next morning the dr could not see her eardrum. There was too much wax in the way. The nurse had to flush her poor sore eardrum with water 8 times and then finally she was able to see the ear infection. We got the medicine (thank goodness it is Zithromax and only 5 doses total!) and came right home. I have a trick for those of you who struggle to get your kids to take their medicine. Let your child choose the worst yogurt that you would never buy on a regular basis. For us it was the colorful Trix yogurts (GROSS). My little girl always wants to buy them because they look so pretty. Well this time I said, why yes, of course we will buy those!

Just in case a miracle happened in the past few years, I put the teaspoon of Zithromax in the syringe and put the teeniest bit in her mouth. Oh mommmy, that tastes terrible, I really do not want anymore. Time to break open the yummy Trix yogurt you always wanted to buy. I take half of the yogurt out and mix in the teaspoon of medicine. I stirred and stirred until it was all mixed up. Her face was so excited to be getting the yogurt she had always dreamed of(her words). That was, until she had the first taste. Ew Mommy, you were right, this tastes terrible. Oh really? Yes, it does, but I will finish it because I always wanted a trix yogurt. I distracted her with a new rock painting kit and quickly spooned the few bites of medicine laced yogurt into her mouth. First dose complete, four more to go! The second and third doses went fine. She did ask me this morning how many yogurts are left because she is sure she never wants to buy that kind again!

Metropolitan Cooking Show Recap and Giveaway!

2013-01-02T14:02:00.000-05:00

I was lucky enough to win 4 tickets to attend the Metropolitan Cooking and Entertaining Show this past November. We had an awesome time and we met many cool people and learned about some incredible new products. Please read through to the end, because I have a great giveaway from my friends at Sheila G's Brownie Brittle company!

The show was held the first weekend in November at the Washington Convention Center. It is amazing how big this event is. Here is the view of all the vendors. Before you even get to the exhibition room you have already walked a mile through the convention center. Now that you worked out, you have room for some goodies.

One tip for you: Wear your most comfortable shoes! You will do a lot of walking.
There were 8 celebrities who were cooking and doing demonstrations in an attached celebrity theater.
Tom Colicchio and Gail Simmons
Michael Symon and Carla Hall
Giada De Laurentiis
Jeff Mauro
and Claudine and Jacques Pepin
Watching the celebrities close-up is so cool! They tell great stories as they cook. It is an awesome experience that I highly recommend to you!

I did not take photos inside the celebrity theater, but I did take this one from above.

Now Back to the foods!

One of our favorite products in our house is Peanut Butter and Co peanut butter. It is the only kind of PB my son Jake will eat. Cinnamon Raisin is his favorite flavor. I am pretty partial to the white chocolate or dark chocolate dreams flavor. If you love peanut butter you MUST try these!

We met many friendly, and entertaining people selling their products. There were many unique goodies that we saw and sampled. Some of our favorites included:
Mason Jar Cookie Company: Customizable Mason Jar Cookie Mixes, cool idea!
Dee's Gourmet Pretzels: Super cute chocolate covered pretzels
Maestro Cutting Boards: incredible all wood cutting boards, great gift idea!
Cocova Chocolates: Local DC chocolate store with chocolate classes, yum.
Carolina Candy Company: Amazing toffee and other candies
The Leavitt Farm pickles, relishes and jellies: Awesome sour pickles and jams, all handmade!
Pecan Jack's: pralines, toffees, truffles, peanuts, and tons more goodies!
Buffins: Better muffins, homemade goodness
Relay Foods: Unique home delivery service for the DC metro area with a twist!
ElCeibo Chocolate: Amazing organic chocolate sourced from Bolivia
Lastly, we met some of the teachers from L'Academie de Cuisine, which is the cooking school that Joey will hopefully attend next year. The teachers were friendly and Joey cannot wait to be graduating high school and moving on to cooking school.

