This is not Faith and Family Reviews giveaway. We are simply hosting the rafflecopter for this particular givaway.
a Commercial Industrial Supply giveaway powered by Rafflecopter
Archive for
5 Tips for Family Vacation Traveling
We have not taken a family vacation in a number of years. We’ve enjoyed staycations right here at home. However, I am really hoping to surprise my husband with a real vacation this year or next. The last time we took a vacation it was on the fly. Seriously. My mom and her best friend were here visiting. My mom is a huge country music fan and has always wanted to visit Nashville. Mom and her friend were here during my husband’s unemployment so while I was all gung-ho to take my mom to Nashville, my husband was not too sure we could swing it. I think I finally convinced him by telling him that we had our hotel points to use and we would eat if we were at home anyways, so it was just our gas money that would be an expense.
At that time I was house cleaning to earn extra income on top of getting my VA business off the ground and that Friday morning I had to clean a house. When I returned from cleaning my husband decided we were going to Nashville for the weekend! Oy! I was excited, but a bit unprepared to say the least. My husband, children, mom and “Aunt” had done most of the packing but there was food and other items to buy.
This is not the way I usually plan our family vacations. I have been known to make lists, print them off and hand them to children to gather things on the list so my husband or I could pack the items in bags or in the van.
Here are 5 tips for family vacation traveling or planning tips, if you will:
1. Make lists of what you will need in the areas of clothing, personal care products and food. That way you won’t forget anything, unless you forget to put it on the list!
2. Take a crock pot and food items that can be warmed in it so you can save money on eating out. We also take fruit, veggie sticks and other snack items as well because you can never know how expensive food will be at your destination.
3. Choose a lodging that offers you at least a refrigerator so you can store food.
4. Plan your activities for your family vacation before you leave so you can budget time and finances accordingly.
5. Plan on using more convenience items, after all it is your vacation too. One example of this would be in the area of food like a family sized can of chili or baked beans. Another would be the DiaperBud. It is a disposable diaper in a vacuum sealed package that is compact, easy to store in your purse, diaper bag, pocket or glove compartment. It’s really hard to stuff a normal diaper in the pocket of a jacket, even some purses won’t accommodate a diaper nicely. Also, the larger packs of DiaperBuds could save room while traveling. DiaperBuds are available at buybuyBaby, BabiesRUs.com, diapers.com and Amazon.com
Family vacations are a lot of work, but with proper planning it can definitely be enjoyable for all, including mom and dad! 
“I received a DiaperBud to review as a part of my participation in a MomPact.com campaign. DiaperBuds have been invented by moms, for moms.”
Moms in Business – Win FREE UPrinting Business Cards
It is important to do some marketing for your business. For the longest time I only marketed my business when I needed to, silly eh? But I have learned that I get far better results if I am continually marketing my business(es). After all a business does not always grow itself, it needs to be watered – garden analogy since it is gardening season.
If you are a mom in business, then you probably use business cards in your marketing plan. I have used a number of different companies to purchase business cards and have even received them free on rare occasions. This is one occasion I get to be the source of helping moms market their businesses by offering a giveaway of 250 Free UPrinting business cards! You’ll also get a chance to share your business (or blog) as one of the Rafflecopter options!
UPrinting offers some cool looking business cards. I have used a try fold, but like the look some of the ones UPrinting has to offer and will be ordering some for our farm or blog.
Prize Information:
250 Die-cut Business Cards for one winner
2×3.5″ Rounded Corners, 2×2″ Rounded Corners, 1.75×3.5″ Rounded Corners, 2×3.5″ Leaf, 2×3.5 Rounded one corner, 2×3.5″ Half-Circle Side, 2×3.5″ Oval, or 2.5″ Circle
14pt Cardstock Gloss / Matte / High Gloss (UV), or 13pt Cardstock Uncoated
6 Business days print turnaround time
Free US shipping only
Restrictions:
1. This giveaway is open to US residents only, 18 years old and above.
2. No prize substitutions allowed.
3. Winners are allowed to win once over a six-month period.
4. Only email addresses used for the giveaway will be eligible to claim the prize.
Enter the Giveaway!
FREE Samples from Dover Publications
Our family loves the coloring books and paper dolls from Dover Publications and when I recently opened our email with free samples I thought, “This is something I should share with my readers,” so here I am!
