Table Talk - Conversation Around The Dinner Table

The hubby and I don't have kiddos yet, but we are always talking about them, the future we hope they have, and what kind of parents we hope to become. We talk often about how we want to raise our children, things we've seen other parents do that we want to mirror, or things about our own upbringing that we want to do differently.

It's obvious that kids are going to introduce a rather radical life change when they finally arrive, so we've decided that there are some things we can do now in preparation for having kids that, hopefully, can become a habit before our lives are upended by little Jakes and Danis.

One thing that Jake and I have always agreed is hugely important is family meal times. We both think it's important to have a time where the whole family sets aside their electronics and gathers around the dinner table to pray, eat, and talk about what's on their minds.

Jake and I try to do this as often as we can. Sometimes we both have a lot to talk about. Sometimes there isn't much going on and dinner is quiet.

A good friend of mine has used dinner conversation cards to help get everyone at the table involved in some discussion over the years. So when I had the chance to get my hands on some conversation cards called Words Fitly Spoken, Uplifting Conversation Starters For All Ages, I jumped at the chance!

The cards come in two sets. The Original Edition, which contains 200 conversation starters; and the Thankfulness Edition, which contains 100. Each edition comes as a PDF file and is formatted for 3 1/2" x 5" cards, which makes them easy to print.

A few nights ago, the hubby and I took some conversation starters from the Original Edition to see how they were. It was fun! Some of the questions covered ground that Jake and I had already discussed, but others gave us some fresh insights into each other—which is always fun when you can learn something new about your spouse.

The cards include questions like:

—What family tradition would you most like to pass on to your children?

—How did you get your name?

—Describe one of your favorite pictures of your family.

Then we checked out the Thankfulness Edition and found these gems:

—Do you believe thankfulness is a feeling we experience or a skill we need to cultivate?  Why do you believe that?

—How do you feel when someone says "Thank you" to you?

Even Jake agrees that these cards are helpful conversation starters, especially for men who don't always like talking about their day. He said sometimes guys find it burdensome to recount the details of the day they've had, but if you can engage them in other topics it's easier to drum up some conversation, especially if they see that it's important to their wives.

We will definitely keep these cards handy for future use, especially for when the kiddos come around.

If you are interested in checking out these card sets you can find them at Good Old Days Farms. This link contains an affiliate link, which just means we will get a small commission from any purchase you may choose to make at no further cost to you.

One of the reasons I want to support these conversation starters—besides the fact that they are awesome—is because of this statement I found on the Good Old Days Farm website:

"The Good Old Days Farm is a community farm located in Blue Ridge, Texas, dedicated to helping people live simpler, healthier lives. Proceeds from all our website sales are reinvested into our small family farm. Through our website sales we are able to offer health education to our community and keep the cost of our organic fruits and vegetables low. At the heart of our community are people just like you!"

These people have a dream that I can appreciate :-)

We hope you check these out, and if you think it's a good fit for you family that you choose to purchase through them. We are sure that you and your family will get many laughs, gain knowledge about one another, and spark many more conversations though them.

Keep pinchin' ;-)

Celebrating Two Years Of Marriage

Today the hubby and I celebrate two years of marriage! It's been a crazy roller coaster ride, but all the ups and downs have just added to the thrill.

We went out for a special lunch on Sunday at the beautiful Juniper's Restaurant at The Wildflower Inn. The food was delicious, the view was gorgeous, and the company couldn't have been better.

As I think back over the last two years a few things stand out:

• We began our journey to debt-free living, and have so far paid off over $25,000 in debt.
• We got to be on the Katie Couric Show and meet Dave Ramsey and his daughter Rachel Cruze and win $594 in the money booth!
• We have gone on vacation to Boston, and Old Orchard Beach in Maine.
• We've had a blast creating three music videos, all of which Jake wrote the lyrics for.
• We've completed lots of home improvement projects together.
• We recently came to the decision to sell our great big beautiful home.
• We are still excited about all that we have to look forward to in our future, including hopefully transforming our imaginary kiddos into real kiddos, adopting some more kiddos, moving closer to our church and Jake's family and growing old together.

