On July 9, 2015, Sonic is reportedly offering half priced cones all day long at all locations.
Note: This deal has been advertised with signage at various Sonic locations across the country. However, I cannot find any official mention of it online from Sonic. (If you find one, let me know!) So I’d recommend calling your store ahead of time to verify that they are participating.
Thanks, Freebies 4 Mom!
Kelli from New Leaf Wellness is giving away some of her favorite Freezer Cooking products (over $200 worth!) on her blog today. To enter, you just need to leave a blog comment.
She emailed me about the giveaway and said:
I wanted to find a way to thank my readers so I put together a bunch of my favorite freezer cooking items, like a slow cooker, food chopper, baggy clips, and other kitchen gadgets.
I wanted entry to be super easy so the the only mandatory requirement is to leave a blog comment. I hope this kick starts someone’s venture into freezer cooking.
Note: I would love your vote in the HomeRight Bookcase challenge! One voter will be randomly selected to receive a prize package. You can vote HERE. Thank you!
Hi friends! I hope you all had a great Fourth of July. I’ve posted about our annual “Spain Family Vacation” for the past two years, where we get together with my husband’s entire family and travel either to the beach or the mountains. For the past three years, we have headed to the beautiful Blue Ridge Mountains in North Carolina. (You can read about Year 1 here and Year 2 here.) We’ve stayed in different towns each time and visited different destinations. All of them have been breathtaking and we’ve had such a great time. Plus, it’s an amazing opportunity for our children to bond with their cousins and for my husband to spend time with his brothers. We all stay together in a big house — all 18 of us. (My in-laws, my husband’s 3 brothers and their families, and us.) I wanted to share our trip with you as well as some Blue Ridge Mountains attractions in case you ever decide to travel to the area. (Which I highly recommend!)
This year we stayed in Highlands, NC, in a remote mountain house in the Nantahala National Forest. The view from the house was spectacular.
Here is an even better view, Chris and Jonah with the mountains in the background.
On our first day there, we checked out Silver Run Falls in nearby Cashiers, NC. I highly recommend this spot for families as it’s beautiful and kid-friendly. It’s an extremely short hike from the car to the water, and it’s shallow enough for the kids to splash and swim. The mountain water is icy cold, but the kids were having too much fun to mind. We packed a picnic lunch and enjoyed our meal by the falls.
The next day, we headed to Cashiers Sliding Rock which, as the name indicates, is a natural waterside on the Chatooga River. It’s also a family friendly destination, but you do have to watch the little ones as there is a random 10 foot deep pool in the middle of the slide. As long as you stay to the side, it’s safe to slide down with little ones on your lap. We had a picnic here too, and the kids loved splashing. That’s their favorite mountain activity — locating waterfalls and creeks to splash in.
Here’s Chris sliding down with Aiden on his lap.
Another beautiful destination was Whiteside Mountain, where we hiked a gorgeous trail up to a lookout point with gorgeous views.
Unfortunately it was pretty hazy on the day we hiked so my pictures don’t do justice to the magnificent landscape, but it was amazing and worth seeing for sure.
The day before we left, we went to see Whitewater Falls, the highest waterfall east of the Rockies. It was absolutely spectacular, but it was raining so I didn’t get good photos. I didn’t want my camera to get wet, so we just took a few phone snapshots. Here’s one of me and my little hiking buddy. He was such a good sport during the whole trip!
It stopped raining on our way back to the mountain house and we pulled over at a lookout spot to take photos of this gorgeous view. It was still very hazy though.
We had to end our trip a day early and head back home on the 4th of July due to flash flood watches in the area since we were afraid we might get stranded. The roads we had to take to the mountain house were very winding and off the beaten path, and could be extremely dangerous if the area flooded. We had an amazing time with family though, and made lots of priceless memories.
We didn’t make it into downtown Highlands this time, but we have gone in the past and the little downtown area is really cute and fun to explore. There are lots of cute little shops and restaurants.
If you are considering traveling to the Blue Ridge Mountains, I highly recommend it! We have enjoyed every destination we’ve visited there.