I know you may be thinking, “Who plays with paper dolls anymore?” To that I say, “We do!” Our children play with their paper dolls more than they play with their other toys. Paper dolls allows them use their imaginations and creativity. There are paper doll books from different time periods which teaches the children about the clothing people of those times wore. My girls are more interested in this than my boys. However, there are paper dolls for boys too and while they are fewer than the girls’ selection it’s enough to keep my boys happy. Soldiers, knights and sticker dolls have been favorites with my boys. My children even cut out the covers of their paper doll books!
A word about the little sticker paper dolls, they do not last long as the adhesive wears off pretty fast if they play with them a lot. However, they are very cheap at $1 or $2 for a few days of fun.
Dover’s coloring books are not only fun but educational as well. Included in the coloring books are fun facts, brief history and information about the topic of the coloring book. We have purchased them to learn more about birds, flags, butterflies, horses and I may be missing a couple.
My Boys Favorite Coloring Pages (so far)
My Favorite Sample Pages (so far)
My Youngest Daughter’s Favorite Coloring Page (so far)
To get free samples from Dover Publications, such as coloring pages, book pages and more, which arrive to your inbox twice a month, just click here.
For more information about Dover Publications and to see the other products they have to offer visit their website: www.DoverPublications.com
Wordless Wednesday – Spring Brings Robins Eggs
You know spring has arrived when you spot robins eggs. Our children have found a couple of robin’s eggs in our backyard. When our four year old came to the door with the second one I managed to think fast and get a couple of pictures. Unfortunately, when he went to put it under one of our trees he tripped and cracked the egg. That’s when we found out why we were finding them on the ground – they were duds. Only an egg yoke was inside, no baby bird was developing.
Treats for Dogs: Cesar Cookie Crunchies
I know a lot of my posts lately have been about our farm animals and pets, but hey they provide fresh content! Tomorrow marks one week since we got our puppy, Padfoot. He provides entertainment, as well as lots of cuddles. He’ll soon be too big to carry – all that nutritious grass, I mean, puppy food he’s been eating!
Our children love playing with Padfoot. He is funny because he will start doing rolls as you pet and play with him in his excitement. He going through the puppy biting stage so we have been trying to remind the children not to allow him to bit THEM but give him a chew toy or stick to chew on instead. After all it is normal development for puppies to bite. WE are just not use to it.
We all generally love just holding, cuddling and petting Padfoot or playing with him. The children are teaching him to “fetch” though he responds “get it” better.
Padfoot is a good puppy. He stays within our patio area unleashed and we leash him at night. We do not always give him dog biscuits for good behavior, but when we do we have been using Cesar Cookie Crunchies. He really liked both flavors: Chicken and Fillet Mignon. As you can see from the photos and video he shows a very favorable opinion – he thinks they are the best dog treats!
I think the photos and video speak for themselves. Yummy in his tummy! When handed these treats Padfoot gobbles them up. How’s that for a puppy’s review?
“I wrote this review while participating in a blog tour by Mom Central Consulting on behalf of Cesar and received a product sample to facilitate my review and a promotional item to thank me for taking the time to participate.”
Our Farm Has Grown! Bunnies, Ducklings and Baby Chicks!
Yesterday was a busy day as we tried to get some of our garden tilled and planted. Due to baby wanting to nurse, I was not too much help, so our second oldest took over tilling (very hard even with a tiller!) She’s sore. I keep telling her to put Deep Relief on, as it is an essential oil blend that soothes sore muscles. My oldest daughter made weeding our family garden fun for the younger crew by telling stories to them to make them forget they were even working! My husband started to build our new composter that I won in an online giveaway. It can hold up to 600 lbs of compost! Much larger than the one we had at the townhouse. He got the stand completed before it started to rain and I had to leave to pick up more critters.
Bunnies
This is the cleaner cage of Luna’s.
My husband built 2 rabbit cages yesterday as well. I took one with me to pick up the bunnies. What funny creatures they are! We have them in separate cages and the black and white one now named Luna (formerly Lucky and Houdini) is very neat. We think she’s a female because she is so neat! Ha! She poops in one spot and pees in one spot. Darth Vader (formerly known as Java) could be Houdini as he has seems to want to get out of his cage. He is messy. His droppings are all over the place getting smooshed since we do not have them set up to just drop their droppings onto the ground (fertilizer for the garden!) yet because the children do not want them far from the house in case predators get them. Sigh. Now we have to wait for Padfoot to get bigger to ward off predators. At least he is growing up with all of these critters so he will know they are “his” domain. Another reason for getting a puppy since an older one could cause trouble by attacking the livestock etc.
