You Could Win this Emergency Readiness Kit

So here’s the thing about living in Manhattan: It’s culture filled and exciting.  It has great shopping and even better food.  It’s never boring, it sometimes smells. It’s where my family has lived since the late 19th century.  And it’s an island, which means that if there’s an emergency here, well, we’re kind of stuck.

So to us, being prepared for an emergency is a necessity.  Yet in a ridiculously un-scientific survey of the other moms waiting outside school for pickup one day last week, not one of them was.  Not even me.

Well, the Office of Emergency Management (OEM) wants to change that.  They want  to give New Yorkers in all of the boroughs the resources to help them take the first steps towards being prepared in case of any emergency.  Not just horrifying attacks, but big snowstorms, or hurricanes, or who knows what else?

Here in NY, the closing of H&H bagels is an emergency.  But really, nothing can prepare you for that.

One way to prepare for more universal emergencies – like water main breaks or black outs – is by taking the new Readiness Challenge – an online emergency simulation that forces you  to make quick decisions at every turn.  It’s not like the answers aren’t obvious once you see them.  It’s just that when you take the test, you see just how many of those “obvious” things you haven’t done.  Luckily, the Readiness Challenge also guides you to the My Meeting Place Facebook application and other OEM resources to help you get started on your own emergency plans.

The OEM even has a link where you can go to find out when your NYC street will be plowed. (If we ever get an snow this year.  I mean, it’s January, and today it was 60 degrees!)

The OEM sent me an emergency preparedness kit (first aid kit, flashlight, batteries and other items you may need in an emergency) and they want to send one randomly chosen winner one, too.  All you have to do is:

Take the Readiness Challenge and navigate your way through the online tool to find out how prepared you are for an emergency.  Once you’ve finished, leave a comment telling us how it helped you get started on your emergency plans.  One lucky winner will be selected to get their own readiness pack.  But everyone who takes the challenge will get the knowledge and information they need to be ready in case of emergency, no matter where you live..

Like if Loehmann’s ever closes. Or, well, something like that.

But if I want in depth suggestions for every kind of tween – from foodies, to book worms, to techies, to fashiontween-sta’s – well, then I head on over to KidZVuz.  There, we’ve not only listed the best stuff, we’re giving  a lot of it away.

And I mean A LOT. Like a Wappy Dog, Moshi Monster DS game with gift pack, Just Dance 3 for Xbox Kinect, just to name a few.

You can’t enter here, but you can over on The KidzVuz Parent Blog, and your kids can enter at KidzVuz.com.

So go. Read. Shop. Enter. You never know.  It could be your lucky day!

Personally, I don’t get it.  To me, they’re neither really stuffed animals, nor quite real pillows.  But hey, that’s why I invented KidzVuz, so kids could tell us what they love — even when their parents don’t get it.

And if you have a kid who loves pillow pets, she’s going to love the Pillow Pets DS game even more. And I’m giving away both: a Pet and the new game.

The Pillow Pets™ game for Nintendo DS lets kid BE Pillow Pets.  They jump, fly, buzz and explore Dreamland, the Pillow Pets™ virtual world.  The tasks are simple and completely non-violent – appropriate for younger kids (it’s pretty much unisex), and easy enough for them to master. (My 11 year old though it was super- cute, but for younger kids) What she especially like was that as you complete levels, you earn accessories for your pet, hats, glasses and more!   That makes the virtual pets even cuter.  PillowPets for DS is an easy, fun, sweet as can be game for kids up to age 7.

Want one?  I’m giving away a Pillow Pets game for Ninendo DS and an adorable Turtle Pillow Pet plush toy to go with it.

All you have to do is leave a comment below telling me what your kid loves about Pillow Pets. (Writing “I want to win” in the comments won’t cut it.)

Want an extra entry?

Subscribe to the KidzVuz newsletter to learn about what other toys and games are coming to a store near you. Then leave me a comment telling me you did.

