Tag: huffington post

Childbirth, Parenting, Pregnancy, Reviews and Giveaways, Uncategorized

Interview With the Creator of My New Favorite Baby Shower Gift- Stockpile

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#MomConfession I dreaded the mountain of ribboned tissue paper and bags at my baby shower. I was grateful, but. So. Much. Stuff. I was already having trouble fitting the essentials into my tiny living space and didn’t know how the stuffed animals galore would be integrated.

I get it- stuff is what you get and give during a baby shower. But, what if there was another option? A great gift that would create lasting value for the baby, and wouldn’t give the mother an additional thing to find a home for? Enter Stockpile, a gift card you can purchase and load with stock from a company of your choice.

I was able to interview the mind behind Stockpile, Avi Lele, and he didn’t disappoint.

Bailey: What was your background before becoming the CEO of Stockpile?

Avi: I started out as an engineering major at MIT, got a law degree at Harvard, and practiced law for 16 years before founding Stockpile. My specialty was patent litigation, and our cases involved complicated, cutting-edge technology. But technology can be intimidating to many people, so every time we went to court, we had to find a way to make the technology accessible – easy to understand and even entertaining – so lay judges and juries had the information they needed to decide the case.

Read more on Huff Post!

Camping, Travel, Uncategorized

How to Take Your Camping Cuisine to The Next Level

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Food prep has always been the metaphorical poison oak rubbing on my leg when I go camping- my main criteria being “what will be the least fussy food to make?” After spending half a day using my mad-Tetris skills packing my car with half my house, I have no desire to be a short order cook of crappy food when I get to the camp site.

But, what if campfire food could be both easy and delicious? (I would go camping more.)

I spoke with Shane Hammett, avid camper and chef de cuisine at the Lone Eagle Grille in the Hyatt Regency Lake Tahoe Resort, to get the (beefed-up) skinny on how to make campout eating a (easy) fine dining experience- albeit fine dining a la fold out chairs, dust and bug spray.

Here’s how to jazz up your campfire cuisine without having to skip the hike because you need to clean up after lunch and start prepping dinner.

1. Build the Right Kind of Fire.

Trying to cook on a campfire without the right kind of fire is like trying to scale a mountain trail in heels- you can do it, but it will take a long time- and it will suck.

Read more on Huffington Post!

Travel, Uncategorized

Ringling Brothers Took It Out of This World

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Holy acrobats-light show-unicycles y’all- Ringling Brothers brought it. And now, they’re bringing it to you. “It” being their new show, Out of This World. I went to Florida (to the 580,000 square foot complex that houses the Ringling Brothers family!) to preview a few of the acts, and the opening of the show – oh my wow. I thought I was going to see some hoops, a bit of flying trapeze shenanigans and popcorn- but saw so much more.

 

I left this experience totally star-struck by these obscenely talented people. I’m not even sure they’re people- they’re so skilled they may actually be from someplace out of this world. (I also left with videos of me jumping rope and unicycling with the Saint Charles Troupe- and when I say “unicycling” I mean “me being held up on a unicycle and pushed around by two strong men.”)

Read more on Huffington Post!

Pregnancy, Self Love, Uncategorized, Video

Talk to Me: How Talking to Our Grandparents Can Make Us Better People

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G-Betty lookin’ fierce on her 86th birthday.

My relationship with my Grandmother Betty (Grambetty) has always been a selfish one. I share endlessly about my worries, accomplishments and major missteps, siphon rich streams of advice from her, send her photos of my little family but rarely ask for images from her life and generally fill her with my own “stuff”, scarcely asking about her experiences.

 

She recently visited my home, and arrived on the same day I heard about the Huff Post Talk to Me project- total “Ah-ha! I’m a jerk” moment.

 

“Why haven’t I done this with my Grandmother before?”

Read (and watch!) more on Huff Post

Career, Self Love, Uncategorized

How a Mismatched Job Experience Helped Me Find My Courage

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I was paid good money to talk to myself on national television about a topic I knew nothing about for four hours, a few times a week (and not have a panic attack).

I was 21 years old living in Austin, Texas working as a student/actress. Acting opportunities were slim (and pretty much all unpaid), so when a friend who was a cameraman for The Jewelry Channel asked me if he could pass my headshot on to his boss-man, I said heck yes — not expecting anything to come of it. I had no hosting experience and only owned costume jewelry.

Three weeks later I received a call from a chipper middle-aged man asking me to come in for an interview.

“Um… OK?”

Because I was 21, I obviously stayed up until 2 a.m. the night before the interview drinking with my boyfriend. I woke up late, showered off the booze, guzzled coffee, and showed for the interview 20 minutes late. Winning?

Read more on Huff Post!

Uncategorized

Here’s What Happened When I Quit Social Media

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When I gave up the screen-feed, my life woke up.

I was addicted to the constant eavesdropping into the lives of people I loved, envied and loathed. My days were a series of mini-searches for something salacious, inspiring, engaging, endearing or so stupid I would feel righteous I hadn’t been the one to post it.

The more entrenched I became in the networks of social media I swam in, the less I had anything valuable to contribute. I was so busy living in other people’s pseudo-lives, I had stopped living my real one.

If I was writing an article and got to a difficult sentence, I would switch over to Facebook, hoping for “inspiration” that would spiral into my son and me watching two otters cuddling — then I would give up on my writing for the day.

Read more on Huff Post Parents!

Mom Humor

Directions to Motherhood

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The journey to motherhood is flush with quicksand, stool softeners, thorns in the sciatic nerve, secret all-you-can-eat-buffets, justified temper-tantrums, loose gravel, flash in the pan “Must Have!” child-soothing gizmos and ill-timed gas.

This road is worth traveling. When we first become parents, we pick up a chubby ball of yummy-smelling deliciousness, but somehow, many of us get lost along the way.

We need directions, and not to prevent stumbles, potholes and occasional avalanches of ice cream; we need them to remind us the bizarre paths we wander down are well-trodden and flanked with supportive been-there, tripped-over-that mommas.

Read more on Huffington Post!

Self Love

Celebrating the Honest Postpartum Body

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Remember the ditty ‘Do Your Ears Hang Low?’ Well, I’ve tweaked the lyrics a bit to apply to my current situation. Here goes:

Do your boobs sag down, do they jiggle to and fro? Do they swing to the right and then reach down to the floor?

Mine do.

At least I think they’re mine.

The postpartum boob transformation occurred quicker than the flick of a baby finger. “My” breasts were small, perky and fluid-free. These new things attached to my chest are droopy bags — albeit fabulous droopy bags. They fill with and distribute milk — fabulous — but they’re just so different and devoid of perkiness.

And “my” stomach, where did that come from? It’s flattish, wide and different. It’s so different from the stomach I came to know so well.

Come to think of it, the only parts of my naked postpartum body I recognize are my knee caps. They’re not saggy. Yet.

Read more on the Huffington Post!