Padfoot
The children playing with Padfoot with the box from the rabbit cages.
Speaking of Padfoot. He slept in the garage with the boys on Saturday night and let’s just say our boys do not wake up easily for Padfoot went several times in the garage. My husband and I quickly decided it was time to introduce him to his dog house. Uh-huh. The children don’t want him so far from the house either since he’s so little. So being soft parents we caved and let Padfoot sleep on the patio where he usually spends his days. Wrong decision. That dog is spoiled already and did not want to be by himself. He whimpered and whined all night outside OUR bedroom! He’s grown up in a barn and he’s at our house half a week and doesn’t want to be outside at night? Come on! We are determined to get him back to his roots, after all he is a FARM dog.
Now, he’s been sleeping all day since he wore himself out whimpering all night. I’ve told the children to tire him out today so he’ll sleep tonight.
Ducklings
When we picked up the bunnies yesterday we also had to stop at a farm that runs a petting zoo as they wanted a couple of turkey poults. We exchanged them for…..? My husband didn’t want any more bunnies, I would have preferred a few bales of hay, but didn’t have room in the trunk for those so we got a pair of mallard ducklings. Remember the book, “Make Way for Ducklings”? Yep, we have two of those. They are very skittish compared to even the turkeys.
Turkey Poults
We didn’t dare put the ducklings in with turkeys because when we got home from picking up bunnies and ducklings we discovered a dead turkey. 
I’d be lying if it didn’t affect me. It made me sad. I questioned what we had done wrong, did we handle them too much? Life and death are a part of life on a farm but don’t ever fool yourself into thinking it’s no big deal. It made me feel like a failure, even though turkeys are known to have high morality rates, even though they are stupid enough to run their own fellow poult over even with just 12 of them in the box. Down to 11 turkeys and counting, praying the rest make it unscathed. You can see how much they have grown already. Their white feathers are coming in too.
Baby Chicks
All 40 of our baby chicks arrived safe and sound. 3 days old. Though the hatchery mixed up our order, which I still have to call about. They are smaller than the ducklings so we put them with them. The ducklings seem happier now with the chicks. Before the chicks arrived the ducklings huddled in a corner together. Now they mingle and are quite lively.
We won’t be lacking in stories with all of these animals, that’s for sure!
All photos are mine. I was too lazy to watermark them! And in the words of my daughter, please do not steal them! If those that steal photos even read blog posts!
Motivation Monday: Brandcation…here I come! #GulfCoast #Brandcation
This week’s Motivation Monday post is to prepare to head to Brandcation in Pensacola, FL on Friday. I will be gone for the weekend. Looking forward to learning from some professional bloggers. I am especially interested in finding out how they have grown their blogs from part-time income to full-time income, as this is one of my goals for this year. I am also excited to see the ocean again. Having grown up on Atlantic coast I get a hankering for a trip to the ocean every summer, as it’s been 7 years since I saw it. It’s been 11 years since I have been to Florida, but I have never been to Pensacola. Doesn’t the photo of Portofino below look gorgeous? Definitely looking forward to the beautiful views!
I will be leaving my crew in the capable hands of my husband, who will have my girls to help him run the household while I am gone. I’d be lying if I said I don’t have qualms about heading off by myself. The mommy guilt over leaving my 20 month old, who happens to be still nursing as strong as an infant several times a day and thru the night. I look at him and I will miss him, his cuddles and smiles. I comfort myself with the fact that I will be barely gone 48 hours. My husband says he will be armed with chocolate milk to comfort our little guy while I am away. Chocolate milk is something my husband loves and that he will bring home and share (sometimes) with the little ones. More recently it’s been baby to prepare him for when I am gone.
Brandcation has been planned by 3-4 awesome ladies and so many sponsors that it is incredible! HotelCoupons.com is a major sponsor, as is Adventures Unlimited, Circle PR, Jambu Shoes, Stargazing, Portofino Condo, and Dunkin’Donuts. There are many other sponsors who sponsored other bloggers to attend or have provided lots of different samples and products for us to try. I will be mentioning them in upcoming posts. We will be having a PJ party on Friday to talk about all the amazing brands and see all the items that were sent especially to us for this event. A huge thank you goes out to each and every one of them for making this event possible! We are all in awe and so very grateful to be attending Brandcation 2012!