Want three extra entries?

Have your 7-12 year old child leave a review of their own Pillow Pet on KidzVuz.com. (free membership required, for kids ages 7-12 only.  All KidzVuz accounts require parental approval, so make sure the “parent email” your child submits when they register is the same email you use in your comment below)

That’s it!  Good luck everyone!

Yes, it’s true.  What it took nine months and two actual human being growing inside of my body to accomplish, I’ve managed to do all my own!!!

Yay me.

In case you, too, would like to achieve this milestone, here’s how I did it:

1. The Internet -I spend five to six hours a day sitting on my butt staring at the computer screen writing for this blog, or for TravelingMom.com.  Or podcasting or posting for Blogging Angels. Or working on the business plan for my soon-to-be-announced new venture.

Which all means that my butt is completely mushy, but my fingers are in remarkably good shape – -what with all the typing.

2. Orlando - Now I’m not complaining, but I just went on a three night all expense paid trip to the super luxurious Waldorf Astoria in Orlando. (yes, you read that right, Orlando, Florida has a Waldorf.  And yes, it really is super luxurious, not tacky luxurious.)  The trip was basically eating punctuated by events that involved little to no physical exertion: massages, shopping, lounging by the pool. (you can read all about it here.)

So – and I repeat – I AM NOT COMPLAINING – But (you knew there was going to be a butt but.) all of that eating, and OK, drinking, my two trips to the empty and well-equipped Waldorf Astoria gym notwithstanding, did not do a lot for my bottom line.  Well, it did a lot.  Just the wrong a lot.  If you know what I mean.

3. Trader Joe’s.  Trader Joe”s:  I love you.  I love your prices.  I love your vibe.  I love your funny little signs.  Sadly, I also love all of your nut-filled (i.e. fat filled) trail mixes.  Damn you, NY Landmark Preservation Society.  Had you acted faster, Trader Joe’s would not be tempting me with it’s delicious snacks!

4. My Kids’ Laptops – Before my kids were required to bring their laptops back and forth from school, I walked them to school, then walked home, then walked back to school to get them, then walked home again.  For a grand total of  5.5 miles.

Now, they have laptops.  And even with the wheely bags, it’s too hard to schlepp across the park. So now the kids take the school bus, I walk the dog for 30 minutes, and then it’s back to the computer – aka sitting on my ass.

5. Me.  I am not above taking responsibility for my own actions.  I eat too much.  I don’t exercise enough.  So sue me. Please. Because a law suit, that might cost me so much money I wouldn’t have anything left for food, and I would LOSE weight.

So what am I gonna do about it?

1. Zumba Fitness® Classes -A few weeks ago, I went to an event for the Zumba Fitness® videogame for Wii, Playstation Moe, Playstation® 3 and Xbox Kinect.  I tried it.  It was hard.  It was fun.  It was really really good exercise.  And since – with the new game – I can do Zumba Fitness® in my living room, I will no longer have the excuse of not being able to get to the gym.  See the new Zumba Fitness® game (and yes, they told me I have to keep on using that little copyright symbol EVERY SINGLE TIME I SAY ZUMBA, I mean Zumba.®) lets you pick the length of your routine, the difficulty level, the music – even the setting.  And you get to dance around like a lunatic without anyone getting to see your jiggly bits.(like Niecy Nash says)

Check it out:

I like this idea.

When the Zumba Fitness® Game finally comes out,On November 18th, I will buy it — yes, with my very own money.  And I will do it.  Not only to lose weight, but because it was fun.  Yes – I have called a form of exercise fun.  Call the papers.  Or the FBI – someone has kidnapped my exercise hating self.

Until Novmeber 18th, until, that is, the Zumba Fitness® Game is available,  it’s the gym for me.  And ballroom twice a week, and yoga.  Because there are no Zumba fitness® classes during the day in NYC, and daytime is my workout time. Just the way it is. Plus, by the time November 18th rolls around, I’ll have – well, less rolls around, and I won’t feel so awkward playing the game.

