Sorry Kids, Mommy's Outta Here

This post is the second in my "Way-Back Wednesday" series (on the third Wednesday of each month, I revisit one of my favorite posts from the past). Enjoy! 

Sorry Kids, Mommy’s Outta Here

That’s right. I’m packing my bags. Leaving my family behind. In just two days, I. Am. Out. Of. Here.

Ok, truth be told, I’m only going to be gone for 3 days—and then I am most definitely, almost probably, coming back. I’m heading out for a girls’ weekend with my six college besties, and I can’t decide if I’m more excited for the actual weekend or for the airport and plane ride experiences.

Sad, isn’t it? I mean, you know you’re a mom of young kids when a trip to the airport and a 3-hour flight BY YOURSELF feels like a spa day. I’m already dreaming of it: Getting through security will be a breeze with no car seat, no stroller, no sullen preschoolers who refuse to answer the TSA agent when asked for their names. After security, I’ll stroll to my gate, maybe stopping at Starbucks or McDonalds for goodies—that I won’t have to share!—and then by a book shop for trashy magazines. And boarding will be lovely: I’ll just waltz to my seat and plop down to enjoy my snacks and gossip rags at will.

But then the real magic will begin.

The plane ride.

Here’s what I WON’T be doing during my flight:

• Reading “Little Critter” books out loud.
• Eating smashed PB&J sandwiches and soggy cucumber slices.
• Learning how to play the “Elmo’s ABCs” app on the iPad so I can help my kids with it.
• Watching “Cars 2” for the 93587935798357^th time.
• Holding someone else’s barf bag.

Here’s what I probably WILL be doing during my flight:

• Reading something—ANYTHING—for grown-ups.
• Eating whatever delicious goodies I could find in the terminal without worrying about modeling good habits for my fellow travelers.
• Smashing my 4-year-old’s high scores on my iphone’s “Angry Birds” app.
• Watching a PG-13 or even (gasp!) R-rated movie.
• Politely ignoring pretty much everyone around me as much as possible.

So, as I pack my one incredibly small suitcase and my definitely-not-a-diaper-bag purse, I leave you with this link to celebrate this month’s “Way-Back Wednesday.”

photo credit

All By Myself

It’s about a trip I took with my kids that went horribly, messily wrong. And it explains why I now carry large ziplock plastic bags with us whenever we all set foot on a plane together. Because those tiny airplane motion-sickness bags?

Ineffective.

By the way, if you’re looking for even more Crazed goofiness, I’ve been featured on a couple of other blogs recently. Check them out:

Last January, my friend Daddy Knows Less let me rant about childless people who think they know everything about parenting. (And yes, I was one of them once.)

And then, earlier this month my friend Martinis and Minivans interviewed me for her "Inside the Blogger's Studio" feature. Read it to find out what hilarious lie I told my kids to get them to eat their veggies.

Pinterest + Preschoolers = PAIN

Well, I may be the last on earth to do it, but I was finally hit by the Pinterest Plague. I bit the bullet a week ago and signed up. And now? Now, I have plans.

Big Plans.

Home decorating plans. Cleaning-my-house plans. Making-darling-and-incredibly-thoughtful-Valentines-Day-crafts-for-my-husband plans.

Lots and lots and lots and lots of plans.

For now I’m still in the research phase of most of these plans. It could take weeks, months, even YEARS for me to gather the necessary photos, infographics, and how-to lists needed in order to effectively put these plans in motion. That’s ok. I don’t have a lot of time to distress and paint old wooden frames at this point anyway.

But I did find one thing on Pinterest that I decided to try right away: an incredibly cute, easy Valentine’s Day craft for kids. Here’s the photo I found and the link to the website:

Click here for the original post

So cute and easy, right? My four-year-old son had a playdate with his best little girl friend coming up, so I decided to take on my first Pinterest Parenting moment and bust out this craft for them.

Well, as I should have expected, things did not go exactly as planned.

I got the kids started, and they were very excited. For about 30 seconds. Then, some things started happening.

First, they asked for other art supplies—markers, stickers, ribbons, stuff like that. Stuff that was NOT mentioned on Pinterest when I found this activity. I had misgivings—WE WERE DOING A PINTEREST CRAFT, not improvising some random art project like preschool hippies!! But I don’t like tempering a child’s natural creativity in general, so I went with it.

