Don't Let Someone Else Drag Your Health Down!

Everyone wants to take care of themselves right? Surely it only makes sense that, since we only get one body, that every single person would want to take as much care of their health as possible. Sadly this isn't the case. As strange as it might sound, but there are a lot of people out there who simply aren't that interested in keeping themselves healthy. It's probably not something that they're doing intentionally, a lot of the time people's unhealthy lifestyles and behaviors come from a lack of awareness of the impact it's having on their body. It's a shame that it's happening but if that's what they want to do then you can't really stop them, the major problem is when other people's poor decision making starts to have a negative impact on your life. With that in mind, here are some situations where other people's behavior could damage your health, and how to stop that from happening.

Accidents on the road

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You might be the safest driver in the world, but there's still a chance that something could happen. This is because, for every careful, considerate driver on the road, there's another one who has no interest in their own safety or the safety of anyone else. The best way to deal with these kinds of drivers is something called "defensive driving." Defensive driving is essentially a method of driving where you're constantly aware of and predicting potential hazards. That way you're in a much better position to avoid them. Of course, you won't be able to avoid everything, especially if someone is determined to drive like a maniac. If you are in an accident, then you should hire a personal injury lawyer so that you can make sure that the other person's lack of responsibility doesn't need to have more of a negative impact on your life than it already has. 

Your partner's diet

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It's hard enough taking care of your own diet, let alone having to think about someone else's. It's surprisingly common that one person in a relationship will be much more conscious of their health than the other. It can be surprisingly difficult to eat healthily and stay active when your partner is constantly buying greasy, unhealthy food. For one thing, having to work around two diets can be pretty expensive, not only that but it's often very tempting to go for a quick, unhealthy fix instead of something healthier after a long day at work. Make sure that you talk to your partner and try to get them to support your attempts to become healthier, for your benefit and theirs.

Your friend's lifestyle

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Everyone likes to have a good time now, and then. There's nothing wrong with that! But we all have that one friend who just seems determined to take it too far. They seem to want to go out every single night, and when they do, they behave as if they've never heard the word moderation in their life! Even if you choose not to drink as much as they do, the late nights and lack of sleep that come with this kind of lifestyle are going to catch up with you eventually. Talk to your friend, and if they're not willing to try to quieter nights in every so often, it might be a good idea to spend some time apart so that you can take care of your health.

Not All Kids Eat Like Kids

I haven't posted about anything personal in so long, so I thought I'd post about my favorite 70-year-old son. Yes, I said seventy. William has such an old soul so I always say he is a 70-year-old man in a 7-year-old body. I wanted to share some things about William's eating habits. He is a very good eater. He exclusively likes foodie-food, meaning NO snacks. When I say no snacks, this means no cookies, chips, fruit, crackers, ice-cream or any candy.. at all. 

Any time we attend parties or functions where there will be food, I panic. You see, William likes home-cooked food-- rice, beans, chicken, veggies and pasta. If you gave him rice with any type of meat, veggie or beans for every meal, he would be so happy. When we are at a party where there will be pizza, cake and ice-cream this means he will not be eating. He may have a couple bites of pizza, but that's it. For his birthday we don't bother with cake because he simply doesn't like it. He recently started to enjoy Krispy Kreme doughnuts and Cinnabon cinnamon rolls. That is the extent of his tolerance for any sweets. When he gets Halloween candy, he gives it to his big sisters. He won't have anything to do with it. The kid doesn't even eat chicken nuggets, tacos or any normal kid food. I think the only exception is mac & cheese. He started taking a lot of interest in what goes into his food and likes to help in the kitchen. He loves to help season food and calls himself a "Tony Chachere's man". His thing is as long as food has flavor, he will eat it. He informed me that maybe when he is 13, he will like snacks and sweets.

People are often stunned to find out that he only eats real food and tell me how lucky we are to have a healthy eater. They are right about that, but it sure would be nice if he could eat regular stuff on occasion to make life easier. Some may call him a picky eater, but the truth is, he's a particular eater. He knows exactly what he likes and doesn't like. I guess for now he will continue to be a foodie as he calls himself. Life with a 70 year old kid, gotta love it!

Do your kids have any odd eating habits?

Things that are making me so happy right now.