If you were to ask Jake (and I just did) he would say that our second year of marriage has been marked by events smaller than our first year, but more significant. Where are first year was a bit of a struggle as two extremely independent people learned how to share their lives, our second year saw us both learning how to relate to each other better while growing emotionally and spiritually. Our first year was tough. Our second year was much improved.

We've made it a tradition to return to the Ivy Chapel in our hometown of Bethlehem, NH, and re-take a photo from our wedding day every year on our anniversary.

Our Wedding Day 2012

First Anniversary 2013

Second Anniversary 2014

And Lord willing we will have about 50 more of these photos someday!

Keep pinchin' :-)

"Just Find Something About Everything To Be Glad About"

The title of this post is part of a quote from Eleanor H. Porter's Pollyanna, a book that I loved reading as a kid, with a movie adaptation that actually isn't too bad—as far as movie adaptations go. This past weekend in Littleton, NH, it was Pollyanna Day, which is held every year in June to celebrate one of the world's most beloved optimists, Pollyanna, and her creator, Eleanor H. Porter (1868 – 1920), who was an early resident of Littleton. I always thought this would be a fun event to take my kids to some day, but seeing as they are still imaginary at this point I had to invite my little friend, K. (When you don't have your own kids, just borrow one!) We decided to dress up for this occasion, so I put on one of my mom's Gunne Sax dresses—which I thought made me resemble Rapunzel from Tangled, post haircut—and K put on one of her princess dresses which she was proud to point out had more sparkles than mine did. Me in my Rapunzel dress.

The first stop on the tour was to see Pollyanna in all her glory in front of the Littleton Library. The bronze statue of Pollyanna, often called "New Hampshire's Most Welcoming Attraction," isn't too far from where the author actually lived.

“... there is something about everything that you can be glad about, if you keep hunting long enough to find it.”
—Pollyanna

K in front of the Pollyanna statue,
Littleton, NH.

Typically Pollyanna Day has some history about the author—by appointment—at the Littleton Historical Society, a guided walking tour of Pollyanna related locations, and... well, not much else. I was a little disappointed that there wasn't more for kids. There was a ribbon cutting for the new Pollyanna archway, along with the presentation of the Pollyanna Signature Award, which is given every year to a local resident for spreading optimism and gladness throughout the community in an outstanding way.

Awesome.

But a four year old doesn't care.

Dedication of the new Pollyanna Gateway.

We did get these cool yellow and blue stickers though :-)

Stickers are awesome!

The only thing that topped our stickers was our picnic lunch near the covered walking bridge in Littleton. Seriously, if you ever get over this way, you've got to check it out. It's next to Main Street, opposite the movie theater, behind the little shops and stores. It's beautiful!

The princess at her picnic.

For dessert we walked up to the Three French Sisters Bakery for some yummy chocolate chip and M&M cookies. We of course had to sit in the awesome pink chairs to eat!

K loved the statue of Pollyanna so much she decided we must go see it again, so we checked in to see if the bronze lady was still throwing caution to the wind and she was!

“... if God took the trouble to tell us eight hundred times to be glad and rejoice, He must want us to do it—SOME.” —Pollyanna

The bronze Pollyanna statue
in front of the Littleton library.

On our way back to the car K decided she needed a photo with this church that is in downtown Littleton.

Umm, ok.

And while we were there we had to take a photo in front of our favorite movie theater, the Jax Jr.

All in all we had fun, even if we didn't feel like we participated in much of the Pollyanna Day activities. For a four year old, dressing up like Rapunzel, having a picnic, taking pictures and buying cookies is THE BEST DAY EVER!

Keep pinchin' :-)

Grandma's House Is The Place To Be

Pay a visit to Clan Grant in northern New England some day and this is what you'll find: a cluster of cars parked throughout the yard, a large front porch dotted with people in conversations ranging from Star Wars to some distant relative's kidney failure, little kids decorating the driveway with sidewalk chalk, a ball game on the TV in the living room, and food... lots and lots of food.

The Grant family gathered around grandma and grandpa's house, 1996.

This is a typical Sunday at Grandma's house, a large farmhouse, with some Victorian vibes (or a Victorian house with farmhouse vibes... whatever), in the middle of town on a quiet street. Grandma's house has always been the hub of activity for the Grants, a "watering hole" of sorts, where there's always free food, Internet, and a game of cards going on.