And how will I have lost the rolls?  By replacing one meal a day with a Healthy Choice Cafe Steamers frozen entree.

Full Disclosure:  I am going to use my Healthy Choice coupons for free frozen diet food that actually tastes…like food!  That actually has an ingredient list with a normal number of perfectly pronounceable ingredients. (I like the mushroom risotto) And that has – wait for it – NO PRESERVATIVES.

And because I am so nice, I’m going to give away a few of those coupons too.  Leave a comment below – telling me what caused you to need to eat Healthy Choice, and I will send two lucky winners two coupons each for a free Healthy Choice entree. (If you just leave a “I want to win” comment, you won’t be entered. )

So – wait – I’m going to eat right, and exercise?

Call the papers!

Contest open to US residents 18 and older. Contest ends Oct 22nd at 11pm eastern.  Two winners will be picked at random by random.org.

But seriously — it’s not even snowing.  It’s SLUSHING.  And I don’t care if that’s a word or not.  That’s what it’s doing.  And it sucks.

Even better, is that it’s going to be slushing non-stop until tomorrow afternoon, which means that by the end of the day tomorrow, there will be about six inches of slush on the ground, just in time for the temperature to rise up into the mid-forties, making the streets even MORE disgusting.  Yay!! Nothing like NYC slush on my dog’s paws to ruin a perfectly good upholstery job.

But rather than dwell on the yuck. (I know I’ve already dwelled, but too bad, baby!) I am offering a virtual solution.  Endless Ocean: Blue World, the Wii game that makes you feel like you’re scuba diving in warm tropical waters.  It may be totally gross and frozen in the real world, but out there in Wii world, it’s endless summer.

Endless Ocean^™: Blue World (click this link, it’ll take you to a trailer of the game) takes the original Nintendo ocean game to the next level, “with new features and story elements that create a mesmerizing aquatic odyssey for players of any age or experience level.” (can you tell I took that last bit straight from the Press Release?)

Endless Ocean: Blue World features an original story that players can follow as they choose. The plot involves Oceana, a girl who investigates the “Song of Dragons,” which her father, a prominent ocean explorer, sought before his death. As you swim around, you advance the story and go on new undersea adventures. Plus, if you happen to have a WiiSpeak microphone and a broadband connection, you can chat with friends(as long as they also have the microphone) while you play.

Wanna win it?  Leave a comment below telling me why your winter weather stinks, and you’ll be entered.  Link back to this post and you’ll be entered again.  Please note:  If you just write: I wanna win.  Or “Thanks for the chance to win” you won’t win.  You need to make some effort, people.  In this case, it involves telling me why your winter weather sucks worse than mine.

Now for the legal mumbo jumbo: Contest open to US residents 18 and older.  Winner will be chosen at random by random.org.  Contest ends Friday, March 5th at 10pm.

Happy virtual swimming!!

Didn’t win but still want to read it? Buy it, why dontcha?  Just click on the little book icon just over there on the right, and pretty soon, you’ll be laughing and reading.  Still not sure?  Save $2 per book by entering discount code SMR2.

I promise it’ll make you laugh.

Notice the last names I’ve fabricated.  Not so very ethnic, are they?  Jews don’t hyphenate.  Take me, for instance.  My maiden name is Rabinowitz, my married name is Friedman.  I considered hyphenating for about twelve seconds.  And then I realized I’d be Nancy Rabinowitz-Friedman; I might as well introduce myself has Nancy Double-Jew.  Twice the guilt!!  Twice the neuroses!   So when I got married I just decided to get rid of my middle name, Jean, and replace it with my maiden name.  That way, the clerk explained, I would legally be able to use either my maiden name or my married name. If I hyphenated, he told me, I would always have to use both names.  Quite a mouthful, don’t you think?