Today I laughed HYSTERICALLY in the car on the way home from picking the girls up from school. I am talking full abdominal pain, tears from my eyes and coughing from laughing so hard. My sunglasses even fogged up. Man, that was some good laughter! 

Today William was complaining about "those meddling kids". He loves old school Scooby Doo. As a matter of fact, he loves all the old cartoons like Tom & Jerry, Yogi Bear, The Snorks, The Smurfs and more. Sure beats Sponge Bob any day! 

This salad is made from baby organic greens (kale, spinach, arugula and others) dried cranberries, sliced almonds, feta cheese and balsamic vinaigrette. It is outstanding. It is my new favorite salad. 

If you haven't tried Mr. Clean with Gain scent, you are missing out on the happiest scent ever. It is as if you accidentally spilled Gain freshness into the air. It really makes me excited to clean. Yeah, I have issues :)

Dwayne and I tried Red Moscato for the first time and really enjoyed it. I think we need to explore some other brands. I am going to make a date night reservation to try out a wine bar in our area in the very near future. 

I love Coca-Cola from the 1.25 liter bottle. There is something so special about the taste from that specific size bottle. It's not the same out of the can or the 2 liter bottle. 

Dwayne and I have been thoroughly enjoying watching the NBA play-offs and even the pre-game, half-time and post-game footage. This has been the most enjoyable basketball season ever! We will be so sad when it's over. 

The thing that has been making me over-the-top happy lately has been the new windows we had installed over the course of the last year. We have noticed a huge difference in the consistency of  the overall temperature as well as the air conditioning unit does not run 24/7. I know our light bill should be looking a lot better too. That will be the icing on the cake! 

So what has been making you happy recently? Please share, I wanna know! :)

Is my what nasty?

The other day my son was doing something that really annoys me to no end that I think every member of the male species does... touching his 'man parts'. I told him I thought it was nasty what he was doing and he responds "Is your penis nasty too?". I told him that girls don't have a penis and that our private parts were different. I realized that we have not had the conversation yet about the differences between boys and girls. Being the active, typical boy William is he just sort of moved on to the next thing. My husband heard our brief conversation and starts to laugh at me. He says that maybe it was better I explain that to him since I might handle it better. MEN!

Wordless Wednesday

I posted about Will's pumpkin patch visit the other day and told everyone to tell me what they noticed in the first photo. Nobody got it. Here is the answer:

He still LOVES Carmex

I will start off by saying that this photo was in no way set-up nor was the row of Carmex arranged by no one other them William himself. I can't believe he had 5 of them at one time and was so proud spread them out and count them. William wakes up some mornings and the first thing that comes out of his mouth is "Where is my Carmex cherry?". He knows his little hiding places and will search high and low to find them! Wow, I am thinking intervention here! My boy is too funny :)

How would you like to smell like a million bucks? | Giveaway

**Contest Closed**
Winners are:
#114 Heather S~ #136 traciet~ #187 Jackie Albino

I don't know about you but I have been a long time fan of Gain® laundry detergent. It cleans our clothing very well but there is something unbeatable about the scent. It is a great compliment when my kids' friends are always telling them how good they smell and it turned out to be their jacket or t-shirt. Gain smells like a million bucks! Speaking of which Gain has launched the “Smell Like a Million Bucks Contest” to give people across the country a chance to win one million dollars, turning one lucky winner’s dreams into a reality.

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To enter the Smell Like a Million Bucks Contest, visit www.facebook.com/Gain (be sure to "like" the page). Participants must submit a video stating that they “use Gain and smell like a million bucks.” All video entries can be viewed on Gain’s Smell Like a Million Bucks Contest tab on Gain’s Facebook page. Each video will be judged based on the creative score assigned after posting the video and the number of video views acquired. The 25 highest scoring videos will then be voted on by the Gain Facebook community. You can check out some of the video entries here. Your video can be less than a minute. I saw some that were only 10 seconds long! Easy huh?

One winner will be selected and announced on August 2, 2011. Entries will be accepted from May 18, 2011 through July 7, 2011. The top 25 videos can be viewed and voted on from July 18, 2011 through August 1, 2011. Full contest rules and regulations can be found on Gain’s Facebook page.

