Vote Augie, Vote Often
“Do you have the most adorable kid in America? Of course you do! Enter our contest today.”
More than a month ago while I was sitting in my car in Madison waiting for Gretchen to finish feeding Augie, she handed me the May 2010 edition of “Parents” magazine (because we buy that kind of thing now). It was opened to a page titled “Your kid. Our cover.” Below that was the well-crafted, and blatantly parent-enticing, series of sentences in the first paragraph of this post. I give the magazine credit for knowing its audience. What good parent doesn’t think they have the cutest kid since the invention of the camera?
Knowing that I was given a great, new camera for Christmas, Gretchen said I could take some pictures of Augie and enter them in the contest if I so desired. I thought, Since I have the cutest kid since the invention of the camera, I might as well take some pictures and see what happens. At best I could win a free trip to the Big Apple, and at worst I’d have a few extra pictures of Augie laying around.
According to the magazine, there would be 10 finalists – nine chosen by the magazine’s editors and one picked by readers. To enter, I just had to follow the magazine’s four easy steps. Step 1: Take a picture of a child three months to 6 years old (preferable your own child so you don’t look like some sort of weird, child molester at the nearest town park). This was probably the toughest step. First, because Augie was just barely 3-months-old when I was handed the magazine. And second, because it’s hard to make 3-month-olds sit still and smile for any period of time. After digging deeper into the instructions on page 216, I also realized this would be a tough step because all the pictures of children under 1-year-old had to be taken within the past month.
Step 2: Log on to parents.com/covercontest to upload your photo. While I was on my month-plus picture-taking voyage, I decided to check out the site, which was accepting since April 4, to see the competition. What I found was more than 150,000 children already entered into the contest. I thought to myself, What are a few hundred thousand kids when I have the cutest kid since the invention of the camera?
Step 3: Selfishly forward your confirmation e-mail to every friend, relative, prison inmate, neighbor, co-worker, classmate, stalker, coach, arch nemesis and passing acquaintance you know (and a few hundred people you don’t), post it on your Facebook and MySpace accounts and tweet it to all 6 of our Twitter followers so they can vote for your bundle of joy. I have always hated it when people send me links telling me to vote for their child or goofy pet so they can win some incredible prize, but I justified doing the same thing by telling myself, It’s OK, my kid has a legitimate shot at beating out 200,000 other kids because he’s the cutest kid since the invention of the camera.
Step 4: Win! This step seemed a little too good to be true considering several hundred thousand parents were entering camera-phone pictures of their diaper-clad children, but apparently it is part of the process. The winners, of which there will actually only be 10, will be invited to New York City for professional photo shoots with the best looking kid to appear on the November cover of “Parents.”
One other, finer rule of the contest, which the editors must pray people don’t actually read, is that parents can upload as many as six pictures of their child. So here are the six that I entered this morning. The first two pictures I entered I have already posted on this Web site. They can be found here. (They are the fourth and fifth pictures of the post). The other four were:
Who loves his Johnny Jump Up?
Check out my baby blues.
Auntie said I could.
So there you have it. That is what I have been doing with my free time since mid-April. Now go, vote for my kid. Because, as everyone knows, Augie is the cutest kid born since the invention of the camera.
To vote for Augie, revisit this blog in about a week. According to an e-mail from Parents.com that's when my link to Augie's album will be available. There doesn’t appear to be a limit on how many times you can vote, so vote Augie and vote often. Then forward Augie’s link to everyone you know (and a few people you don’t). Voting is open till July 14, so make it a part of your schedule to vote for Augie every day.
More than a month ago while I was sitting in my car in Madison waiting for Gretchen to finish feeding Augie, she handed me the May 2010 edition of “Parents” magazine (because we buy that kind of thing now). It was opened to a page titled “Your kid. Our cover.” Below that was the well-crafted, and blatantly parent-enticing, series of sentences in the first paragraph of this post. I give the magazine credit for knowing its audience. What good parent doesn’t think they have the cutest kid since the invention of the camera?
Knowing that I was given a great, new camera for Christmas, Gretchen said I could take some pictures of Augie and enter them in the contest if I so desired. I thought, Since I have the cutest kid since the invention of the camera, I might as well take some pictures and see what happens. At best I could win a free trip to the Big Apple, and at worst I’d have a few extra pictures of Augie laying around.
According to the magazine, there would be 10 finalists – nine chosen by the magazine’s editors and one picked by readers. To enter, I just had to follow the magazine’s four easy steps. Step 1: Take a picture of a child three months to 6 years old (preferable your own child so you don’t look like some sort of weird, child molester at the nearest town park). This was probably the toughest step. First, because Augie was just barely 3-months-old when I was handed the magazine. And second, because it’s hard to make 3-month-olds sit still and smile for any period of time. After digging deeper into the instructions on page 216, I also realized this would be a tough step because all the pictures of children under 1-year-old had to be taken within the past month.
Step 2: Log on to parents.com/covercontest to upload your photo. While I was on my month-plus picture-taking voyage, I decided to check out the site, which was accepting since April 4, to see the competition. What I found was more than 150,000 children already entered into the contest. I thought to myself, What are a few hundred thousand kids when I have the cutest kid since the invention of the camera?
Step 3: Selfishly forward your confirmation e-mail to every friend, relative, prison inmate, neighbor, co-worker, classmate, stalker, coach, arch nemesis and passing acquaintance you know (and a few hundred people you don’t), post it on your Facebook and MySpace accounts and tweet it to all 6 of our Twitter followers so they can vote for your bundle of joy. I have always hated it when people send me links telling me to vote for their child or goofy pet so they can win some incredible prize, but I justified doing the same thing by telling myself, It’s OK, my kid has a legitimate shot at beating out 200,000 other kids because he’s the cutest kid since the invention of the camera.
Step 4: Win! This step seemed a little too good to be true considering several hundred thousand parents were entering camera-phone pictures of their diaper-clad children, but apparently it is part of the process. The winners, of which there will actually only be 10, will be invited to New York City for professional photo shoots with the best looking kid to appear on the November cover of “Parents.”
One other, finer rule of the contest, which the editors must pray people don’t actually read, is that parents can upload as many as six pictures of their child. So here are the six that I entered this morning. The first two pictures I entered I have already posted on this Web site. They can be found here. (They are the fourth and fifth pictures of the post). The other four were:
Who loves his Johnny Jump Up?
Check out my baby blues.
Auntie said I could.
How could I not be the cutest kid in America?
So there you have it. That is what I have been doing with my free time since mid-April. Now go, vote for my kid. Because, as everyone knows, Augie is the cutest kid born since the invention of the camera.
To vote for Augie, revisit this blog in about a week. According to an e-mail from Parents.com that's when my link to Augie's album will be available. There doesn’t appear to be a limit on how many times you can vote, so vote Augie and vote often. Then forward Augie’s link to everyone you know (and a few people you don’t). Voting is open till July 14, so make it a part of your schedule to vote for Augie every day.
Vote Augie will be written on a sticky attached to my computer. Love the pics.
ReplyDeleteWhile I won't presume to call my child the "cutest kid since the invention of the camera", I will selfishly ask for you to vote for Augie so I can finally see NYC! Hope everyone has a fantastic Memorial Day Weekend!
ReplyDelete