I learned to jump my bike off a ramp in Grandma's driveway back before it was paved. My cousins and I tore paths through the lilac bushes and surrounding banks playing GI Joe. I was raised just as much there as I was at home.

And today nothing has changed. Well, I'm no longer jumping my bike off ramps in the driveway, but Grandma's house is still like Mission Control for our family. Except today it's my cousin's children and my little nephews who tear up the landscape with games of tag and hopscotch and water guns and... whatever else kids are into these days.

For the members of Clan Grant, this is the quintessential American dream. We wouldn't do life any other way. We're a tight family. We love being together, especially if there are burgers and dogs on the barbecue and soda in the fridge—and yes, up here in New England, it's soda. Not pop.

This is part of the reason Danielle and I want to be closer to family. We were both raised in very similar New England families where mom and dad taught their kids proper manners and grandma's house was always a place full of generous helpings of love and cookies.

Danielle can recall a time when she was a kid and her mother wasn't home when she got a hair brush knotted up in her hair. Being only about a mile from her Nana's house she hopped on her bike and peddled down the road, tangled brush bouncing around on her head—which today would probably be considered fashionable—where grandma helped her get the hair brush free.

Both of us can recall countless other times where we would walk or ride bikes to grandma and grandpa's house for help, sweet treats, cable TV, and a little extra attention. In fact, when I think about the reasons we go to our grandparents' houses today I think to myself, "Nothing's changed!"

As a big picture thinker, I look at my family and see the ripple effects throughout the generations. Good family breeds good people. Good people make good leaders. And good leaders guide our country. The decline of America today isn't solely the fault of corrupt politicians, it's largely the fault of a broken family system rife with ever-increasing divorce rates and parents who've lost sight of a Godly vision for their families.

I know I'm not going to raise perfect kids, but by God I sure am going to try. There's an old saying that goes: "It takes a village to raise a child." Though there is some truth in that saying, there aren't many villages in today's world that I would want assisting me in raising my kids.

But I do I want as many Grants, Belyeas, and Elliots as I can find!

Keep pinchin' :-)

The Ultimate Homemaking Bundle - Feather Your Nest This Spring

So, the hubby and I are fairly new to this whole blogging adventure. Originally we set out just to tell our story, keep a journal of our progress, and share what works and doesn't work as we journey to debt-free living.

While we enjoy this whole blogging thing it does take time, and so we ventured into the process of trying to earn a little money from our blog, hence the ads you may see, and the occasional "plug a product" post, in which we'll include a link to a product that we may earn some money on if it gets enough clicks. Honestly we haven't really made any money off of it so far, but since an income is secondary to our original goal we keep pressing on.

Just this week I was given the opportunity to plug an awesome bundle of e-books, which will be on sale until Monday. While this opportunity does offer me a pretty decent commission, I don't share it just because of that. After looking into all you can get from this deal I wanted everyone I know to hear about this amazing opportunity.

Here is a little video which will give you some info about why you need the Ultimate Bundle.

I purchased mine the other night and am so excited about all it has to offer. There are 78 e-books in this package covering topics like faith, kids, financial stewardship, food, heath and wellness, holidays and special events, homemaking, homeschooling, marriage, motherhood, pregnancy and babies, self-care, working from home, and blogging.

Not only are these fantastic books, but the authors seem like great people. By purchasing this bundle you are actually supporting missionaries, stay-at-home moms, and many working moms too! Here is a picture of some of the books included:

Epic, right?

And there's also about $200 in bonuses!

These books sold individually would come to a grand total of $698.

So, why am I sharing this with you? Because if you want to get your hands on all of these great resources and not pay $698, then all you need to do is purchase it between now and Monday night at midnight and you can get all of this and more for only $29.97 for the PDF files and $39.97 for Kindle versions. If this is something you think you would like to give to a friend they also have a special offer of buy two get the third free!

All you have to do is click on the picture below! 

I hope you enjoy this bundle as much as I am. Now I'm off to figure out how to make some "ice cream with nourishing ingredients" and then maybe read the Frugal Secrets of Real Foodies. If you have any questions about the bundle feel free to leave a comment and I will get back to you as soon as I can.