*This promotion is in no way sponsored, endorsed or administered by, or associated with, Facebook. You are providing your information to Procter & Gamble and not to Facebook. The information you provide will only be used in connection with the Contest or in connection with promotional or other activities by Gain.

My friends at Gain wanted to share the gift of smelling like a million bucks with Momfiles fans. We are giving away one bottle of Gain® laundry detergent to 3 lucky Momfiles readers!

To enter: *Mandatory- Let us know if you are a Gain user. If so, what is your favorite scent?

For extra entries:
~ "like" Gain and Momfiles on Facebook (leave your name you like us from)
~ (5 entries) Enter the Gain video contest and share the link here. (see contest rules above)
~ Tell us what part of the Barenaked Ladies video you liked the most
~ Follow Momfiles on Twitter (leave your Twitter name)
~ Tweet this giveaway & leave the link to your Tweet(once daily):

Don't you want to smell like a million dollars? Enter to win #Gain laundry detergent from @momfiles http://tinyurl.com/3gd594c 3winners

~ grab the Momfiles button
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Contest is open to US Residents only and will end at 9:00 PM EST on June 25, 2011. 3 winners will be picked at random and contacted by email to claim prize. Please be sure to leave your email address if you do not have a Blogger profile. Good luck!

I received a product sample and no other compensation was received. All opinions are 150% mine as always.

Yep, I'm the mean mom

Today marks the first official day of Summer break for the girls. Most of the nicer parents let their kids sleep in as late as they would like. Not this mean mom. I expect both teens to be up no later than 9 AM. I remember the days when Dwayne and I were first married (even right before) when his grandmother was still alive. She would start knocking pots and pans around and also turn up the volume on the TV to wake us up. I will never forget how each and every day she would tell us that young people have no business staying in the bed late. That made no sense to me at the time. She would express how important it was for us to do something, be productive. After all, we were young, healthy and energetic. Why waste it sleeping until noon? I think from listening to her tell us these things for 2 years that it somehow got stuck in my brain. I have the same feelings about young people getting up and getting out early. My kids tell me all the time how their friends get up at 1 in the afternoon! No way, not my kids. Thankfully my girls are pretty good at getting up and at 'em. I do have some days that I give them a free pass to stay in bed longer but for the most part they still get up out of habit. Call me old-fashioned~~ That I am!

Wordless Wednesday

He still holds on to his Carmex no matter what...

Boys like to spit huh?

I have discovered over the past week that William enjoys spitting for no reason. He will make spitty sounds and start laughing. I am feeling like he is going back to the baby days. I try to get him to stop and he still does it. I can't figure out what caused him to start this. I had a couple men doing some home improvement work on my house and I asked them if their sons did it. They immediately said "oh yeah" Then they go on to tell me that it doesn't stop. Eww!! I was so disgusted! The girls never did anything like this so I guess it is a male species thing. Gosh, boys are some gruesome little creatures :p

He's old school and not changing one bit

If you have been an active Momfiles reader then you might know that Dwayne and I are very old school. I however know when to get with the times. For example, these are my ear buds. They are cute, small and can fit in my pocket.

Here is Dwayne's version~ the bulky headphones. He has had them since about 1996. It finally came apart a week ago and he was heartbroken.

He went and bought new headphones. They are HUGE. It is like he specifically needed to seek out the biggest ones he could find. Not only is it enormous but it also has a 50 foot cord attached! WTH!?

You can compare the size of the old ones with his new ones. My husband takes old school to his own ridiculous level. Oh and he likes to listen to his cassette tapes from his boom box with these. He has even tried plugging this thing into his BlackBerry! bahahaha!

I did go and buy him some plain ear buds for his phone so he doesn't look like a fool. Bless his heart, what do I do with him? ;)

I want fweep

William is a thriving 2 1/2 year old who is full of energy all day long. His new thing is deciding that he wants to take a nap-- "I want fweep" in the late afternoon each day. This is not your ordinary nap. Dude wants to sleep hard and long... 2 hours+ if you let him. I refuse to have him napping past 3. He ends up not going to sleep at night until after 10 or 11. That makes me feel like such a bad mother.