I am sure I will have many new stories to share upon my return, so stay tuned!
Puppy, Turkeys, Feed, Oh My!
Our Puppy
Meet Padfoot, our 8-week-old Newfoundland puppy. He’s smart and sweet (most of the time). We found him through Petfinder.com after a friend said to check there. I had expressed my concern to her that I doubted the Shelter would accept our pre-adopt – they had a three-page questionnaire and I wondered if they would even accept us after filling it out. That same night my friend sent us the Petfinder.com link, we looked on the site, found Padfoot – same price as a adopting from the shelter – emailed the owners because guess where they were located? Very near where I went to pick up the turkey feed! The owners emailed us back Wednesday morning, I called and we set up a time to meet at the feed supply store. That was God ordained, if anything was! Very thankful for how God leads. Truly amazing, that we got a puppy all because of a questionnaire, a friend’s help and no local organic turkey feed to be found.
Thanks to Padfoot’s previous owners he is potty trained and can “shake”. He is the perfect fit for us because he was raised on a farm around goats and chickens. His father is a Golden Retriever and his mother is a Newfoundland that his previous owners paid $1100 for! Yikes! We are trying to train Padfoot our property boundaries, to walk on a leash and not to nip/bite our fingers and clothing. He still naps a lot during the day and has been pretty good at staying on our patio even when we are not out there. My husband commented on that tonight and we are hoping that Padfoot is being trained to stay on the patio while we are inside…that might be wishful thinking though.
The children have been incredibly helpful with the puppy. They have taken the majority of responsibility of taking care of him. They came up with the idea of rotating who picks up dog poop, who walks him, who feeds him, who sleeps in the garage at night. We have been very impressed. The owners of the home we are renting gave us their dog house, but it is in the barn and we have to get it out, so the garage is Padfoot’s home at night time for now. We aren’t allowed inside pets and that’s ok with us.
And yes, those familiar with Harry Potter, the puppy is named after the character in the movie/books. We finally let our older girls watch/read the series. Surprisingly, they have learned a lot from it. Not wizardry or witchcraft either, contrary to what many Christians believe about the series.
Turkeys
We got a call from the Post Office at 6:30am on Friday saying our 15 turkeys had arrived. My husband had already left for work, thankfully only 20 minutes into his 50-60 minute drive. He came back and helped me finish up the box for the turkeys’ home, then he was off. One of the older girls and I finished up and everyone helped introduce the little guys (and gals) to water and their feed. Unfortunately one turkey was dead on arrival, but so far we’ve only lost the one.
Turkeys are really stupid. They walk over sleeping turkeys and they get stuck in their feeder. But our children love watching them and holding/petting them. They will make some tasty meals in the fall. 
We have a pile of feed in our garage and had to pick up puppy food tonight, as the previous owner generously gave us 3-days worth.
Puppy, Turkeys, Feed, Oh My!
FAMILY TASK LIST MASTER (I found this by Googling “Chore Charts” or something like that. I just customized it with our family tasks.)
Contrary to my frazzled post early in the week bemoaning, “Puppy, Turkeys, Feed, Oh My!” my calm has returned. I have created a family task list so we can streamline tasks and everyone can see and check off what they have done. I still have to come up with a more thorough farm task list, but this is a start so everyone knows what needs to be done and who is to do it. We’ve kind of been just assigning things as we go along and I am hoping this will keep us organized and get everything done that needs to be done. The beauty of it all is that it isn’t just me doing all of this. Our whole family is involved and everyone down to the youngest, though our 2-year old is still not capable of doing much, he can fetch things, take things to the garbage etc. Things appropriate to his understanding and age.
We are excited and thankful for our start to farm life with critters.
All photos are mine. I was too lazy to watermark them! And in the words of my daughter, please do not steal them! If those that steal photos even read blog posts!
Gifts from Boys
Gifts from boys. You never know what one of our boys will come up with, but this is the gift our oldest son chose for his big sister on her birthday a couple months ago. Pretty sweet gesture that melted her heart! I love it when children do stuff like this! It is a pretty frequent occurrence in our home, amazingly enough, but we still have lots of those other moments where they are still learning to love each other! After all where there are people there is conflict.