But the best booth by far belonged to the Brownie Brittle Company. If you have not tasted Brownie Brittle yet, you can thank me later. We tried Brownie Brittle at our local Costco about 6 months ago. After one bite, you are not going to be able to stop eating it. Each piece is like eating a corner piece of Brownie, you know, that crunchy, delicious piece, that everyone is always fighting over? Each piece of brittle melts in your mouth. Brownie Brittle comes in three flavors, chocolate chip, walnut, and toffee crunch. Costco only carries the chocolate chip flavor, which we thought was the best flavor, that was until we tasted the toffee crunch. Wow.

I must be honest here and tell you that I sometimes have to hide the Brownie Brittle. If I did not hide it, there would be none left for Mommy! I have 7 people in my house and they all love the brittle. Fights have broken out over the last pieces in a bag. They are that good. So guess what, my loyal readers? The awesome Brownie Brittle ladies have offered to give one of my readers a bag of each flavor!! Yes! One winner will get a box of goodies from the Brownie Brittle team.

This is Sheila G, the inventor of Brownie Brittle. She is a genius at making addictive delicious treats. She is also super nice and friendly. I was so lucky to meet her at the show. All the Brownie Brittle ladies at the booth were wonderful.

So what are you waiting for? I know you want to win your own Brownie Brittle, so leave me a comment below and tell me: What is your favorite treat? It is that easy! I will give you one more easy way to enter this contest too! Follow me on Twitter and leave a separate comment below that you did. Giveaway ends January 9th at noon. Winners will be chosen by Random.org and will be notified by email, so please leave your email address if I do not know you, so I can contact you. Good luck!

I was not compensated for this post, but I was provided with some incredibly delicious Brownie Brittle for my family to enjoy. We buy all our own Brownie Brittle at Costco or online. It is that delicious! All opinions included in this post are my own.

Update on the Chevrolet Volt

2013-01-02T12:56:00.002-05:00

We have had our Chevy Volt for about 6 months now and I have to tell you that I really love it now.
It is so awesome not having to fill up with gas as often as we used to.
The car is still very zippy and drives really nicely.
There is something that has surprised me about it.
During these colder months, when we charge the car fully overnight it maxes out as 28-30 miles of charge. Over the summer we could fully charge it up to 40-42 miles. So basically the winter months we are getting 10 miles or MORE of less charge. This really stinks! My trips are being cut shorter and we are running out of charge more often than we did this summer.
There is another problem with the car in the winter. It does not get warm!!!! We have bundled up more in the house and then get in the car and we are ok, but if you forget to bundle up, OY!
When you turn on the heater, defroster, seat warmer, you will use up your charge even faster. And when you use the heat, it does not feel nice and warm, like it does in all our other cars.
A friend who has a Volt, (Hi Susan!) gave us a great tip! While the car is plugged in, and before you are ready to get in it, you can use the Onstar App to turn the car on and set it to maximum heat inside. You then are not using up any of your charge since it is still plugged in. My husband once turned it on and started to heat it up while he was sitting on an airplane, waiting to get off! Now that is cool, or hot!
So do I still love the volt? Yes, I do. But I had to buy a super warm coat, gloves and hat and keep some blankets in the back for the kids, so we do not freeze to death this summer.

Have you met Pinypon yet?

2012-12-05T14:00:00.004-05:00

We were so excited to get a huge box in the mail a few weeks ago. Inside the box was all the stuff a 4 year old girl would ever dream of. The contents of our box held the materials needed to host our very own Pinypon party.
We had never seen Pinypon before, but boy did this make my little girl happy. We decided to have a Pinypon party right away. We invited our favorite girls over to celebrate a birthday and of course the introduction of her friends to the Pinypon people.
The Pinypons are very similar to Polly Pockets, except in my opinion, they are much cuter. They are also bigger than polly pockets so they will be easier for a younger child to play with. The accessories are very small, but the Pinypon themselves are a nice size.
Each of our guests got to bring home their own Pinypon character along with the usual little girl stuff in a goody bag, mini nail polish, rings, and of course some chocolate.

We had a very happy group of girls at our Pinypon party, especially the two winners of the big prizes!

One winner received a Nenuco Bubble Making Doll, so realistic looking!
And another winner received a Pinypon Caravan set.

