Get Your Glow On: Vaseline Spray & Go Moisturizer

The invention of spray-on sunscreen was a game changer at chez guru girl. Summer mornings no longer resemble the steer-wrestling event at the rodeo. This is because the sprayed on version of sunscreen is so much better than the lotion form that the Dynamic Duo happily stand still for the daily application.

Imagine this nirvana for yourself and daily moisturizing, a process which I know many of you skip because, like me, each morning you’re trying to get everyone else ready and out of the house too. Who cares about their own moisturized arms and legs when the first grader seems to have forgotten pants?!

In winter, this is fine rationale. Now however, it is spring, and that rationale has got us looking scaly, not supple. And the spring fashion magazines say scaly is on trend for your bag, not your leg.

Luckily, there is a remedy, and it is just as quick as spray-on sunscreen. Because it’s spray-on moisturizer for your body. It’s called Vaseline Spray & Go Moisturizer. You spritz yourself with this light mist, and it absorbs faster than the winning couple breaks up on “The Bachelor”. Actually, even faster because the company promises no greasy residue on your clothes. Score! Am off to Target now to score myself some of this moisturizer and some Easter candy too. Happy Spring, indeed! It’s available for around $8 at drugstores. (Click this link to find Vaseline Spray & Go Moisturizer on overstock.com.)

The Family Ski Vacation & Other Spring Break Tips

Proof there is a God, and he/she has a killer sense of humor: family ski vacations.

I’m on one now. And someone has to be getting a kick out of the chaos.

That someone isn’t my fella, who we’ve nicknamed Ski Butler. The ski butler gets a particularly grim look on his face each morning as he becomes a buckling/zipping/tightening/toting dervish, in an attempt to get us all ski ready.

I might also not be enjoying the chaos as much as I should, mostly because my body has been awash in fear. Our first day out it was beautiful, the Dynamic Duo were in ski school, the Ski Butler was on a conference call for work, and I had a morning on the slopes to myself.

I became so excited that I hurried to the nearest lift and jumped on. Thirty seconds into the ride, on the bouncing ski lift with no safety bar, I remembered my fear of heights.

My fear of heights is something of a new development, kind of like sun damage. So even though I grew up riding this rickety, old ski lift, fear had never been a factor. Now, however, fear seems to be the only factor. I sat there alone, with heart racing, ears thrumming and one thought screaming through my mind, “MUST GET OFF THIS LIFT IMMEDIATELY.”

Not really an option. Because having a full-fledged panic attack on the lift wasn’t really a good option either, I focused on the tree line and sang “You Are My Sunshine” the entire way up the mountain. Out loud.

Obviously, since I’m typing this, I made it. And the vacation continues to get better. I found a nice, low ski lift that works just fine for me. The ski butler’s skills are growing too. Yesterday the boot buckles were so tight no one’s boot fell off with the ski still attached, a big difference from the previous day.

Yesterday something else unthinkable happened: the Dynamic Duo didn’t want to get off the mountain. That’s how much fun they were having… with us, their panic-attack-having, grim faced parents!

That’s something else that comes with age: how thrilled you are when your kids are thrilled. Not by a new video game or outfit. But when your kids are thrilled by something you’ve done together as a family, you feel like you’ve won the lottery.

And maybe that’s what God intended when he designed family ski vacations. Or maybe he was just up for some comic relief… which the guru girl crew has provided in spades this week.

Happy spring break, guru girls & guys!

12 Titles That Aren't Dostoyevsky & You'll Like A Lot More

I have a confession that brings me shame. Sometimes I buy the books that are recommended in “People” magazine. This is a terrible thing, I know, and it may get me kicked out of the intelligentsia. Or at least viewed with disdain by my serious reader friends.

Here’s the thing: A lot of the time “People” book recommendations are pretty good. Just like they have a nose for figuring out which celebs are getting horizontal, “People” has a nose for decent books. We’re not talking War and Peace here, but if you’re looking for decent literary fiction, you could do worse. I read Truth In Advertising (reviewed earlier), and I just finished The Good House, because “People” recommended them. Both were good books. Not popcorn. Not Dostoyevsky. Somewhere in between.