Keep pinchin' :-)

Developing An Attitude Of Gratitude In Your Kids

"Why is it that a two-year-old is often happier playing in the box a toy came in rather than playing with the actual toy? Why is it that children living in poverty in third-world countries seem happier and more content than kids in wealthy nations? Because neither is caught in the trap of comparisons. They don’t know what they are missing out on. They are simply grateful."

That's the idea behind Smart Money, Smart Kids, a brand-new book out by Dave Ramsey and Rachel Cruze. Literally, it just came out today. I think.

I remember one Christmas when I was a kid, probably eight years old, I was tearing open presents like a madman... er, boy. My stack of presents was pretty big, and was piling up so fast that I couldn't unwrap them fast enough. I was oblivious to everyone else in our small crowded living room—my cousins Nick and Danny, my aunts and uncles, my sister Tess, my parents. I couldn't think of anything else but me. Me and all those glorious presents that just kept on coming!

I don't remember being aware of Philip until my dad tapped me on the shoulder and asked me to come into the bedroom. He closed the door behind me and told me that Philip was a foster kid, just a little older than me, who had been sent to live with my aunt and uncle the day before Christmas. No one knew he was coming, so no one had gotten him any presents. I remember feeling a little embarrassed at that point by all the presents I had so greedily been diving into.

Dad made me put on my coat and boots and we drove into town looking for a store, any store, that was actually open on Christmas. When we found a little hardware/convenient store, dad took me inside and asked me to pick out a couple presents I thought Philip might like. I found a radio-controlled car and an action figure. We took the toys back to our apartment, wrapped them, and gave them to Philip.

I don't know if Philip expected to get anything for Christmas or not, but being a boy of around 10 or 11, I'm sure he was hoping for something. The look on his face when I handed him the presents was one of surprise and happiness. He had that radio-controlled car racing around the kitchen in just a few minutes.

I tell this story because I think, more often than not, we see kids on Christmas throwing temper tantrums because they didn't get what they wanted, or they didn't get enough. I tell ya, it was an eye-opening thing for me to witness a kid like Philip endure a Christmas fast while I was enjoying a Christmas feast.

In their book, Smart Money, Smart Kids, Dave and Rachel talk about raising children who are sincerely grateful for what they have. How do you teach a child to develop an attitude of gratitude? How do you show them what it is to appreciate what they've got?

I think for my kids it's going to involve taking them to a soup kitchen or homeless shelter on Christmas Eve where they can help serve the less fortunate at a time when they're getting plenty. I want to give them a visual picture to keep in mind whenever they think they don't have enough, or complain because of what they have. Because I'll tell you this, after I gave those presents to Philip and went back to my stack of gifts—which had grown considerably in the time it took my dad and I to go on our brief shopping trip—I didn't have the same greedy, gimmie-gimmie attitude. I was sort of blown away by what my dad had done, and embarrassed that I didn't see the need that he saw in Philip.

"We all have things to count as blessings, but we also have a tendency to lose our sense of awe and our sense of gratitude. Make sure your heart is full of gratitude for the blessings in your own life. Let your children witness this in you, and they will want to respond with gratitude for the blessings in their own lives." —Smart Money, Smart Kids.

What has it been like for you teaching your kids to be grateful?

Keep pinchin' :-)

Six Things I Wish Would Go Away

My wife may say differently, but I like to think that I'm a fairly easy-going person. Minus the charming smile and 2% body fat, I sort of see myself as the Ryan Reynolds type—laid back, carefree, rolling with the punches. I have my diva moments, but at least I'm no Julia Roberts who earned the nickname "Tinkerhell" on the set of Steven Speilberg's Hook because of her notoriously difficult personality.

I don't know yet what kind of a dad I'm going to be, but this is the picture I get when I imagine myself with kids.

ME: All right, who pooped in the shower?
KID: Daddy, I had to go real bad.
ME: Well, at least it was near a drain. High five.

Because, you know, life is just too short to sweat the small stuff.

Like most people, however, there are a few things that just irritate me to no end, like steel wool rubbed vigorously across that sensitive piece of skin under your eye. It's my opinion that these six things need to be erased from all existence.

