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Monday’s Mama is Inspiring AF.

Published on February 5, 2018 by Darlene Dee3 Comments

**This month I’m dedicating all of the Mondays to Mamas in Colorado. Hey, y’all, hey. Let me infiltrate, please and thank you.**

Please meet Shabana Waheed of Fierce Living. Shabana lives in Denver, Colorado, and she is pretty freaking cool. Shabana is married to her very first match on eHarmony, and they have one daughter and she’s currently knocked up with another sex tbd. (Congratulations, Shabana!!) Also, check out that title picture. This chick can wing her eyeliner like WHOA.

Shabana really does live her life fiercely. She has Hashimoto’s thyroiditis and Celiac disease, both autoimmune diseases, but they do not stop her from pursuing her fitness goals and staying active. She has lost seventy pounds so far which is AMAZING. She’s currently growing a person using only her body, but still hopes to stay active and healthy during her pregnancy.

And because everyone likes a before and after pic, check this out.

Also check out that super fly unicorn hat. WANT.

Shabana is all about fitness (obvs), health (double duh), product reviews (she is also a HUGE contributor to Guidance Guide), electronic dance music, dancing, and staying as fierce as possible. Fierce Living encompasses most of this, though I haven’t seen any videos of her dancing at a rave yet. Maybe next week.

Shabana was nice enough to answer some questions from this Colorado newbie. Thanks, girlie!

1. What is the coolest thing about Colorado? What is the most annoying thing about Colorado? What is the Colorado-est thing about Colorado?

The coolest thing about Colorado is that we have the mountains not that far from Denver. There are so many Winter and Summer activities to do. Our weather changes a lot but most of the time it is sunny, which is great. But again the most annoying thing about Colorado can also be the weather as well. It can be 75 degrees one day and snowing blizzard the next. It’s crazy but cool. The most Colorado-est thing about Colorado is people who are from Colorado are proud to be from Colorado. We love our state flag, displaying it, stickers on the car, shirts, hats… we love it all, we are proud!

(Darlene here. Note to self — gotta get a flag.)

2. I love the name of your blog. I love the idea of living fiercely. What is something we mamas can do everyday to live fiercely?

One thing that moms can do to live fiercely is to remember to take care of themselves. So often we treat ourselves last or forget about ourselves altogether and we are left feeling empty. I believe in taking time for yourself. Whether that’s going to Target alone and leaving the kids with your husband or partner or tag teaming with another Mom friend. I like to get my hair dyed, go out with friends or just relax in bed alone. Making sure you get “me” time to recharge is a way to stay the fiercest version of yourself! You are important! Take care of YOU!

3. Everyone outside Colorado wants to know: are people here walking around high all the time? What are your thoughts on the legal weed?

Are people walking around high all the time? Well, I’m not. I mean, there are definitely people who are but I haven’t really seen a huge difference in my interaction with the public. I am not opposed to legal weed use. I do hope people are being responsible but you know there are always those few who make everyone else look bad. That comes with the territory, I think. I did vote yes for the legalization. I have seen it help people in their day to day lives and I believe more research needs to be done on the benefits of cannabis. There are huge possibilities, I believe.

4. It’s the PTA Bakesale: homemade, store bought, or NOPE?

I’m usually a nope mom but I LOVE TO BAKE so I’d probably bake some gluten free cupcakes that are decorated. I particularly love decorating cakes and cupcakes, so that’s my jam.

Darlene again. OMFG I love the phrase ‘nope mom.’ We should all strive to be ‘nope moms.’

Read her blog or follow her on Instagram. Get some Fierceness in your life.

Summer Bugs Me.

Published on June 11, 2017June 14, 2017 by Darlene Dee5 Comments

I love most things about the summertime. I love the longer days and the grilled dinners and the splashy water play time.

I do not love the mosquitos. And ants and locusts and spiders and gnats and bees (ok I kind of love the bees in theory), but mostly the mosquitos.

We like to use up all the sunshine and stay at the park until dusk which means walking back home during the Mosquito Happy Hour.

Babystar was getting new bites every day. But also, chemicals.

WHAT IS A GOOD HIPPIE MAMA TO DO?