If you have a little girl in the 3-6 year old age range and you are not sure what to get her, check out the Pinypon toys sold at Toys R Us and many other online toy stores. My daughter loved the characters themselves. She also loved to load up her caravan and drive it over to her dollhouse. The caravan is well made and comes with many cute things including surf boards, and a shower for the pinypons. The accessories that come with the Pinypons have kept my daughter enjoying the play aspect for a very long time.
If you are interested in learning more about Pinypon please visit them on
Facebook
Follow them on Twitter

I was invited by Mom Select to host a Pinypon party. I was not compensated for this post, but I was provided with Pinypon prizes to give to our party guests. All opinions included in this post are my own.

Healthy Cookies

2012-11-01T13:46:00.001-04:00

We feel lucky to have survived Hurricane Sandy unscathed. The worst damage we had was to my finger. During the storm while peeling an apple I sliced off the top of my finger. I feel quite lucky that this was the only damage we had.
My kids love sweets. What kid does not? They really love a small treat after dinner so today I made a healthy cookie. No added sugar. No junk. A sweet treat that tastes great and satisfies the sweet tooth while being quite healthy at the same time.
Here are your ingredients. Feel free to experiment!
You can make these cookies gluten free and they are naturally vegan as well.

Healthy Cookies
1 and 1/2 cups rolled oats. Bob's Red Mill makes awesome oats!
1 and 1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp sea salt
1 large banana or 2 small bananas
1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
1/4 cup raisins
1/4 cup dairy free chocolate chips
Mix all the ingredients together in a bowl. If your bananas are not very soft, you should mash those up really well first, then add the applesauce, and finally the rest of your ingredients.
Bake at 350 for 20-25 minutes, depending on the size of your cookies.
Eat with a nice glass of milk or almond coconut milk.

Here Comes the Boom Real Parents Movie Review

2012-10-13T18:37:00.000-04:00

Here Comes the Boom is a comedy, rated PG, about a disenchanted teacher (Kevin James) who found inspiration from a talented and dedicated music teacher (Henry Winkler). Kevin James decided to help Henry Winkler save his music program from the recent budget cuts. Kevin James needed to raise a significant amount of money and figured out that his best chance was to enter a MMA fight. After watching a MMA fight on TV, he decided he could make a bunch of money simply by losing. This led to him having one of his adult students (Niko from a Citizenship class he taught at night) agree to be his trainer (played by legendary MMA fighter Bas Rutten, who absolutely stole the movie). Niko took him on as a student and got him fights at small local shows. You can obviously see where the movie heads to, but the way they got there was funny and touching. Was this movie predictable? Yes, it was. Does this movie take elements from other fighting movies? Yes, it has elements from Rocky and Karate Kid. Yet, we all still enjoyed it. It was funny throughout. There are a bunch of great characters and actors including Henry Winkler and Salma Hayek. Many famous MMA fighters have tiny roles, and it was fun to recognize them (Shoutout to Mayhem Miller). The end of the movie even had a few really touching moments.

Disclosure #1: From my DH: I have to admit - I am a MMA fan and watch UFC regularly which may be why the fight scenes didn't bother me at all. If you have never seen an MMA fight you might want to catch a few minutes of one before heading out to see this movie. Other than that, there is really nothing to find objectionable at all about this film. There is very little cursing that we can remember and absolutely no sex at all. We took two 14 year old boys to this movie and they both loved it. They both found this movie to be hilarious and they sat through it twice in two days.

If you liked Paul Blart - Mall Cop you will probably also like this movie as well. We loved Kevin James in King of Queens and he was just as hilarious in this movie as he was on that show. This is a fun movie that you will enjoy seeing and will laugh about afterwards.

Disclosure #2: We won passes to attend two screenings of this movie. All parts of this review are our own thoughts and ideas and we were not at all influenced by the grouchy reviewers who were sitting in front of us discussing how many minutes the movie would be and how much they were dreading being there. Do not listen to the negative reviews and give this movie a chance!

Get Unreal!