Next, they started experimenting. My son became fascinated with a glob of glue from his glue stick and began poking at it. Then he scribbled on it with a marker, yelling, “I’m dying it!! I’m dying the glue!” Then he used the marker to draw on his hair. Again.

Of course, distractions were inevitable. I’m not sure how jumping up and down, flapping one’s arms and shouting, “Look! Look at me! I’m flying! LOOK AT ME!!!” is part of anyone’s artistic process, but there was my son doing just that. His friend was unfazed and, after watching his antics for a minute or two, went back to using her rebel art supplies to do non-Pinterest-endorsed activities like coloring on top of stickers.

Finally, they finished their Valentines. Here are the results:

My son's valentine

His friend's valentine

Um, yeah. This would be MY valentine. Mommy, FTW!

At this point, my son’s friend became inspired and hid herself away in another room to make a “secret valentine.” When she emerged, she handed my son this:

awwwww....

Well, my little guy thought this whole secret valentine thing was a great idea, so he hid HIMSELF away in the other room to make one for her. When he emerged, he gave her this:

ummmmmm...

Apparently, my son’s “POOP” valentine somehow reminded the kids that playing with underpants is always a fun game, so they moved on from art supplies to that. To my son, the Underpants Game just means wearing underpants on your head and body and throwing them around the house. Like this:

He takes after his father.

So he wasn’t quite sure how to respond to his girl friend’s suggestion that they use the underpants for a more practical, organized activity: to make a treasure trail (duh). So then I found this in our bathroom:

I love how they are evenly spaced.

There’s really nowhere to go but down after fun like that, is there? Thankfully, my friend showed up to claim her daughter right about then, so we’ll never know what might have happened next.

Can Southern California Recover from this "Arctic Blast?"

This post is the first in my new series, "Way-Back Wednesday." On the third Wednesday of each month, I'll revisit one of my favorite posts from the past. Considering that I've been blogging for a whole year now, I figure I've got about 3 months before I run out of "old" material. Then I guess I'll have to institute "What's-Happening-Today Wednesday," which, technically, will just be another new blog post. But, as my husband likes to say, that's Future Molly's problem. Present Molly likes "Way-Back Wednesday," and is proud to present the first in the series....
 
Can Southern California Recover from this "Arctic Blast?"
We've had quite the cold snap here in Southern California this past week. Daytime temps have been stuck in the 50's, and nighttime temps have fallen into the *GASP* 30's! OK, upper 30's, but still. We don't see 30 degree-weather very often around here, so the response has been somewhat close to panic. ESPECIALLY from the local news media. Check this out to see what I mean:


In light of this emergency, my family has had to take some extreme measures. First, we have had to figure out once and for all how to work this, our heater:

Cat photo bomb

Yes, that vent you see bears the sole responsibility for heating our whole house. For our part, this involves a complex schedule of opening and closing various bedroom and hallway doors so that the thermostat, in the living room, gets some heat and the boys, in their bedroom, get some heat, and that we, in our bedroom, are kept cat-free (thanks to my cold-hearted husband). Sadly, Hubby and I have to choose between heat and being cat-free, so I am sleeping under, I don't know, maybe EIGHT blankets at night these days.

The second adjustment we have had to make has been to our clothing choices. My boys had to trade their light hoodies for fleece jackets on our bike rides around the neighborhood. My poor 2-year-old abandoned his barefoot lifestyle and took to actually wearing socks inside the house. And while my 4-year-old STILL refuses to wear jammies to bed, he has been donning them as soon as he gets up each morning rather than wearing nothing but underpants, as is his usual style.

Yes, it has been a week of sacrifice and hardship for us here in Southern California.

So, for my first "Way-Back Wednesday," I've decided to revisit a post I wrote around Christmastime a year ago about my problems adjusting to winters in a warm-weather locale. I grew up in Chicago, so every year at Christmas I feel like I'm in the Twilight Zone when I see Christmas lights wrapped artfully around palm trees, shining their twinkling lights on lush, green lawns. To see what I mean, check out my post...

A So-Cal Christmas

And, while I appreciate your worry and concern, know that we here in Southern California are going to be OK. Temperatures should be in the mid- to upper-70's by the weekend, my kids will enjoy their friend's birthday party in a local park, and the fleece jackets will be stored safely in the hall closet for the next few years.