For a moment there, I considered going with a one-name moniker:: Madonna, Cher, Bjork, Elmo.  I tried Nan – but that sounded like a pug-nosed, perky cheerleader.  And I feel pretty confident with my big-nosed, sarcastic, pessimist persona.  I thought  I could take my new initials, NRF, and call myself Nerf.  Only that sounded like a squishy ball, and frankly, I didn’t need any name-based reminders of my physique.

Maybe my husband and I should have combined our names to create a new one. We could have been the Friedowitz family, or my personal favorite, the Rabinimans. Then again, maybe not.

So I stuck with the old switcheroo – sometimes one name, sometimes the other.

What’s in a name?  A lot.  If there weren’t, there wouldn’t be websites devoted to helping us choose names for our kids, or forums online for women deciding whether or not to give up their maiden  names.  Hilary Rodham Clinton wouldn’t be, well, Hilary Rodham Clinton.  She’d be Hilary Clinton or Hilary Rodham.  Not both.  Names are complicated.  Maybe that’s why Elizabeth Taylor never changed hers.  Imagine if she had, she’d be Elizabeth Taylor Hilton Wilding Todd Fisher Burton Burton Warner Fortensky. (I think she stayed Taylor not for the celebrity, but because somewhere in her mind she knew she’d one day marry a man named Fortensky – and she just couldn’t bear to called that.)

Once we had kids, it got a bit complicated, but I figured it out. Generally, anything professional – writing, producing – I used Rabinowitz.  Personally, I used Friedman, since I wanted to share a name with my kids. Aside from getting doubles of every catalogue in the universe, it’s worked out pretty well for the past 12 years.

But this fall, when I decided to publish as Nancy Friedman for the first time. I don’t know why I did it. I guess I just figured that at this point, I’ve pretty much stopped working, and most of the people I know, know me as Nancy Friedman. So why not publish that way?  Plus, I think it kinda bugged my husband that everything else I’d ever written had been under my maiden name. And I wanna keep him happy.

Now is where the giveaway kicks in (yep, you had to read this far to find it!).  I’m giving away two copies of the new anthology See Mom Run, edited by Role Mommy Founder Beth Feldman. It’s a collection of essays by moms…including me.  And it’s really, really, funny.  I promise. Just leave a comment below with your “dancer name” for a chance to win. What’s a dancer name? It’s the name of your first pet, follwed by the name of the street you grew up on.  If you were a stripper, it would be the name you’d dance under — hence “dance name.”  I’d be Honey Whig.

Hey — maybe I should publish under that next time!

Good luck!

Contest ends Friday, January 29th at 11pm.  Must be 18 years or older. US residents only. Two winners will be announced Saturday, Jan 30th.

I asked you to write a comment with your worst holiday indulgence and I think I gained ten pounds just reading them.

Lots of people said fudge, and Christmas cookies. But some people really let it all hang out.  Like Moonlighting Mama, who said “Pumpkin Pie.  Like a whole pie.”  One woman said cheese balls.  Really?  Another said Grinch Balls — which do sound pretty seriously good. Props to the one and only Hannukah foodie. I’m with you, babe. But my favorite indulgence was the one from the guy who just said Food.

Pretty much says it all, doesn’t it.

The winner (as chosen by random.org, btw)  turned out to be a fellow NYCMoms blogger (beccarama) who lives in my neighborhood.  Pretty funny, since I knew almost none of the nearly 200 entrants.  I walked the dog and met her on West End Ave where I did the handoff.  No postage required.

I’m planning on more giveaways soon…probably from Nintendo.  So stay tuned.  And read me once in a while, even if I’m not giving something away.  At least while you’re typing you won’t be eating!

A time to go out and celebrate.  And eat.

A time to have more excuses to stuff your face than any other time of the year.  (With the possible exception of birthdays.  After forty, the only way through a birthday is with spoon in one hand, ice cream in the other.)

This holiday season, however, I am offering you an out: A free copy of Wii Fit Plus.