I’m still not sure, but I did buy some DEET-free bug repellent made up of a blend of essential oils. (Kid’s Herbal Armor Natural Insect Repellent $5.50.) It had KIDS and NATURAL right in the name.

Two things:

I don’t know what DEET is but it sounds bad.
I don’t believe essential oils can cure illnesses but I do know that certain plants repel insects so it seemed legit.

I really wasn’t sure what I was looking for but I compared the active ingredients at Target. The Kid’s Herbal Armor had a bunch of oils (citronella, lemongrass, peppermint, et cetera) that were almost identical to the Babyganics and Honest Company kid’s bug repellents.

I bought the Kid’s Herbal Armor because it was $5.50 instead of $9.49 or $12.34. To be fair, the Babyganics and Honest Company’s bottles were larger, but I wanted to make sure it worked first. Maybe we needed the DEET after all? (WTF IS DEET?!?)
The first evening, I only rubbed the insect repellent on Babystar’s ankles, a popular hangout for Arlington mosquitoes. She has pretty sensitive skin and I wanted to make sure there was no reaction. She made it home with no rash and zero bites on her legs!

Those fuckers bit her arm instead.

The next night, I used the Herbal Armor on her legs AND arms. She was bite-free! I have been keeping her arms and legs coated and it is still working. I don’t put it near her face at all but I do a little swipe behind her neck, and she usually has a hat on for extra protection.

I highly recommend this natural bug repellent. Probably the Babyganics and/or Honest ones are good too, since the active ingredients are almost identical. But I have not tried them so I cannot say for sure.

RAISING BABYSTAR: $18,090.14

What kind of bug repellent do you use for your kids or yourself?

Lost in the Park.

Published on June 11, 2017June 12, 2017 by Darlene Dee14 Comments

This is the last known photograph of Babystar’s favorite water bottle.

It was a blue and yellow (and metal) smaller size Contigo that her grandparents gave to her during her last visit to Myrtle Beach. Blue and yellow are her favorite colors! She loved pushing the button so the straw would pop up! (She could actually open and close it herself and it was still 100% leak-proof in my bag.) And Contigo beverage containers are magic so her water stayed cold all day!

(Seriously, Contigo makes MAGICAL containers. My coffee stays hot for literal hours. This is the most important thing for me as a SAHM so yay Contigo.)

Alas.

We totally left Babystar’s favorite cup at the park last Tuesday. I would have gone back to fetch it but I didn’t realize it until about 10pm and I knew the squirrels had likely taken it by then. Lucky squirrels. I hope they at least figure out how to get the straw open.

I was devastated. Like, way more upset than I needed to be over a freaking sippy cup.

Amazon Prime to the rescue — almost. Apparently, there are no more blue and yellow ones. But at least her water will be cold again. $15.99. (Hella expensive for a child’s cup but completely worth it.)

RAISING BABYSTAR: $18,084.64

MAYDAY MAYDAY: Parents, what is your kid’s favorite kind of on-the-go cup? What is YOUR favorite?

Snacks, Pals, and SnackPals

Published on February 26, 2017April 9, 2017 by Darlene Dee2 Comments

AKA That Time I Tried Tryazon.

Have you ever heard of Tryazon? The concept is pretty cool. You sign up and they email you ‘party opportunities’ which is code for ‘free stuff in exchange for free marketing.’ All well and good, fair is fair and all that jazz. When you see an email that interests you, you fill out a short application and Tryazon then chooses a certain amount of ‘party hosts’. (Usually 100 but I have seen less.) You get a box of goodies and have a party inviting your friends over to check out these goodies and then post about it on social media.*

If you check #tryazon over on my Twitter or IG, you will see some pictures of my party.

I invited about a million people, but the party day turned out to be the first 70+ degree day in our area in MONTHS (last Friday), so lots of mamas took their children outside to play instead. I don’t even blame them. I would have done the same thing. Don’t worry, I did take Babystar to a park before the sun set. I’m not a MONSTER.

Before I knew that only a few (wonderful, stunningly gorgeous) friends would turn up, I went to Trader Joe’s that morning and spent $44.09 on fruit and cheeses and crackers and a few bottles of sparkly stuff to drink. Non-alcoholic because BOOOOOOORING but also because it was the middle of the afternoon and I have too much responsibility for day drinking these days. Which, quite frankly, sometimes very much sucks but here we are.