How My Dead Cat And My 4-Year-Old Saved Christmas

I have to admit, Christmas is sort of a bummer for me. Thirteen years ago, one of my grandfathers died on Christmas Day, and then four years ago my mom died just a few weeks before Christmas. The most wonderful time of the year? Eh.

But this year, I had to rally my Christmas spirit. See, I now have not one but TWO young sons who believe in Santa Claus and who have fully embraced the spirit of the season. (That is, if by “spirit of the season” you mean “getting presents, eating junk food, and losing your shit at increasing volumes every day for the three weeks preceding Christmas.”) So I couldn’t really half-ass it like I have in the past.

But I knew I couldn’t make Christmas really wonderful for my kids if I was mostly faking my own joy of the season. So I thought a bit about what I could do to make me feel jollier over the holidays. And I came up with a great idea:

This year, for the first time, we would get a CHRISTMAS TREE!

Now, please understand, I am not such a Grinch that I have denied my children the delight of having a full-sized, decorated Christmas tree simply because I didn’t want one. The problem always lay with one of my cats. He was a voracious plant-eater—anything plant or even vaguely plant-like was delicious to him. And since plants violently disagreed with his digestive system, we had banned them from our house, including Christmas trees.

Tiny tree, post-Santa garbage collection

To compensate, we bought a 2-foot fake tree that we decorated then placed on a table and surrounded with whatever we could find that would block the cat’s access to it. Toys, books, empty cereal boxes, water bottles—it was like a yearly game of Tetris as we tried to cover every square inch of space around our midget tree with clutter and garbage so that the cat couldn’t get at it.

Ahhhh, clutter and garbage...the true spirit of Christmas.

Each year, I looked at our sad little garbage tree and wished we could have a big happy tree. I didn’t want my kids to grow up thinking it was normal for Santa to haul out the trash under the tree and leave presents in its place. I wanted a proper Christmas tree, and this year I was going to have one.

(As for the tree-eating cat? Well, it turns out that was a good news, bad news situation. The good news was the cat wasn’t eating plants any more. The bad news was that was because he died back in August.)

So, in an unusual fit of holiday cheer, I packed both kids up in the car and headed to Target to buy a big, beautiful, gloriously pre-lit fake tree.

At the store, we snagged one of the snazzy carts that have the little trailer behind it with two kid seats. This meant both of my kids were strapped in and contained—a definite plus in a crowded pre-holiday Target. But it also almost doubled the length of my cart—a definite minus in a crowded pre-holiday Target. But then, in a true Christmas miracle, we easily found the tree section, picked the kind of tree we wanted (7 ½ feet tall!!), and found a Target employee to load the enormous tree box into our cart.

But as we headed for the checkout lanes to pay, I realized we had two problems.

Add 70 lbs of kids and a huge Xmas tree...

One, my extra-long cart was now about two feet longer—thanks to the huge box sticking out of the end of it. Doing a simple left turn required about 72 adjustments and took at least 2 minutes. It was going to take FOREVER to get to the checkout lanes.

But it turns out that was a good thing, because it gave me some extra time to figure out how I was going to solve problem number two: fitting two kids in car seats, one driver, and one enormous Christmas tree box into my Honda Civic.

I called my husband, thinking he could bring the second car around to take the tree home. No answer. After a few more fruitless calls I realized I was on my own. I paid for the tree and slowly, slowly wheeled us all out to the car.

With the kids safely strapped in their seats, I got started. Despite a valiant effort, the trunk was a no go. The box was going to somehow have to fit in the car with us. I got to work adjusting the front seats—pushing them back and reclining them as far as I could without crushing my kids. I took off both the headrests, and I pushed and pulled that tree box until it was almost, ALMOST all the way in the car.

But not quite.

The box and I had reached a détente. It needed one little push from the passenger side, but if I let go of it and left my spot on the driver’s side it would slide out of the car. And I wasn’t sure I could recreate the exact sequence of maneuvers that had gotten us so close to victory. I felt my newfound Christmas spirit slipping away as I imagined wheeling the kids and the tree back into Target to return it. I sighed and muttered to myself, “If I just had someone to give it a tiny push….”

From the back seat, my 4-year-old piped up, “I can help, Mommy! I’ll use all my strongth power!”