2012-10-03T13:47:00.001-04:00

Candy Season is upon us.
You will be required to buy candy in a few more weeks.
Don't you want to buy candy that is missing all that junk?
Get Unreal candy has done the hard work for you.
They have come up with 5 flavors that taste just as good as the candy bars you had as a child, but free from the junk you no longer want to feed your family!
Do you have a few minutes to watch a cute video? Lots of people have discovered Get Unreal candy, so check them out!

Let's take a minute and look at a bag of Peanut M&Ms. A small 49 gram bag has 250 calories and 25 grams of sugar! The rest of the stats on your favorite peanut M&Ms are 30 carb and 13 grams of fat.
Now I would like you to met Unreal #54. A rival to the Peanut M&Ms.
Unreal #54 is a 42 gram serving, the perfect size for small hands.
Unreal #54 has only 200 calories, 16 grams of sugar, 11grams of fat, and 20g of carbs.

Most importantly the ingredients on the Unreal line are clean!
No corn syrup
No Partially Hydrogenated Oils
No Artificial Ingredients
No GMOs
No Preservatives
and a low glycemic index.
Candy is not served very often in my house, but if I am going to serve my kids some candy, it will definitely be UNREAL

We tasted all the Get Unreal candy options and they all taste amazing. We really did prefer them to regular candy bars. My teen boys said these bars were much better than regular candy and filled them up for a long time! I loved that we were eating less junk and cleaner ingredients. Try it for yourself. If you see me out and about, I might just have a bar for you to try.

Disclosure: I was invited to host a GetUnreal party and to learn more about the Get Unreal mission and brand. I was provided product to sample, take home, and give away to friends and family. The opinions expressed above are my own. We had a really fun party where we tasted all the different UNREAL candy and put them up against the well known M&Ms Snickers, etc... The Unreal candy won by a landslide. You can make up your own mind about this product by purchasing a bar at CVS or Michaels. Additional retailers to launch soon. Check out the Get Unreal website for product information.

Chevy Volt Electric Car for our Family??

2012-09-21T19:02:00.004-04:00

My husband got a mailer all about the Chevy Volt. Very nice I told him. A few days later he said he was going to go look at the Volt. Really? A four person car for our 7 member family?
Yes, he said. It would be a great car for when we are just a small group.
So he visited the Volt a few times and I still was not sold.
The car is way too small I repeated.
But since this would be my husbands car I told him fine. You want it, you can get it.

So now we are proud leasers of a new Chevy Volt.
The first few weeks I really hated the car.

It smiled at me and then started to grow on me a bit.
I started to love some things about it.
Positives:
*No gas to pay for. With prices hovering in the $4 a gallon mark, I did not miss filling up my car as often. Each charge will get you about 36-38 miles of driving without needing to plug in again. There is a small gas tank as a back up if you are going on a longer drive. I am proud to say we have gone almost 500 miles and not used even .1 of gas, woohoo! This picture is hard to see but it says 478 miles and 0.0 of gas. I love this!

*Smaller groups are quieter to drive around than larger ones. :)
*Onstar for the life of the lease. Onstar is awesome!
*XM Radio with a way of rewinding a song. Can you say Call Me Maybe played over and over again while driving to preschool? Maybe this should be a negative.

*Easy to park, I have only driven big cars for years now and this car is really easy to park!
*Speedy little thing. You barely step on the pedal and woosh you are off! Careful though, you do not want to get a speed camera ticket.
*Quiet. This car is sooooo quiet. You turn it on and you can barely tell it is on. Sometimes people will stand next to the car and not realize I am trying to drive away. There is a teeny horn that you can use to alert pedestrians that you are moving. Smart Chevy Volt designers!
*Great NAV system and console area. Easy to figure out and use.
*Race car feel says my 4 year old. She only wants to go to school in her race car.

*Last positive is a very comfortable seat for each person. Bucket seats all around. A real improvement from the minivan days.

Negatives:
*Remembering to plug it in. Sometimes you just do not remember that extra little step.
*You cannot fit as much in the trunk as you can in the minivan. I buy a lot at the store and need a way to bring it home.
*You try to plan your trip to be in the under 40 mile mark, so that you will get back home before you need to charge it.
*There are not that many charging stations YET. We do have a few, but not at every store we go to.