1. That Song from Frozen
"Let It Go" is like crystal meth for every wannabe singer in the world. It has gone from a well-executed Disney hit to a particularly frightening obsession among young girls because it's witty, catchy, and the music is totally predictable, which makes it easy to sing—seriously, you can sense every musical number building from a mile away. The movie is now five months old, but people are still churning out "Let It Go" parodies on YouTube. In fact the trend has become so tired that "I Hate Let It Go" parodies of "Let It Go" are starting to become a thing and... I'm tired of talking about this.

2. Celebrity Name Abbr.
Thanks to the 140 character limit that Twitter introduced and the growing annoyance of texting shorthand, many celebrity name abbreviations have made it so far into the cultural lexicon that people are actually speaking them as though they're too lazy to say the person's whole name. Jennifer Lopez has become J-Lo. Scarlet Johansson is ScarJo. And Kristen Stewart is now K-Stew, which sounds like a cheap brand of beef soup.

Then there's the celebrity couple names—which almost deserves its own category on this list. Names like Bennifer (Ben Affleck/Jennifer Lopez), Brangelina (Brad Pitt/Angelina Jolie), TomKat (Tom Cruise/Katie Holmes.) These absurd "uni-names" are used to describe a celebrity power couple, but instead these words just make the people who use them sound like fad-crazed teenage girls at a slumber party after a Lady Gaga concert.

3. Instagram
In all fairness, Instagram is a great invention. It's got cool filters and tools that make improving photos a breeze, but the crafty use of this application has been lost into the void of the one resource our country will never run out of: stupid people. Thanks to morons everywhere a tool that once thrived off creativity and imagination is now used to post unimaginative pictures of things like people's dinner which are promptly uploaded to Facebook where everyone gets to not care about them over and over and over... and over... again.

What's worse, thanks to Instagram's photo improvement filters, millions of teenage girls are tricked into thinking they can be models, which leads me to number four...

4. Selfies
The internet calls them selfies, but I call them by their medical term: narcissistic personality disorder, named after a mythical Greek boy who fell in love with his own reflection. For those who don't know, a selfie is the act of turning your phone or camera toward yourself and snapping a photo, which you then promptly plaster all over the Internet. A Facebook page filled with selfies says one thing to the world: my life is all about me! And that's not a good thing. If you're a teenager, selfies are excusable, but if you're over 20... no, scratch that. Selfies are just wrong.

And speaking of selfies...

5. The Duckface
The duckface is when a person poses for a photo and presses their lips together in such a way that they look like they have a small duckbill. The phrase was coined to mock people who were trying to look like Angelina Jolie—one of the few people who actually looks good doing a duckface—but the duckface caught on and is now a trend. The duckface is a weird entity because some people do it right—like Ang-Jo—but most everyone else who does it just looks stupid. Either way, when you see someone making the duckface, the question arises: Why are you trying to look like a duck? Ducks are not sexy. If you look like a duck you look like a rapist. Plain and simple. Not sexy. Go away.

6. Miley Cyrus
It's not just Miss Cyrus who has become an insufferable irritation, but the entire craze surrounding her. Even her innumerable detractors have become annoying. (I'm annoying myself right now just writing about her, so I'll keep it brief). The twerking. The foam finger. The syphilis tongue. Stop. Just... stop.

What about you? What sorts of cultural oddities do you hope to see die—hopefully in a painful way—this year?

Trusting Him Without Borders: Part Two

Yesterday I talked about my need to choose whether I'm really serious about my relationship with Christ and will I choose to stand firm no matter what I might face, or will I run at the first sign of hardship. Today I wanted to share a few specific things that I have been thinking about in relation to this.

• Finances. Honestly the road to becoming debt free hasn't been that hard yet. Sure we have given up more than we probably would have wanted, and definitely more than we thought we would, but compared to most of the world we are still living very well. The part that I struggle with the most concerning our finances is whether we will be able to get out of debt soon enough so I can stay home and raise the imaginary kiddos. This has been the desire of my heart since I was just a child myself, and sometimes it looks like it will never happen. Even if we get out of debt can we survive on one salary? I have to choose to believe the truth though, and that is that God wants to give us the desires of our hearts. He has never failed me and He's not going to start now. He has good things planned for my life. Notice I said "good" and not "easy" :-)


• Adoption. When the hubby and I first started dating, one of the first life goals we found we had in common was a desire to adopt. Since being married, we've talked about this desire a lot, and each night when we pray together I pray that we will be able to adopt little babies from other countries someday. As we get closer to making that a reality I find that it's easy to get overwhelmed by the costs involved with adoption, the challenges it will bring to our lives, and the logistics of it all. Part of me thinks it will never happen, but that's not what I want, and I believe our Father put this in both of our hearts for a reason. I have to trust that He will provide, that He will make a way for it to happen. He is very clear in scripture that we are to take care of orphans, and I believe that He will honor our desires in this area.


