Monday, June 23, 2008

Commercial parenting by proxy.

I'm not the mom who refuses to let my kids have sugar, fast food or watch tv. I prefer a moderation in all things approach. But, the past two weeks have not been an example of this moderation idea. I think we've eaten fast food more than I've cooked. Shameful.

When my girl came dancing into the kitchen clutching her bottled chocolate milk and belting out something like, "McDonald's helps kid fulfill their potential" I knew something was wrong in frugal subversive suburbia. You know something sad? I don't even like McDonalds anymore.. it's just easier than making lunch. Time to rethink lunch.

This isn't the first time my girl has spouted some commercial nonsense though. It's not her fault. Kids are raised to believe what they are told. Why should they question what a commercial says about diapers, cereal, or some plastic junky toy?

Over a year ago she serenaded her dad and I with this little song:


Fruity pebbles, fruity pebbles, fruity pebbles are nutritious. fruity pebbles, fruity pebbles, fruity pebbles are nutritious. Fruity pebbles, fruity pebbles, fruity pebbles are nutritious.

Dip them in the green thing.

Nutritious. Butricious.

Fruity Pebbles are nutritiouuuuuuuuuuusssssss!

Pensive Narrative interlude: Fruity pebbles, like fruit, is nutritious. Do you know what else is a fruit? Carrot. Carrot carrot. Carry Carrot.

Fruity pebbles, fruity pebbles, fruity pebbles are nutritious. fruity pebbles, fruity pebbles, fruity pebbles are nutritious. fruity pebbles, fruity pebbles, fruity pebbles are nutritious.


A few weeks ago while I was buying diapers for her little brother, she asked me if those were "Huggies Natural Fit". I tried to explain how the people that make commercials want us to spend our money on their product. Just because the commercial says that's what you should buy, it's not necessarily right. And then I tried to explain that the "Huggies Natural Fit" diapers cost a lot more than the generic or regular Huggies that I normally buy which work perfectly fine.

This parenting thing is hard. Sometimes I feel like there is no happy medium and there is the distinct possibility that no matter what I choose it's somehow still not going to be right.

With our tivo/satelite dish acting so weird lately, I've been talking with hubby about just dumping it altogether and living with broadcast.

5 comments:

Tread Softly said...

When my nephew was six years old, he turned to his dad and said, "Daddy, do you know what we could do to save money?"

His bemused father replied, "No, what?"

"By switching to Geico. We could save %15 or more on car insurance."

Have you googled "Nag Factor" yet?

MamaGeek @ Works For Us said...

I wholeheartedly agree. Moderation is key.

I must say "McDonald's helps kid fulfill their potential" MUST be pitched to McDonalds as a new sloga. OR be made into a bumper sticker. Or something!

Rhonda said...

about TV, my hubby just agreed that when our 2 year contract with Direct is up in a few months, we will cancel it and just go with whatever reception we can get.
YAY! I think TV fries adult minds too.

Red said...

Inasmuch as I love to watch TV, I would gladly give it up in a heartbeat. Granted that is thee only source of entertainment we have right now (financial situation right now).

But we are seriously considering letting cable go, to save money, and of course let got of the crud that is on TV these days. *shudders*

Jenny's Vegcafe said...

It's Frugal Vegcafe's DH here... We are also internet downloaders (Free Best Week Ever Podcast, and TV shows uploaded illegally to amule filesharing.) We're library renters. We're Red Box renters. We're Netflix 1 at a time/unlimited subscribers.

But, we're Tivo LOVERS it's got Amy D's cost per wow ALL OVER IT. Yet, even with the cost per wow benefit, we can't help but think that paying _anything_ to have our time "wasted" is dumb. Especially when we have a working VCR.

Life without Tivo was time spent scheduling our lives around certain shows we really wanted to watch. It was missing whenever Amy Sedaris was on Saturday Night Live.

*ugh* It's "only" $45 a month. "Only" $600 a year. I'm an adult, I'm allowed, right?

Google