Coast 2 Coast Mom

Style Me, Mom's Fashion Files: I've Become a Techcessory!

This post is my entry into the fabulous Mom's Fashion File contest for an opportunity to win a personal style session during BlogHer 2011. Wish me luck! :-D

I can see it in the eyes of my long distance family and friends when we see them after long spells and know I look visibly worse for the wear. Carrying more weight than the last time they saw me? Yep. Looking a bit less stylish? Sigh. These past two years lamenting the transition from office professional to work from home mom have taken the toll on my inner soul to my outward appearance.

What hasn’t changed, though is my interest and involvement in the tech industry. Working from my home office across the country has isolated me from the fashionable friends I used to be so in tune with just a few short years ago. Unfortunately, I'm not near my trusted mom or sisters to tell me the honest truth – in the nicest possible way saying:

“Why don’t you coach our Girls on the Run Team with us?”

Highlights from Getting Gorgeous with Degree in NYC

Earlier this spring I had the opportunity to attend a fabulous Getting Gorgeous with Degree event hosted by blogging friends Vera of Lady and the Blog and Audrey of MomGenerations. Not only was it fun to catch up with so many of my NYC tri-state blogging friends, but it was a great opportunity to learn more about many of the fashion, health and beauty sponsors for the event. I would have snapped more photos if I hadn't been chatting so much!! I definitely won't think twice if I get another opp to attend a Getting Gorgeous event :-D

 

 

Here's a few of the Getting Gorgeous with Degree highlights for me:

Wear Red on Friday and Capture My Flag for Heart Health

February is all about hearts and Diet Coke is reminding women not to forget about their own. In support of the National Heart Lung and Blood Institute's effort to celebrate American Heart Month with The Heart Truth campaign, Diet Coke is helping to send an important message to women about the risks of heart disease, the leading cause of death for American women.

Diet Coke's Capture The Flag campaign places heart flags both in the real world and online. When you find one in your real life (check in using Facebook Places) or find one online on popular websites, you can trigger donations to heart health programs. You can also plant your own flag online (like I have here on this site - over to the right) and if someone clicks on it, Diet Coke will donate $.10 to this important cause. So go click on mine!

. . .and please note that this Friday, February 4th is National Wear Red Day - to show that "Heart Disease Doesn't Care What You Wear-It's the #1 Killer of Women," - so please wear red in support of combatting heart disease. 

ER visit while traveling with your kid? Been there. Done that.

With only one child so far, there's a wealth of situations that I know c2cDad and I won't ever encounter. Like Bill Cosby mentions in one of his comedy specials from the '80s, with one kid, you don't have to go through the rigmarole of discerning who it was that broke something. With one kid, you know who did it.

I was hoping we'd also avoid many of the middle of the night scares and ER trips with just one, but this holiday season proved me wrong. A trip to the ER while traveling? Check.

NYC Marathon Goes Green with the LEAF

Tomorrow is the 41st running of the New York City Marathon, and continuing the theme of a healthy and green lifestyle is a not-so-surprising sponsor of this year's event: the Nissan LEAF. The LEAF is the official pace car of the 2010 ING New York City Marathon, and for the first time, the front runners won't be breathing in a trail of car exhaust. . . because this year's car is 100% electric.

 

I unfortunately was unable to make my appointment today to get a personal overview of the Nissan LEAF at the pre-marathon health and fitness expo; however, I've been so interested in the car that I thought I'd share a few details with you:

• The LEAF has a range of 100 miles per charge based upon US EPA LA4 City cycle
• The SL model has a photovoltaic solar panel rear spoiler
• It comes with CARWINGS™ - an in-car telematics system that displays battery power, nearby charging stations, and allows for remote connection to the LEAF

You can have a chance to check out the car as it makes its way through a multi-venue tour and receive some free merchandise courtesy of the ING NYC Marathon partners, and even enter to win a sweepstakes for a chance to win a new LEAF! For each day's location, follow @NissanLEAF on Twitter.

Passing Along Info from Eggland's Best

In the midst of all of the news about eggs tainted with salmonella, I'm thinking that it was pretty well-timed that I had the opportunity to meet with one BlogHer sponsor in particular: Eggland's Best. Their presence there was priceless in hindsight, considering 1) the news that has broken since then, and 2) that they just had the opportunity to strike up relationships with the 2,400 bloggers attending the conference, to communicate with about how their eggs are safe to consume and unaffected by the salmonella outbreak.

