July 27th, 2009

My Love for You is so Timeless…

My hus­band loves the clas­sic beau­ties– the hour glass fig­ures of the pinup girls, vin­tage cars, and eat­ing at din­ers with juke­boxes and soda jerks. He prefers sus­penders over belts, low-cut neat hair­styles, cig­ars and pipes, and mom and pop shops. Even his taste in jew­el­ery is clas­sic– pre­fer­ring pocket watches over wrists watches any day.

When we cel­e­brated our first wed­ding anniver­sary on August 30, 2004, I scoured the Inter­net look­ing for a pocket watch that embod­ied the clas­sic beauty of the old Hunter-case watches worn by the rail­road work­ers of 19th cen­tury. It was vir­tu­ally impos­si­ble to find one that had the look and feel of the old-style pocket watches,and the ones that I did find were extrav­a­gantly priced. Unfor­tu­nately, I could not find one that we could afford– you know, new­ly­wed and barely mak­ing ends meet.

This year, how­ever, as we come upon out 6-year anniver­sary, I have decided to bite the bul­let and buy a pocket watch for my hus­band. I found a great, inex­pen­sive col­lec­tion of the Jules Jer­gensent watches for under $300. I plan on get­ting my hus­band the watch on the left with a phrase, “my love for you is so time­less” engraved on the back.

I guess this is going to be the anniver­sary of clas­sic gifts, because when my hus­band asked me what I wanted, I sug­gested that he check out the Cit­i­zen Watches col­lec­tion which includes and  old-fashion-styled charm bracelet watch. I am nor­mally not a fan of watches for myself, but this bracelet/watch is absolutely breath­tak­ing. It’s going to be a great anniversary!

January 1st, 2009

Product Review: Good Deals & Smart Steals

Let’s face it, the econ­omy has us all suf­fo­cat­ing and stressed beyond relief. So, when I was asked to review the new book “Good House­keep­ing: Good Deals & Smart Steals: How to Save Money on Every­thing,” I jumped at the offer. And I am glad I did.

The tiny book  packs a huge punch with how to get the most out of your money sim­ply by know­ing where to shop. Take, for exam­ple, auc­tions. When we think of auc­tions we think of Ebay or Yahoo, but did you know that you can find auc­tions through the United States Postal Ser­vice or the United Stated Depart­ment of Treasury?

In addi­tion to auc­tions, some of the other tips include how to save money pur­chas­ing big appli­ances, orga­niz­ing a cloth­ing exchange with friends, keep­ing up with car main­tence, and even max­i­miz­ing coupons by shop­ping on “Dou­ble Coupon Days.”

If part of your New Year’s Rea­so­lu­tion is to save money, you will ben­e­fit from this amaz­ing tips offered in “Good House­keep­ing: Good Deals & Smart Steals: How to Save Money on Every­thing”. This book gets two thumbs up from my family.

July 17th, 2008

Lighter on the Salt, Heavy on the Taste

I am always look­ing for health­ier alter­na­tives to my favorite snacks and Lays Orig­i­nal potato chips are by far my favorite chips. They con­tain 180 mg of sodium (the same as white bread) and with my and my husband’s cur­rent high blood pres­sure issues, I have to avoid them. So, when I was con­tacted by a rep­re­sen­ta­tive from the Zócalo Group with an offer to try a sam­ple of the Lays Pinch of Salt Potato Chips, I jumped at the chance to do so– and I was not disappointed.

The chips arrived in a very large box con­sid­er­ing the size of the bag (a reg­u­lar large bag of chips), which made me chuckle. But a big box was needed to con­tain the fla­vor of these chips. They were amaz­ing. My hus­band, who NEVER wants plain chips, enjoyed them as well. And while sodium is still off lim­its to us, it’s good to know that we can indulge every now and then with a bet­ter choice.

I do want to share some nutri­tional infor­ma­tion that Jen, the Zócalo Group rep­re­sen­tive who sent me the free sam­ples, for­warded to me. I cross-checked this infor­ma­tion with the USDA and it is accurate.

SODIUM COMPARISONS OF FRITO-LAY PRODUCTS AND COMMONLY CONSUMED FOODS AND SNACKS

*Data from USDA Nutri­ent Database