• The Future. It's scary to think where our country is heading. It feels like it won't be long until the freedoms that I have grown to take for granted may be stripped away from me. There are times I think I was born in the wrong era, and I wish I could raise my imaginary kiddos in the past where life seemed simpler. I've contemplated building an underground home to hide in, or finding an island to purchase, but I have to trust that God chose to put me here on Earth at this time for a reason, just as He did Esther. I have a purpose today, and my job is to fulfill that purpose. I have to trust that He will take care of us, give us wisdom as we raise children in a world we couldn't have imagined as children, and guide and direct us on this journey.

The greatest thing I've realized this past week is that I have to trust Him in the good and bad. I have to expect trials, temptations, tribulation and hardship, and know that I'm not spared from these things just because I'm His child. If God chose to protect His children from everything then the New Testament would have looked very different. I need to be prepared to follow Him out on the waters, into the scary places, farther than I would have ever imagined. I need to rest in His embrace even when that's the only thing I have left.

I want to sing:

I will call upon Your Name

Keep my eyes above the waves

My soul will rest in Your embrace

I am Yours and You are mine

—Hillsong United

Keep pinchin' :-)

Yearning for the Good Old Days of "Old Fashioned" Living

The hubby and I often talk about our imaginary kiddos and how we want to raise them amidst this crazy world we live in. We look around and see that most kids aren't living like we did growing up and we think it's detrimental to their development. It's not uncommon to see children—and I'm talking, like, 10 and under—pulling out iPhones or iPods when they're out of the house and glued to the TV when they're in the house. That's not what we want for our kids. We want a bit more simplicity, fewer electronics, more games of tag and Kick the Can, all of which, by today's standards, is pretty old fashioned.

Not only do I want this for the kiddos we will one day have, but it's what I want for us too. It's so easy to get home from work and for each of us to hop onto our laptops in separate rooms and spend most of the evening catching up on Facebook, Pinterest, or checking out the latest movie trailers. I'm not saying there is necessarily anything wrong with this, but sometimes it makes me wish for the past, before my life revolved around the internet.

I have to be intentional though, as the internet has become such a part of my daily life. It's where I catch up with friends and family, check out crafts and recipes, look at the weather, and get the news. But I know that if I don't start being intentional about cutting back now, then how can I expect to be able to teach my kids to slow down and enjoy life, to spend more quality time with the people in their lives.

I guess it's like that in a lot of areas of my life, areas that I hope will be different when we have kids. Without even realizing it I've convinced myself that I'm going to be this whole different person with lots of patience, wisdom, kindness, gentleness, self-control... You know, the fruits of the spirit thing?

Who am I kidding though? If anything all of those things will be even harder to cultivate in my life when those little bundles of joy arrive. I must begin now. Things must change. I have to decide what I want and move in that direction.

Recently I've begun reading a lot, and while I have a kindle, I really enjoy going to the library and picking up a real book, something I fear future generations will only read about in history. As a child I loved reading, but as an adult I've allowed the busyness of life to take that love away from me.

But, you know, there is something really special about curling up by a fire and diving into a good story that can take you to another world. I don't want to miss out on that anymore. I am hopeful that this is just one small step in moving back to my roots, to life before the internet. I'm not saying I won't use the internet at all anymore, but I want it to become something that I don't have to do, something that, on some days, I'm just too busy enjoying life to pay any attention to.

I want to begin the journey to old fashioned living, so that someday I can take my kids on a journey there with me, and share in the joy of being together, slowing down, and having the time of our lives!

Keep pinchin' :-)

Free Family Fun Date - Winter Olympics

The other day a Mom, who is going through Financial Peace University with us, made a comment about how hard it is to cut back on spending when it influences your kids so much. When it comes to things like going to the movies, theme parks, sporting events, restaurants, it can be quite hard to convince your children that it's worthwhile to let go of these things—even if just for a period of time.