Lucky us we just so happen to purchase Eggland's Best brand, or pick them up from our local Abma's Farm market - and a container of Eggbeaters too of course. ;-) I was happy to see the Eggland's Best booth and even won a carton of eggs for playing their jackpot game on the BlogHer expo floor. (Doesn't it just tickle your toes when you win something that you already like and use?)

This week EB sent me an email comforting me in understanding that Eggland's Best eggs are not included in the massive nationwide egg recall. As I know some of you are prone to worrying like me, I thought I'd share with you a bit of what they emailed me and point you to the FDA's Newsroom to learn more about the egg recall, and to the EB site to learn a bit more about Eggland's Best eggs.

Cooking and Baking with Stonyfield Yogurt

Last week I had the pleasure of attending a cooking demonstration at the De Gustibus Cooking School at Macy's Herald Square with green nutritionist Kate Geagan, MD. I learned some of the healthy benefits of substituting organic yogurt or Greek yogurt for other ingredients like sour cream, mayonnaise or oil in recipes. I got to watch Kate cook up some delicious Tangerine-Maple Yogurt glazed chicken and tasted her roasted red pepper cold soup, salmon spread, blueberry muffin, and my favorite, pot de creme - all "healthified." with Stonyfield yogurt. Check out part of her cooking demonstration in the video below and definitely try the Pot de Crème recipe found on the Stonyfield site.
 

Lastly, I appreciated learning more about Stonyfield Organics, as my other interaction with the brand has been with Yo Baby Yogurt and the movie Food Inc. One of the most fascinating things that I took away from the event was less so about the yogurt and more about their organic farming practices and the creation of The Greener Cow Project. By simply changing the diet of the cows, which includes alfalfa, flax and grasses, they've been able to increase the milk's omega-3 content and decrease saturated fats organically. This diet has a side benefit as well, reducing cows' burbs, which as hilarious as that may seem, the burbs contain methane, and in great enough quantities are harmful to the Earth's atmosphere as the emissions are a contributor to greenhouse gases. You'll have to read it to believe it...

Let's Move: Parents Take Action Against Childhood Obesity

Recently the Silicon Valley Moms Group contributors were invited to participate on a call with U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack to discuss some of the new initiatives being put forth to improve the school lunch programs from a federal level.  This call took place in support of Michelle Obama's Let's Move initiative launch today. I was bummed to have missed the call (don't worry - I wasn't TOO bummed, being at Disney World afterall! ;-) )

I had access to the notes of some of the other SVMoms participants and have been reading their posts from the call this morning, and wanted to chime in myself as my perspective hasn't been reflected. The purpose of the call was to educate moms on the current state of school lunches and discuss reauthorizing the Childhood Nutrition Act and increasing school funding for more fresh fruits and vegetables in school lunches. (Which is a TOTAL no-brainer for most moms.) I learned that the U.S. provides lunches to 30 million children a year, and serves breakfast to around 10 million, making school lunches a critical component in the Let's Move initiative to combat childhood obesity. 

How Vicks Saved My Marriage This Weekend...OR How I Got My Humility Back

Last fall I was honored to have attended a FABULOUS luncheon at Spa Chakra in NYC hosted by Vicks. The "Breathe Life In" event was fabulous in that it was well organized, featured friendly informative speakers, offered healthful food, and was in a beautifully sunny and relaxing setting. (Even the spa display shelves leading to our meeting room sylishly showcased the new Vicks products - c'est chic!) About a dozen or so local NYC-area bloggers participated in the luncheon to learn more about this year's new product line from Vicks, and we heard from Procter & Gamble employees Dr. Crystal Harrell, Vicks global ER manager; Dianna Kenneally, principal scientist; and Stefanie Ferrari, a pharmacist.

Join Me In Taking The Pearl Pledge - It Doesn't Cost a Dime, and May Save A Life

Womens healthcare is a hot button for me, as I find that many women manage the health of their family members, their careers, the household, and seem to let their own healthcare slip through the cracks. It doesn't happen on purpose. It's as easy as leaving the dentist and telling them to just send you a postcard because there's no way you can commit to an appointment six months from then as you race out the door to pick up a child from an event or get back into the office. Then the postcard arrives, and it gets buried in a drawer or on a desk pile, and when you finally get back into the dentist, it's been a year and you now need a root canal. (Not that this has happened to me, but it isn't far from the truth. I wouldn't be surprised if it does happen - and often.)