I smiled at “strongth power” and realized he was right. He could help me. My baby wasn’t such a baby anymore—he was pretty strong and, just as important, he could unbuckle his own car seat. He popped out of the car, got behind the box, and gave it his biggest push. Lo and behold, it slid just far enough in that we could close the passenger door. We jumped up and down in the parking lot, high-fiving and screaming “STRONGTH POWER!” while my 2-year-old applauded in the car.

We survived the trip home, and I used some of my own strongth power to put the tree together. And then, for the first time, we got out the BIG box of ornaments, and decorated our full-size Christmas tree.

And it may just stay up until Valentines Day

A Merry Good Time At Knott's! #MerryFarm

Yay! Christmas!

December is here and it’s Christmas time at our house! Well, sort of. Our tree has been up for a week, but we haven’t gotten around to putting ornaments on it yet. Three out of four stockings are hung. (I’m not quite sure why my 2½ year old is so mad at his stocking, but every time he sees it hanging over the fireplace he yells “NO!” and pulls it down, throwing it on the floor.) I bought a wreath for the front door but it didn’t quite fit, so it’s hanging on the kitchen window.  

So, we are getting in the Christmas spirit—one step at a time. But even before the naked tree and the too-big wreath and the despicable stocking appeared, we had done one VERY Christmas-y thing: Visited Knott’s Berry Farm’s Christmas celebration, Knott’s Merry Farm.

Of course, with a 4½ year old and a 2½ year old around, nothing is easy. My husband spent a good deal of time in the kitchen the night before our trip packing a huge bag of snacks, lunches, wipes, extra diapers…pretty much everything we might need. And, of course, the kids woke up extra early the next morning and spent 3 hours asking if it was time to leave yet. And…it rained. But we were all excited to go, and being Midwesterners by birth my husband and I were not about to let a few raindrops spoil our day. So we packed up the stroller, the diaper bags, and the kids and hit the freeways.

"Winter Wonderland" stage at Camp Snoopy

We had been to Knott’s before for their Halloween Camp Spooky celebration, so we knew to hit the little kids’ area—Camp Snoopy—first, before the crowds got crazy. But here’s the thing about a little rain in Southern California—everyone freaks out and stays home. Which means, NO LINES at Camp Snoopy or, for that matter, most of the park! I played the pregnancy card and “let” my husband squeeze himself onto most of the rides with our littlest guy, who is too little to ride alone. The kids had a great time and loved the Christmas decorations.

After lunch, we ventured out of Camp Snoopy into the rest of the park. We were worried that there wouldn’t be a ton for our little guys to do out there, but we were wrong. After a few rides, we sat down to see “The Gift of the Magi” in the historic Knott’s Birdcage Theatre. I enjoyed it, and I think older kids would appreciate it, but it went a bit over my guys’ heads. And I must apologize to the actors now: Yes, that was William yelling, “Too much talking!” during an early scene. Thank goodness we were part of an audience filled with mommy bloggers and their kids, so we weren’t the only rowdy ones around.

"It's Christmas, Snoopy" Ice Show

Later, we got out of the rain and watched the “It’s Christmas, Snoopy” Ice Show in the Charles M. Schulz Theatre. The kids loved seeing the Peanuts gang on ice skates and in short animated clips between scenes. The music was great and the ice skating was pretty cool.

There’s a bunch of other cool stuff to do at Knott’s Merry Farm that we missed either because we left early (hey, bedtime’s at 7 pm around here and we don’t. mess. with. bedtime.) or because it got rained out. The Peanuts Holiday Parade was, sadly, cancelled due to rain, but seemed like it would be a ton of fun. There’s also the Calico Christmas Tree Lighting show with the Peanuts gang and a beautiful 45-foot-tall Christmas tree. And littler kids will enjoy the “Winter Wonderland” show at Camp Snoopy. My favorite ride at any amusement park has always been the log ride, so I was really bummed to miss out on Knott’s Elf Mountain. The magicians at Knott’s have transformed the Timber Mountain Log Ride into an up-close and personal view into the world of Santa’s Elves, but with me being pregnant and ALL of my boys (husband included) claiming an “allergy” to water that day, we had to skip it.