Oh wait, I ate a 0.19 banana while shopping so that’s actually $43.90.

Tryazon sent me plastic snack dispensers called SnackPals from a company called Wow Gear. They also sent a Wow Cup, a cool looking game to play from Madd Capp Games, and three different types of snacks to fill the dispensers (goldfish, gummis, and Cheerios).

Ok, so I signed up to do this to see if I was a ‘Brand Ambassador’ type of person. I am not. I am more of an ‘honest review’ type person. I never really learned that lesson about ‘if you can’t say anything nice, STFU.’ I think I will not be asked back. Whoops.

I WILL say that one mama LOVED the SnackPals dispenser. She went home with two of them — the unopened door prize and one of the demos. She said that her son refused to stick his hand into that other variety of snack containers. You know the kind I mean; there are several on the market but they all have a sort of plastic seal with a scary claw like opening that keeps the snacks from spilling out. We have the ubbi tweat container and Babystar digs it. (We had two and lost one and I don’t miss it enough to replace it. So there’s that.)

The point of the SnackPals container is portion control snacks for kids while on-the-go. Or while at home, too, I guess. You fill it with snacks (goldfish or gummis or m&ms if you are competing for favorite parent that day), turn it upside down, give it a solid shake or two, turn it right side up, then open the top to dispense a small portion of snacks. That totally happened when the adults experimented.

However, a three year old in attendance could not figure out how to work it or even open it. That is unfortunate because I kind of think three-year-olds are about the perfect target audience. The one year olds ignored it, even when they saw that there were snacks inside. The five year old shook and dispensed, shook and dispensed, over and over so there was no portion control aspect other that a parent saying hey that’s enough which we could do with literally any container.

The five year old quickly became the hero among the children there and wielded her power like a proper Snack Princess.

Because we were FULLY COMMITTED to this product review, we even checked to see if it fit in the stroller. It did not (we only checked the one already open and parked out front but dude).

Also, it has no handles. Little fingers need handles. Mamas holding seventeen things need handles. If it’s not going to have handles, then it should at least fit in a stroller-sized cupholder. Right?

The Wow Cup sippy cup COULD NOT BE SPILLED. If all you are looking for in a cup is that it can not be spilled, look no further. But also, not a single one of the six children at the party could drink from it. (Yes, I washed it in between tries while wishing Tryazon had sent more than one for review. And to be fair, the four month old baby didn’t even try. Lazy baby.) Even I couldn’t get any water out. A couple of other ADULT WOMEN with brains could not get any water out. One of the mamas in attendance luckily had a similar sippy cup for her one year old and told us that we had to sort of squeeze/bite the sides to make it work. We did. It worked. But WHY would you want to teach your child to bite the lip of a cup?!? What about when they drink out of a glass made of ACTUAL GLASS?!? Seems dangerous to me. Hard pass.

(But then later that night I made my husband try it, you know, for research, and he drank with no problem and didn’t even understand my confusion. So, obviously, I need to replace our wine glasses with plastic and metal.)

We did not play the included game at the party. It looks really fun, and it will be played very soon at a child’s birthday party, and I think it will be perfect. It is labeled for players age six and up (which is why we didn’t play it and quite frankly why would you send that particular game along with snack dispensers and a sippy cup??) and it is for 3-13 players. I think the girls will have a blast playing at the party.

The party was fun. Parties are fun. But I would have rather spent $40 on a party on a day of MY choosing and not had the conversation center around baby products. Well, the conversation almost always gets around to baby products anyway because we mamas are #basic like that, and I guess it was kind of fun to have something new to experiment with, so I guess I might do it again but I am pretty sure I will not be asked to do it again.

RAISING BABYSTAR: $14,882.78

*Now the Tryazon web site has an option for something called ‘Tryabox’ where they ship you something to review and you don’t have to commit to a party and that sounds really cool. I like parties but again: $43.90. Which I know I did not HAVE to spend (and I definitely have leftover snacks) but what kind of host invites adult people to a party and offers them only Cheerios? Not me.