How did you spend the 4th of July? I would love to hear about it! Leave a comment below and let me know.
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The post Our Family Vacation & Blue Ridge Mountains Attractions appeared first on Erin Spain: Home, DIY & Lifestyle Blog.
Guest post from Asheritah of One Thing Alone
When my husband and I went minimalist, we quickly realized that our trash habits had to change too. With a little research and some planning, we saved over $684 — and lightened our carbon footprint.
Here’s how you can too:
Our electric company pays $50 for refrigerators that still function, and offer reimbursements for energy-efficient replacements. And when our laptop crashed, we bought a new one and sold the dead computer for $50 online. Easy-peasy!
I save all my veggie scraps and rotisserie chicken bones in the freezer and make crock-pot stock once a month. One batch equals $17 savings, and if I’m not planning on making soup that week, I simply freeze the stock for later use. The other scraps go into our compost.
The average American drinks roughly 16 oz of soda a day (source), the equivalent of two aluminum cans or one plastic bottle. If those containers were recycled, a household of five could recover at least $68, if not more in certain states. You can also recycle wine corks, cooking oil, tennis balls, and golf balls for cash.
When we remodeled our bathroom a few years ago, we took the old cast-iron tub to a junkyard and got $48 for something we were going to throw out anyway. Since then, we’ve also sold old wiring, aluminum house paneling, our old water heater, and other miscellaneous metals.
The best way to get money for things around the house is to have a yard sale. But for those of us who just don’t have that much to sell, donating items to thrift stores results in an easy tax deduction.
You know those old college textbooks you’ve been hanging onto “in case you might want to refer back to them someday?” (Please tell me I’m not the only one.)
Five years after my graduation, I still hadn’t opened the cover on a single one, and I decided they had to go. Some I listed on Amazon and others I sold in bulk for easy payments. I also sell books I receive from publishers to do video book reviews, so I get to read books and make some money off of them. Voila! More shelf space and more money.
As a result of our collective effort to throw out less stuff, we found our 120-gallon trash bin was nearly empty each week. I now pay only when I need a pickup. We went from paying $10/month to $2 every two months, and they pick up our recycling for free!
Have you tried any of these methods? How else do you throw away less trash and make more money?
Asheritah helps overwhelmed women find joy in Jesus on her blog and through her books. She likes giving away free stuff to encourage women in their walks with God.
Our friend, Abi, over at The Modern Prairie Girl is running a sale on her Etsy Shop during the 4th of July weekend.
Use coupon code SPARKLERS4 to get 40% off anything from her Etsy Shop through July 7, 2015.
Google Play is offering FREE download of the movie All Creatures Big & Small.
Thanks, Freebie Radar!
A testimony from Mandy from MissMaesDays.com
The day had come when I had had it with storing all of our school supplies, projects, lesson plans, and books in our kitchen drawers and cupboards. For years, I was using the kitchen island and drawers for homeschooling our kiddos and it just was not working.
I had an “a-ha moment” when I looked at our hardly-used formal living room…it was the perfect space for a classroom! When I saw it in my mind I knew it could be done.
But we didn’t have the extra cash to transform an entire room in our house into a school room. How in the world could I afford the furniture and supplies to make the conversion?!
Then it hit me like a ton of bricks! Sell the formal living room furniture — the couches, tables, lamps, and decor. Then, USE that money to purchase the items I need for our school room!
Voilà! A school room paid in full, without using credit cards.
After my efforts to create some extra cash, I found that I had over $1,000 cash IN HAND. So, I set out to get some deals!
Once all of my hard work had paid off, I sat back and prepared to design our homeschool room knowing that we paid CASH for it! It was the greatest feeling in the world. (Here’s a look at our finished room).
MissMaesDays.com is the creation of Mandy Mae; wife, mother, teacher, and frugal-DIY-enthusiast. Hoping to inspire mothers to take action in making a positive influence in the lives of their children with simple, DIY, crafting, thrifting, and teaching projects, Mandy Mae enjoys sharing both her successes and hiccups with easy-to-follow tips & tutorials.
Have you saved up and paid cash for something — large or small? Submit your story for possible publication here.