Not having kids of our own I don't know what it's like to be in this position, but as I was doing the dishes today I was thinking about the "Free Date Nights" I've been doing for my husband and wondered, "Why not come up with a bunch of 'Free Family Dates?'" So, I'm going to try to post at least one idea for a family fun night every month for all those parents out there who need some affordable entertainment alternatives to enjoy with their kids.

Since we're in the middle of winter at the moment, I thought it would be fun to kick things off with some Winter Olympics. This family fun date can be just for your family, or you can invite a few other families to join you, or even host it at your church. The idea is to create easy games to compete in, with possible prizes or medals, with the ultimate aim of simply having tons of fun.

Game Ideas:

• Sled Race - Time each member of the family coming down the same sledding hill.


• Obstacle Course - Create some sort of course that would involve jumping over things, crawling under things, and winding your way through things. Again, time each participant to see who can do it the fastest. This could also be done as a relay pairing older children with younger ones to even out skill levels.


• Long Jump - Mark a spot in the snow for each participant to jump from to see how far they can leap. Measure each jump to see who is the longest.


• Speed Skating - If you have access to an outdoor free rink or a body of water you can have skating races, all members could skate at the same time so you wouldn't have to time it.


• Target Practice - Line up cans or bottles and give each member the same amount of snowballs to knock them down. You can change the distance based on the age or ability of each member.


• Snow Sculpture Competition - So long as the snow is conducive to sculpture making, divide your family up however you see fit and see who can make the most impressive snow sculpture. Set a time limit to keep things exciting. Have grandparents or neighbors be the judges. Or you could simply give each sculpture an award based on the funniest, most original, scariest, etc. 

Those are just some ideas to get the creative juices flower. You can always take to Google to find activities that are more suited to your family.

If you decide to have a Winter Olympics with other families some additional ideas could be:

• Cardboard Sled Race - Have each family build their own cardboard sled using only duct-tape and cardboard. They could either construct their sled at the event or do it at home as a family project. Time them down the same hill and see whose design is the fastest.


• Family Flag - Have each participating family bring a "family flag," which they can create to represent their family at the games.


• Have an Awards Ceremony - Acknowledge each athlete or the winners of each game, and present them with a medal, which can be as simple as string with a round piece of construction paper with 1st, 2nd, 3rd place on it, or as elaborate as you want it to be.

To end your games consider serving hot cocoa and cookies or have a bonfire and make s'mores. If you decide to host a Family Winter Olympics tell us all about the fun you had doing them!

Keep pinchin' :-)

A Dream or a Nightmare?

For Christmas my in-laws gave me a book. Not just any book, but a book that I had been drooling over at their house this past year. It's called "The Backyard Homestead." And I titled this post "A Dream or a Nightmare?" because whether you're me or my husband a book like this could be just that.

I read this book, which is about growing our own fruits, veggies, herbs, and animals, and I think of all the possibilities we have on our four acre property. My husband looks at it and sees lots of work, and declares he doesn't want to be a farmer. While I don't want to go all "small farm" here in Bethlehem, the possibilities of a small-scale backyard homestead have been imprinted in my head, and I fear there is no going back now! Sorry honey :-/

This idea is very close to my heart, and it's not because I want to know where everything we consume was grown and how it was processed, or to make sure that we are eating the healthiest food we can, although those are all good reasons.

I want to do this because I feel like it will give me more purpose when I hopefuly in my dreams stay home someday to raise our children. It will also help keep me busy, and I believe that if done right it could also help us save a lot of money on our grocery bill when we have to feed all of the imaginary kiddos.

So I guess that is my main reason. Once I stay home our income will take a severe slashing, and one way I can help compensate for that and help provide for our family is by growing fresh fruits and veggies, and maybe a few birds, on our little homestead.

My hope is to start really small this summer, by expanding on what I did last year (which was have a HUGE garden) and learn how to better take care of the raspberry bushes, grape vines, and apple trees we have on our property. Also, I would like to start growing a few more fruit trees/bushes as I know it will be several years before most of them will begin producing. Just small stuff you see. Now to just get the hubby on board :-)

Keep Pinchin' :-)