The Morning High-Five I have a love/hate relationship with summer. I love that we're free to do what we want, but I strongly dislike that we always end up sitting around doing nothing. And there's nothing more annoying to me than looking at a group of children, lounging in their pajamas, watching TV late in the morning. In an attempt to get all of us off on the right foot in the morning over the last couple of summers, I've halfheartedly used a simple system called The Morning High Five. I first read about it over at Life as Mom, and have expanded it a bit to work for older kids. I have renewed vigor right now as I am looking at 14 (long) weeks Keep Reading

The end of school and the beginning of summer is just around the corner for the Pacific Northwest and it's time to relax, sleep in, and get wet. I know that putting a little bit of work into planning out my family's summer routine before everyone is home all day gets all of us headed in the right direction. A couple of years back, I started setting up simple systems to keep my house and people loosely organized which increased the chances of us going out and doing awesome stuff. Relax, I'm NOT a "type A" person. I don't love charts and calendars and checklists. I'm totally chill, but the older my kids get, the more systems I need to have in Keep Reading

S'More Combinations Looking to jazz up your next camping trip or backyard fire pit party? Change up the typical graham cracker + chocolate + marshmallow s'more with these nine s'more combinations! The Neapolitan -- Strawberry marshmallow, white marshmallow, and chocolate. Kraft has tons of flavored marshmallow options at most grocery stores. Dark Chocolate Bomb -- Chocolate marshmallow and fine dark chocolate (Lindt or Trader Joe's have delicious options) Chocolate Caramel -- Rolo or other chocolate covered caramels (Trader Joe's has amazing caramels) and marshmallow (Kraft has these awesome Caramel Bits available too!) Hawaiian -- Toasted Keep Reading