In my never ending quest to be – if not thin – then at least thinner than I have been most of my adult life, I have tried it all.  Starting back in High School when I went on The Woman Doctor’s Diet for  Teenaged Girls (which involved eating nothing but oranges and hamburgers for a week. Really) to the low-fat hi-carb/lo-carb-high fat crazes, to relatively sane diets like  Weight Watchers, or simply shutting my mouth every once in a while. (I’m writing a book about that one, it’s going to be called: The Get up off your Lazy Ass and Stop Stuffing your Face Diet.)

But the bottom line for me, a woman who has weighed more or less the same (within 5 pounds – other than pregnancy) for more than twenty-five years, is that I need to exercise to change my body. (or get Swine Flu. Neither a very tempting option.)

I have more excuses for NOT going to the gym than reasons to go there.  I don’t have time.  I have a headache.  I have to cook dinner/go shopping/write a post/pull out my toenails with a tweezer.  Basically, ANYTHING but exercise.  But then this new crop of exercise games for the Wii showed up.  The Wii Fit basically ruined any chance I had of ever having a believable, justifiable excuse not to exercise.

For those of you who haven’t heard of it (like, say, those of you who never read, watch tv, listen to the radio, or are anywhere within 100 feet of a child) the Wii Fit was Nintendo’s genius idea to make the already pretty good for exercising Wii into a true exercise machine.  The Wii Fit tracks your exercise success by letting you set weight loss and BMI goals, and then letting you know who you’re doing.  You get an avatar trainer. and then follow along with the Mii’s as you do a series of balance, strenght, or aerobic exercises.  It’s fun, and it works. (Not that it’s the greatest workout ever, but it sure beats sitting at home and typing on a computer, which is what I’m doing right now. Yeah.)

The Wii Fit Plus, the latest incarnation of their already enormously successful game, takes it all one step farther.  Now you get to choose your workout, personalize it, set how much time you want to spend, pick a pre-set routine, or make up your own.  There’s a locker room, and more choices, more ways to personalize.

I’d do it more myself, but I have to cook dinner/go shopping/write a post/give away my copy. (full disclosure: it’s one of two free copies that Nintendo sent me.  One for review, one to give away.  And I’m giving it.)

So, do you want to get in shape without having to leave your home?  Or, if it doesn’t really get you in shape, do you want to at least not turn into a total slug in this, the how much can you eat in one six week period holiday season?

Leave a comment below, telling me what holiday indulgence is your worst, and I’ll enter you to win a brand-spanking new copy of Wii Fit Plus. (please note: you need to own a Wii Fit Balance Board to use this game.  Don’t say I didn’t warn you.) Winner will be chosen by random.org on Sunday, December 13th at 9pm. Contest open to US residents 18 and older.

Want more chances to win?  Link back to this post on your own website, and I’ll enter you again every time someone links over. Tweet this contest, and include the hashtag #hip2housewife giveaway, and I’ll enter you yet again.

Hey, everyone could use a little flab insurance over the holidays.  Why not you?

She was funny, charming, and so incredibly rrrrrripped  — you could bounce a ten pound weight off her abdomen.

You can read all about my visit with her here.

Plus, right here on this site, you can enter to win Jillian’s very own Quick Start Rapid Weight Loss System, plus a free week of weight loss tips and support from JillianWeightloss.com.

Jillian’s Quick Start system contains two bottles of her special formulations: Maximum Strenght Calorie Control™, and Maximum Strength Fat Burner™.  She swears that taking four capsules a day will jump start your weight loss and make it easier to meet your weight loss goals.

Wanna win? (or should that be lose?)

Leave a comment below telling me what you love about Jillian, and what you DON”T love about dieting, and I’ll pick a winner at random using random.org.

Now for the Fine Print:

Contest open to US residents only.  Must be 18 or older to enter. Don’t forget to leave your email address (no one will see it but me.) Contests ends 9pm, Friday, October 9th.

Good luck!