Neither has made it onto my list of favorites. Which include:

- Life of Pi

- Bel Canto

- Cold Mountain

- I Capture The Castle

- Middlesex

- Everything Is Illuminated

- The Time Traveler’s Wife

- In The Fall

- The History Of Love (by Krauss)

- The Miracle Life Of Edgar Mint

- Fluke

- Cutting For Stone

But if, like me, you often take a break between bigger reads, check out “People” recommends for a good in-betweener book. You can do this while waiting in line at the grocery store. Peruse “People” magazine’s book page instead of getting suckered in by the Enquirer headline. No good can come from trying to figure out which celebrity has ballooned in size, been snapped at the beach and had her head blurred out beneath the headline “Guess Who This Is?” But a lot of good can come from checking out “People”, like reading The Good House by Ann Leary for instance.

1 Step To A Happier Dog: Green Interactive Feeder

I have friends who arrange play dates for their dogs. I have difficulty being organized enough to arrange play dates for my kids. So I admire this level of dedication. But I’m unlikely to find it within myself anytime soon, despite the fact that our dog is clearly bored and compulsive. So I like when magazines offer a solution I can buy. Like this one I just read about: the Green Interactive Feeder!

This gizmo is like a puzzle for dogs. You hide Fido’s kibble in it, and he has to search it out piece by piece. This is a winner on two fronts:

 

 1) It helps prevent the “growing problem of pet obesity”. This is according to the product’s inventors. (Really? This is a problem we should be worried about?)

 2) It keeps your pet entertained.

Personally, I would be really annoyed if my fella made me find my food every time he whipped up a meal for me, but that’s exactly what I’m going to do for Stanley, our dog. The interactive feeder promises to engage him mentally, quiet his anxiety and slim him down.

Actually, these benefits are exactly what I need. Why don’t they make this sort of stuff for people?! It’s available on amazon.com for $31.50. (To learn more about the Green Interactive Feeder on amazon.com, click this link.) 

Best Book Ever: "Wonder" by Palacio

I love inspirational sayings. The only thing that stops me from embroidering my favorites and framing them is that it’s a weird, old lady thing to do (and also I don’t know how to embroider). But I’m all about a good precept.

I recently came across a great one in, of all places, a kid’s book. It said, “Your deeds are your monuments.”

This, by itself, was interesting. Then it got even more so. The book’s hero, 12 year old Auggie, wrote a paragraph about what these words meant to him. Here’s what Auggie wrote: 

“This precept means that we should be remembered for the things we do. The things we do are the most important things of all. They are more important than what we say or what we look like. The things we do outlast our mortality. The things we do are like monuments that people build to honor heroes after they’ve died. They’re like the pyramids that the Egyptians built to honor the pharaohs. Only instead of being made out of stone, they’re made out of the memories people have of you. That’s why your deeds are like your monuments. Built with memories instead of with stone (Palacio, 2012, p. 65).”

Wow. These words of wisdom are from the book Wonder by R.J. Palacio. The book is about Auggie, a child with a severe facial deformity. What happens to Auggie when he hits 6^th grade and attends school for the first time? What does the experience teach Auggie, his family and his classmates about the choices that unite and divide us?

It’s one of the best books I’ve ever read. The resident 10 year old loved it too. She had to check a copy out of her school library just so we could read it at the same time. Because neither one of us wanted to put it down. That’s how easy it was to read and yet buried in those pages were some really great insights. About courage and friendship and pressure and change.

It’s one of those books that’s special. It would work for kids as young as 3^rd grade. And the dialogue it’ll inspire at your house? Ageless. Because these topics are just as relevant at 40 as they are at 14. We can’t control friendship, pressure or change. But we can control our choices, the decisions that determine what our personal monument looks like. (Click this link to learn more about "Wonder" by Palacio on amazon.com, where you can purchase it for around $9.)