Calico Christmas Tree

If you live in Southern California or plan to be here over the holidays, I highly recommend checking out Knott’s Merry Farm—especially if you have littler kids. (Don’t worry—there’s plenty for bigger kids to do, too, including a few roller coasters that I am nowhere near brave enough to try out myself.) We had a great time and will definitely be making Knott’s Merry Farm a regular holiday tradition from now on!

This Is A Cry For Help

I need your help. ALL of you.

As you may know, I've spent the last couple of months writing my ass off for the Blogger Idol contest. It's been a wild ride: Many of the posts I wrote made me cry, a few made me laugh, and at least one made me cringe (unicorn sex, anyone?). Early on, I was devastated to be eliminated--only to be brought back with a "save" the next day. I've been pestering my family, friends, and readers for votes every week, and you all have been very patient with me. I appreciate that.

But this is it. There are three of us left, and this week's elimination will determine who makes it to the finale. As I heard Blanche say on "Golden Girls" once, I'm as nervous as a virgin at a rodeo. (By the way, how risque was that show? I think I was too young to fully appreciate it at the time....)

The thing is, I'm up against some heavy-hitters in the voting department. If I'm going to stay in it, this needs to be my biggest week for votes. This week I wrote about what I've learned from blogging and from Blogger Idol. I'd be so grateful if you'd check out my post and vote for me, Crazed in the Kitchen. You can click HERE to get to the voting page. And if you feel inclined to share that link with your own family, friends, and readers, here it is for you to copy and paste: http://www.writersarethenewrockstars.blogspot.com/. Voting requires nothing but a click--no registration, no personal information required. You can vote once per IP address so feel free to go out and find yourself some extra IP addresses, if you know what I mean!

Thank you so much! I really appreciate all of your support!

Vote for Crazed in the Kitchen! Just one click--no registration.

I Haven't Been This Flexible Since High School

Yes, I’ve been “stretching” a lot this past week, but not like you might think. I haven’t taken up yoga or pilates or anything ridiculous like that. No, the stretching I’ve done has been more of the mental variety. Let’s just say I’ve been writing WELL outside of my comfort zone, thanks to Blogger Idol.

And, wow, am I ready to plop ass-first right back into that comfort zone of mine. I positively DREAM about writing about poop, or boogers, or my weekly dance with the city sanitation department again. PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE let me tell you all about the song my 4-year-old son recently made up called “VAGINA!” Just don’t make me write about Unicorn Sex ever, ever, ever again.

Just shoot me.

Yes. I said “Unicorn Sex.” See, right before Thanksgiving, the powers-that-be at Blogger Idol handed me this as my latest assignment: “Write a tutorial about how to breed unicorns.”

(Insert copious amounts of swearing here)

Here’s the thing. I’m not a unicorn person. I don’t really know much about their mythology, I never saw “The Last Unicorn,” and I can’t remember if they poop rainbow or glitter. They’re just not my thing. But I had three choices for my tutorial topic (how to groom a chupacabra, how to breed unicorns, and how to harvest actual buffalo wings and actual chicken fingers), and, well, unicorn mating seemed like it would be the easiest to handle.

(And by “handle” I mean “make up from freaking scratch because unicorns are NOT REAL and, therefore, DO NOT ACTUALLY BREED.”)

Well, I was wrong. This dumb unicorn post might have been harder to write than giving birth to my 2^nd son (a blissfully easy birth) and maybe even more painful. But the good news is that I think I coined a new word: “Uniporn.”

Yep, “Uniporn.”

You’re just going to have to go over to Blogger Idol and read it yourself to see what I mean. And while you’re there, I hope you’ll vote for me, Crazed in the Kitchen. BECAUSE A VOTE FOR ME IS A VOTE FOR UNIC….

Oh crap, forget it. Just vote for me, please?

Vote for Crazed in the Kitchen!

Blogger Idol is down to just FOUR contestants now! While votes count for just 1/3 of each contestant’s overall score (judges’ scores count for the other 2/3), they can make a HUGE difference in the outcome each week. Last assignment, I came in FIRST after the judges’ scores, but ended up tied for 2^nd after voting. Not too shabby, but it could mean the end of me with so few contestants now left. Please vote for Crazed in the Kitchen, and please share liberally on social media! Thank you SO much!

Why I Chose Formula For My Babies, And Why That's OK

I'm in the Top 5! Click here to vote for Crazed in the Kitchen.