I tend to let him catch a good 20-30 minutes and I wake him up. He is pretty grumpy for about 5 minutes but then he springs back into action. I never thought I would say it but I wish my toddler would NOT take a nap during the day!

Have you ever experienced this kind of sleeping behavior with your child?

Addicted much?

It's no surprise that my family loves Carmex lip balm. It is a must have for us and we don't go a day without it. Now William on the other hand has a fascination, perhaps obsession with Carmex...stick, tube, strawberry, cherry, original...he has no preference. He does not actually use the stuff, he just likes to hold on to it. If any of us have one in our posession and he sees it he will yell out "carwex!" and we prepare to say good-bye to it. He will seek out his Carmex all over the house. Yesterday I caught him with 4, yes FOUR of them at one time. I am not making this up. I had to grab him to snap a photo.
He has even fallen asleep clutching a Carmex in his hand. I really don't know what it is but I won't complain. It is like a compact little soothing device for him. The parents from Brie's volleyball team are always so amazed at how calm Will is when Carmex is in his hand. They said they need to go try it out with their little ones! I am sure they also think the Ismails are a bit crazy, haha! Hey, it beats having a 2 year old sucking on a pacifier or carrying around a blanket all day.

Y'all better not be making fun of his big head!! haha :)

Question: Does your child have a fascination for something unusual?

Teef!

This boy LOVES brushing his teeth. He wants to do it at least 6 times a day. He yells out "Teef, teef!" If only he could learn how to swish and spit. We would be good to go then!

Flashback Friday (sort of)

Check out your boy, old school style. He refuses to live any other way. Remember when all television service went digital? He thinks he can beat the airwaves and catch a local channel. Bless his heart.
This all comes from the man who still listens to cassette tapes. All you younger bloggers must be scratching your head wondering what that is! haha!!!

What to do, what to do?

Most of my regular readers know that I have been trying to decide between twin beds, toddler beds, futons and whatever else for my little tot. I am not sure why I am putting this much pressure on myself since the little guy is still pretty content with his crib and loves to play in it each day. My mother-in-law said that I was dragging out the last bits of baby that is left of him. She said she thought that was a good thing! Maybe I should formulate a poll for readers to vote on what I should do. Potty train begins next month so I have to hurry and make a decision!

What happens after you cook?

I have been married for a little over 16 years now and for the entire time I get made fun of for what I do after I cook a meal. I allow the food to cool slightly (maybe 20-30 minutes) and then I pack it all up in containers and put it up in the refrigerator. I am not one of those people that leaves food out ALL day long. Sorry, the idea of getting viciously sick to my stomach is not appealing! This most especially applies to poultry. So what do you do after you cook?

I want my toddler to stop taking naps

Sounds crazy doesn't it? I really want William to stop taking a nap each day. This kid tends to take his nap between about 2:00-3:15 (during afternoon school pick-up). Don't get me wrong, it is probably the most peaceful part of the day but the problem begins at night. The boy thinks that 10:30 and 11:00 are acceptable bedtimes. He in turn stays down late the next morning and repeats the process. I would much prefer that he wakes up at the crack (I love getting up early) and goes to bed by 8 or 9. He really does not act any differently without the nap. I guess I will just have to see how things go over the summer since the girls will be around more. He changes when others are home in the daytime so I guess time will tell!

Question: At what age did your child stop taking afternoon naps?

I know I say it all the time...

The male species...the ickiest species EVER! My son has started the popular man trend of putting his hand in the front of his pants (under the diaper). I will never understand the need to fondle the man parts. I know you ladies (and men) know what I am talking about! UUUGGHHH!!! So so icky!!

I'm not ready give it up yet

There are some items that parents believe to be a must with babies. Granted William is no longer a baby but now a toddler, there is still use for certain thing right? For instance, you still use the carseat, stroller, playpen and several other things. The one thing I still use is the changing table. Most people think it's a waste but I LOVE it. I had one that I used for both girls and bought one when I was expecting William. I love being able to store and organize his diapers, wipes, powder and all kinds of bath related and miscellaneous items. It has been the most useful piece of equipment we purchased.

Now what do you do when it gets to this point?

Man, I just don't want to get rid of this just yet! Will has outgrown this changing table by a couple inches. Y'all better not be making fun of me :P