2 Ways To Beat Common Kitchen Problems

This is me in Disneyworld, with poultry that made me laugh instead of wince.

 

I believe there’s nothing worse than touching raw chicken. This is one of the reasons I could never be a surgeon. A little thing called SAT scores would be the other reason. Human body parts can’t be that different from the chicken thighs I just got at the grocery store.

This is the sort of thing I think about as I cut open the chicken package and arrange the slimy pieces on the baking sheet.

It is absolutely disgusting. And yet it’s a task I do every single week because chicken is a dinner staple. There has to be a better way. So I gave it some thought: What is it about the process that really repulses me? How could I make it better?

I came up with the solution just this morning, thanks to the twisted thinking that had me pondering surgeons who have to touch slimy things like hearts. Surgeons wear disposable gloves.

I could also wear disposable gloves! I could order them up online and keep a box of them in my kitchen. In fact, as soon as I post this blog entry, that’s exactly what I’m going to do. (If you want to do so too, click this link to go to amazon.com where you can get a box of 500 disposable gloves for around $12.)

Think about a task you dread. Break it down. What is it exactly that makes you hate it? How could you minimize this part? Do it, and don’t worry if it makes you look silly. (How is anyone going to know? Unless you’re foolish enough to write a blog and offer it up as “expertise”?)

I also hate cutting up onions because the process makes my eyes burn. Now I buy my onions pre-cut, which is a little spendy, but when I was a newlywed-on-a-budget I kept my snorkel goggles in a kitchen drawer and would wear them when cutting up onions. It worked great, and the only downside I had to endure was a little teasing from my fella. 

Don’t let life’s chores get you down, guru girls & guys. Apply some creativity and tackle them with gusto (and/or ask your friends what they do). The “phone a friend” option is also very good when your creativity well is running dry.    

Movie Review: "Side Effects"

I’m not one for pretty boy actors. And if their off screen hijinks include lame treatment of women? They’re off my hunk list forever. This is why I’ve never been a big fan of Jude Law.

But I am a big fan of date night at the movies, which is where I found myself yesterday, confronted by a terrible slate of films, except one, less terrible option: “Side Effects”. This movie stars Jude Law and that other pretty boy actor I just don’t like the look of: Channing Tatum. The movie was billed as a suspenseful thriller. It was showing at the right time. My fella and I were in.

 

The movie is indeed suspenseful and thrilling. It also provided us with a first in our relationship. I hate onscreen violence so when it’s happening I watch my fella’s face instead of the movie. When the bad part’s over he gives me the nod to go back to watching. Last night my fella gave me the nod and what do you know? The most violent part happened, right before my eyes. It was that unexpected and shocking!

 

It’s a good thing I wasn’t the one holding the Raisinettes. I was so startled I would have dropped them for sure. I did this once, in Boston, and spent the remainder of the movie scrunched up, sitting criss-cross-apple-sauce on my seat, because I was sure Boston rats would be at my feet, nibbling on the spilled Raisinettes and possibly my toes.

 

This was the kind of creeped out feeling I got from the movie “Side Effects”. The movie’s about a depressed gal (Roonie Mara) and what happens when the drugs prescribed to help her end up hurting her. This is the kind of movie that keeps you guessing about who’s bad, who’s good and what in the heck the director was thinking in casting Channing Tatum as a genius financier. One who wears twerpy hats and white buckskin shoes. Clearly, the wardrobe lady for this film isn’t going to be nabbing any Oscars. Neither are any of the actors.

 

Because the film’s not exactly high art. But it does engage you and make you thankful if the extent of your mental fogginess is an inability to remember where you left the car keys. Because poor Roonie Mara can’t remember much about the car keys or anything else really. Is her malfunctioning brain to blame? Her medication? Her therapists? Pharmaceutical marketing campaigns?

 

There are lots of indictments here. Kind of like the “Women Tell All” episode on “The Bachelor”. And though that’s not high art either, sometimes that’s just what you’re in the mood for.