Yes, I fed both of my sons formula when they were babies. I have to admit, however, that *I* didn't exactly choose formula so much as my severely under-performing breasts did. But, thanks to formula, my babies survived their infancies and are smart, funny, wonderful little guys today.

But what about women who CAN breastfeed, but choose not to? Are they "bad moms?"

This is what I wrote about for my Blogger Idol post this week: "Don't Tell Me What To Feed My Baby!" It's a topic I am passionate about, given my experience. I hope you'll head over there and read and comment on my post, as well as the other four excellent posts this week. And then I hope you'll vote for me, Crazed in the Kitchen.

In other exciting news, my posts have been featured on BlogHer and Bonbon Break this week! Head over to the Food section of BlogHer to read my post, "The Truth About Wine Labels." And check out the Bedroom on Bonbon Break to read my post about Lung Cancer Awareness. Enjoy!

Regrets, I've Had...Um, Very Few, Actually

I'm lucky to say that I don't have a ton of regrets in my life. Not that there are none, but no one's going to make a movie-of-the-week about my life, either. Pretty standard skeletons here in the Crazed in the Kitchen closet.

So I was surprised at my reaction to my Blogger Idol prompt for this week. Our assignment was this:

Go to Blogger Idol and vote for Crazed in the Kitchen!

Write about a chance that you regret not taking, or a chance that you had, that you didn't take, that may have turned your life in a totally different direction.

Here's the funny thing: Something came to my mind IMMEDIATELY. I mean, the second I read that prompt, I knew what I should write about. But...it was a bit personal. And, to be perfectly honest, I knew it would be difficult to write about, given the complicated emotions tied up in the topic. So for days I tossed around other, more lighthearted, ideas. Here are a few:

What if I had taken that Photography class junior year of high school instead of Journalism? Would I have ended up going to a different college (I went to a journalism school), had different friends, a different job and family now?

Hmm. Interesting to think about for a bit, but probably not much of a post.

Ooooh, I know, what if I write about that time when I was eight years old and I got to get up on stage and play Bozo Buckets on TV on the Bozo Show? What if I had been just a bit more careful and hadn't missed bucket number one? (Yes, that happened, and yes, it was horrifying.) Probably would've been discovered as a child actor and would be eating raw vegan food with Gwyneth Paltrow right now. Right?

Nah.

So, I did it. I wrote the post I was meant to write. I cried a good deal while writing it--both sad and happy tears (and no, this one is not about my mom). It's an issue about which I STILL have mixed feelings. It's about how a decision I made led to the most wonderful things in my life, but also to a lingering sadness. It's about...

Well, you'll just have to head over to Blogger Idol to read my post and find out more. And please vote for me, Crazed in the Kitchen, while you are there!

(Then, look for more Crazed in the Kitchen all over the internet beginning next Monday. My Lung Cancer Awareness post will be running on the wonderful Bonbon Break, and my post "The Truth About Wine Labels" will be up on BlogHer. Check my facebook page later this week for more details.)

Women's Biggest Cancer Enemy--Not What You Might Think

As you were probably aware, October was Breast Cancer Awareness month. It was impossible to miss; pink was everywhere. On social media, in the newspaper, on TV—I even saw our local firefighters wearing pink shirts while they cleaned their trucks recently. Breast cancer is a real threat to women, and increasing awareness, improving screening, and funding research of this disease should continue to be a priority.

But it shouldn’t be the ONLY priority, as far as women-killing cancers go. And it’s possible that it shouldn’t even be our biggest priority. Did you know that there is another cancer that kills roughly twice as many women each year as breast cancer?

It’s lung cancer.

In fact, lung cancer kills more women each year than breast, ovarian, and uterine cancers combined. And, 20 percent of its female victims—like Christopher Reeve’s wife, Dana—were never smokers. So why doesn’t lung cancer receive the attention that breast cancer does?

The main reason is that most people associate lung cancer with smoking and assume, in some way, that lung cancer victims are in part to blame for their disease. I admit, I felt this way for a long time. Until, that is, my mom was diagnosed with Stage IV lung cancer four years ago. Yes, she had been a smoker in her lifetime, though she wasn’t at the time of her diagnosis and hadn’t been for some time.

My mom and her 1st grandson. He was 7 months old when she died.

