Category: Travel

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Keeping Your Child Active During the Summer

Once school is out for the summer, children don’t get as much play time. Sure, they might get to the park once in a while, but it isn’t a daily activity like playing in the schoolyard. Luckily, there are a few things that you can do to ensure that your child gets enough exercise when school is on hiatus.

Summer Camps

There are a number of different summer camps in Battle Creek MI that meet this purpose. These camps are aimed at not only keeping your children active, but also educating them in the process. There are a few different types of camps available, so have a look around to see what you can find.

Play Dates

Setting up a few play dates with your child’s friends works wonders because it allows them to get some exercise. If you are seriously committed to the cause, you can take turns hosting the event and allowing the other parents some time away.

Daycare

Even if you are a stay at home parent, putting your child in daycare for a few hours per week could be beneficial. Not only does it allow the child to interact with other kids, but it can also get him outside more often than he would at home.

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Beautiful Sunday

Finally! A weekend with decent weather. This was the first Sunday with weather that let us get outside and enjoy ourselves without it being too hot or ruined by late afternoon thunderstorms. This summer has been unbelievably hot. Although it did get close to 90 degrees again today, with the clouds blocking the sun and a little breeze, it did not seem so hot.

We took advantage and went outside as much as possible. We even took a drive over to the lake and fed some ducks and geese a few pieces of stale bread that we had brought with us.

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Going to the Lake!

This looks like it is going to be the first really nice weather weekend we’ve had all spring. In fact, it is like summer now!It was in the 80’s yesterday and it is supposed to be the same again today.

So my sister and I are going to take her son to the Lake and put a blanket out on the sand to watch him play. There is a really nice public beach just 5 minutes from my house, with a huge sand beach, a nice playground with slides and swings, and a bath house with indoor toilets and sinks and private changing rooms. It is all free except for the parking fee.

The State charges $5 per car for daily parking, but I found out that if you buy a season pass, you only pay $35 dollars for unlimited parking all year. The parking fees go directly to the State fund for taking care of the parks, so I don’t mind contributing to that, since I use it a lot.

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Alaskan vacation

I have been wanting to go to Alaska forever. I have family there and have never gotten to visit them. My cousin has been trying to get me and the rest of my family to come up for a long time. We have considered it off and on, whether to just go up for a visit or to take a cruise while we are up there. We even looked into alaska hotels to see if we could find one that is near enough to visit family, but also to just enjoy the trip.

This lodge style hotel is just what I am looking for if we decide to go up. I want the full experience of the Alaskan “frontier” style vacation. This kind of hotel embodies that style to it’s fullest.

This is the kind of views you can expect to see in Alaska. I cannot imagine a more beautiful place on earth to visit, I asked my cousin how she could deal with the extreme cold during the winter and she said” The perfect summers make the harsh winters totally worth it”. Can you imagine a “perfect summer”? The perfect temperature all summer long without being too hot at any point is definitely worth experiencing. As much as I love to ski, I don’t think I would ever brave a winter vacation there though. That would be a bit too cold for me.

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Car Insurance

I decided to change my car insurance company to a new one. The old one kept adding new fees for this and that, and it really started to make me angry. I found cheap liability insurance and they promised no additional or hidden fees. That made me really happy. I had previously kept the same company for a really long time, but lately every I turned around, I was getting a bill for additional fees etc. That is something you shouldn’t have to deal with when you buy car insurance. I haven’t had any accidents or anything like that to make my payments go up, so it was just infuriating to have them do that.

Now that I found a better company that has better prices as well, I will not have to deal with anything like that again. My car is my baby and I want her insured, but I don’t want it to put me in the poor house doing it either. I needed to do this before I take my annual road trip when we go on vacation. I plan on driving to Florida and going to Disney with the kids, so it was a definite necessity. Add to that the money I will save on it can go towards our vacation.

We are so very excited to be able to go to Disney this year. Usually we go down to the beach, but now that the kids are all old enough to really enjoy Disney, we just have to go. I cannot wait until we get there. I haven’t told the kids where we are going. They think we are going to the beach and we are going to make sure we arrive in the middle of the night, so that the next morning when we get up we can really surprise them. It is going to be so much fun.

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Road trip

I am going on a road trip to Memphis with my mom to see Graceland. I have always loved Elvis since I was a little kid growing up. I listened to his music, (mostly Christmas Carols) with my mom because he was her favorite when she was growing up. She told me all the stories about him and we watched all of his movies. It is something that we could enjoy together as mother/daughters should.

I have my own rituals with my daughter that we do. We watch the Grease, Dirty Dancing and other movies of the like, that I grew up with. One day we will have a road trip to see something neat like this. My daughter is going with us on this trip as well, but the boys will stay with dad for the weekend. They get to have some grandpa time and go fishing. All in all, it should be great for the whole family.

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Completely jazzed

I just received my passport. It takes quite some time for a passport to be made. Not as long as it used to but it is still a lengthy process non the less. It used to take six weeks or more to get one. Now it is down to about three. Well, at least that is how long it took to get mine. Perhaps it is because I have a business trip coming up soon and my company helped put in the paperwork. I am not sure, but I am happy to have it.

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International job

Well, I have an exiting new account at work, that is going to let me not only travel, but delve into another culture. We are doing a consulting job for a company in Romania. I am so looking forward to the time I will get to spend on this account. My boss has already promised that when he goes to Romania, I will be able to accompany him. I have to procure the services of a translation agency for the documentation as it will be in our best interest and let the client know that we really care about their business.

The translation service will take all of our documentation to and from this client so that there is no confusion what so ever. I especially arranged this because while the client speaks a lot of English himself, we would like to make them feel more comfortable. Using a translation company has worked very well for us in the past, so we are quite content with the process. I will over see all of the documentation myself to make sure that it is one hundred percent correct. I am sure it will be though. This is an amazing opportunity for me.

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On the road again

My sister and I are off to our concert. We still have two hours of driving, but by our calculations we will get there early and might not get too jostled by the crowd. Both of us have bad backs and necks, so that would not be good for us.

I’m glad it stays lighter now, because the drive so far has been great. Lots of interesting things we are passing and we both want to come back to this area. It’s really pretty even without leaves on the trees. It also helps that my sister has a really comfortable, nice car!

 

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A weekend vacation

I’ve decided to pack up for the weekend, get in the car, and just drive to see where it takes me. I love to visit little towns and sight see. I really don’t have any destination in mind.

Maybe I’ll find a great antique shop, or a nice little bed and breakfast. I know though, that I just need a break from work and home renovation.

It will be nice to get away, and see where I end up. I’ll check in with my family, of course. I know they worry. I do too when they go on vacations or I’m not in contact with them at least once a day.