But the thing is, I had watched my mom try to quit smoking more than once, and I believed her when she told me that it was the hardest thing she had ever done. The truth is that nicotine—the substance in tobacco that makes smokers feel both relaxed AND alert simultaneously—is extremely addictive. (According to a 2010 Time magazine article, ex-heroin users have said that it’s harder to quit smoking than heroin.) Not only that, but between 1998 and 2004 tobacco companies increased the nicotine content of cigarettes by 10 percent. And, while they were making cigarettes MORE addicting, they were also aggressively targeting women in their advertising.

I just learned that November is lung cancer awareness month. Even now, almost four years after my mother’s death, I never knew that. I’m guessing that most people don’t know what lung cancer’s “color” is (white). And I’m guessing that most people don’t know it kills so many women each year. This needs to change. Lung cancer awareness should be on everyone’s minds in November, like breast cancer is in October.

But that’s not enough. The tobacco industry needs to be held accountable for the deadly effects its products have on women. And women of all ages—but especially teens and younger women, who are especially targeted by tobacco companies’ advertising—need to know that they are being preyed upon. Smokers who want to quit should be given the help that they need, rather than being expected to do it on their own, as many do. Economically speaking, our country needs to take further steps toward becoming independent of “Big Tobacco.” (I wish I had suggestions here, but I think I’d need another college degree to fully understand that!)

 My mom had no idea back in the ‘70s and ‘80s that smoking would keep her from knowing her grandkids. She had no idea that it would make her miss her only son’s wedding. She only knew that she felt powerless to stop, even though she wanted to. In her memory, I’ll be wearing a white ribbon this November. I hope, in time, that more people will wear them each November, as well. 

**UPDATED 11/11/12** On December 1, 2012, my 4-year-old son, Matthew, and I will be walking a 5K for lung cancer awareness in honor of my mom, his Grandma GG. If you'd like to donate to this important cause, please go here:
http://bjalcfyournextstepisthecureoc.kintera.org/inmemoryofgrandmagg 

Thank you!

This article was originally posted as my fifth weekly entry as a contestant in Blogger Idol. To see the judges' comments, read it again here. And be sure to follow me on facebook and Twitter to find out about the next round of Blogger Idol, coming up next Wednesday!

Blogger Idol: I'm Out! No, I'm Back In! VOTE FOR ME!!

You can click here to vote for Crazed in the Kitchen

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times...

Click on Bono to vote for me--that's fun, right?

Well, that may be exaggerating a bit. But my last week in Blogger Idol has been a bit of a roller coaster ride, and now I NEED YOUR HELP!

Our last assignment was to work with another contestant and interview each other. I was lucky enough to be paired with Jenn from "Random Thoughts n' Lotsa Coffee." We had a good time getting to know each other and working on the post together. We burned up facebook and gmail chats, and came up with a great post that you can read here.

Best of times, right?

But, alas, it wasn't enough. Fate and the Blogger Idol judges are fickle, and last Friday I learned that we had been eliminated.

Worst of times.

But the Powers That Be of Blogger Idol had a trick up their sleeves, and on Saturday I learned that I had been...SAVED! THAT'S RIGHT--I'M BACK IN BLOGGER IDOL!!!

BEST OF TIMES AGAIN!

Oh, wait. Except now I have to bring it. And by bring it, I mean BRING IT. Because now I have to prove that they didn't make a mistake in bringing me back.

You could also click here to vote for me

*gulp*

Of course, this week's assignment just HAD to be a doozy: Write about a day in the life of your family as if you were superheroes (click here if you'd like to play at home). Well, I did my best, and as of NOON CST on Wednesday, my post is live at Blogger Idol. You'll have to click over to read it, but let me give you a tease:

My superfamily's super alter egos are called "The Vaginator," "WhereDaddy," "The Inquisitor," and "Ole Blue Eyes." 

Intrigued? Head over there, read it, and vote! (Um, vote for Crazed in the Kitchen, that is.)

That's right--votes make a huge difference every week! And like I said, I need to bring it this week--with my post and with the votes. So please, let's show those Blogger Idol head honchos that they made the right decision in bringing me back. VOTE FOR CRAZED IN THE KITCHEN!!

Thanks!

Clicking here to vote for me is by far the most fun, don't you think?