Search Results for may (200)
After leaving Highland Hammock State Park, we booked a few days at a Thousand Trails park in Wachula, FL. Thousand Trails Orlando was full so we got in at the overflow park called Peace River. It’s the typical TT park. Everyone smashed in like sardines and up in your business. Not our cup of tea but every now and then we endure it to save some cash. You can’t beat $3 (until we can start boondocking).
We only stayed there 4 nights and I'm glad we did because just a couple days after we left we were told half of the park had to get out of there due to flooding. It was already pretty flooded when we were there. We even saw tow trucks pulling big rigs out of the mud. After our 4 nights there we hopped parks (as you have to do in Florida when staying at TT parks) and made it to Clerbrook RV Park. This was not a horrible park. It was crowded, but we lucked out in a site where not many people were around - and they let us wash our RV! You'd be surprised how many parks don't let you keep your rig shiny and clean.
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When Jon and I got married, we got some marriage advice. “Make sure you always have regular date nights”. Well, ok. I actually can’t remember much of what we used to do before we had kids other than work then come home, make dinner and watch That 70’s Show. I don’t recall having “date nights”. Every night was a date night. I was with my favorite person and we had fun even if we just stayed home and played ping pong or just laid around all evening.
When we had kids, we got some marriage/parenting advice. “Make sure you always have regular date nights”. “Make sure you get away from your kids at least one evening a week.” Well, ok... I’m not so sure about that. We never really had ‘scheduled’ or ‘regular’ date nights. I don’t think I put Adali down the first 9 months of her life and even had a hard time letting other people hold her. Did our marriage fall apart? Nope!
We had 4 kids in 5 years and we always got the same advice. “Make sure you always have regular date nights.” What is with that? Why does everyone think that dropping your kids off once a week to ‘get away from them’ is such a good idea? When did our society begin to believe that our relationships depended on getting away from our kids on a regular basis?
Look, I know we all need a break now and then. And I know days and nights full of diaper changes, crying kids and chicken nuggets can definitely kill the romance in a relationship. But does a movie and dinner out every week rekindle it? I don't know, man.
I have all the questions because we did mostly the same thing. Except our date night was every 2 weeks or so. But we still looked forward to it with much anticipation. That was, until we started traveling full time.
We have been on the road 9 months and guess what? We have survived without having regular date nights! Weird, right?
In fact, when my parents came down to the Keys they suggested they watch the kids so that we could have a night out. We had no idea what to do. We just felt lost. Then, when we came here to Panama City our friends so graciously asked to watch our kids so we could get away one night. We thought about it for several days and decided we would rather hang out at their house and let the kids play together while we got to talk and catch up.
Basically, we have seen the shift in our thinking. While dates are great (not mandatory) you can actually create your own ‘date’ while you are still with your kids. Sometimes we take the kids out to eat and we will let them sit at their own table and while we sit at a different one nearby. It's enough separation that they feel all special that they’re alone and we feel all special like we are on a date. It’s a win/win.
We also stay up late after the kids go to bed and sometimes we will watch a movie or just sit and talk. And guess what! That’s the same thing as a date. Kids are in another room but we are able to talk or watch a movie without interruption. You can create your own date nights even when you live in a tiny house with several tiny people!
Stay up later. Put a candle on the table. Get dressed up, stay at home and listen to your favorite music. Or better yet, go to bed early and watch funny Jimmy Fallon episodes on YouTube! (that may be our favorite thing to do) Date night is what you make of it. It doesn't have to be expensive, elaborate or even away from your kids. Get creative!
You don’t HAVE to go away and you don’t HAVE to do it every week. Don’t buy into the hype. For your next scheduled ‘date night’, try inviting the kids and make it a family date night. You’ll enjoy spending quality time with the kids and they will thank you for including them on your ‘date’. Trust me! The more the merrier!
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Recently we had the pleasure of staying at Highlands Hammock State Park in Sebring, FL. When I booked our reservations I was told that it’s the oldest state park in Florida. Awesome! We love old stuff. However, I was afraid that the ‘oldest state park’ may in fact be not so awesome. My mind wandered to buildings falling over and not being taken care of. I pictured horrible bathhouses and roads full of potholes! I am SO GLAD that was not the case when we pulled into Highlands Hammock State Park.
We were greeted by smiling, helpful people. We drove to our site (without pothole roads) and we were lucky to get a site on the end of the line. This being an older park, it’s not super condusive to big rigs, but we had no problem with our site. We saw that there were a several other big rigs in there, but the majority of rigs were on the smaller side and honestly, a bit crammed together.
We had a larger lot and no neighbors on one side since we were the last site on the lane. Our neighbors to the other side were an older couple tent camping for the week so we never felt crowded during our time there.
The views from our site were awesome. We have loved seeing Florida’s different landscapes but this site - and this park - have been one of our very favorites so far.
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With our recent trip to the Dry Tortugas, we knew we had to get a cooler of some sort. We didn’t want anything too big because we wouldn't be needing it often and we didn't have anywhere to store it. Soft sided cooler it is! Thankfully we found one of the best on the market from IceMule Coolers.
With a bit of research we purchased the 20 liter cooler in orange! We decided to try it out in the Keys before our trip to the Tortugas. We filled it with a bag of ice to see how long it would keep it cold.
We checked it 24 hours later and found that while most of the ice had melted, it was still freezing cold in the cooler. Since we knew we could buy more ice on the boat each day, the IceMule wouldn't have any trouble keeping our food cold.
Good News! None of our food went bad in the 2.5 days on the island. We did end up purchasing ice within 24 hours, but everything was still cold despite the 85-90 degree weather on the island.
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You may have noticed things are starting to look a little different around here. After 8 months of transitioning our lives from living in a house and subdivision to traveling full time in our 5th wheel, we finally have the time and brain space to make BareNeckers a full-fledged brand.
Being a designer, the first thing I wanted to nail down was a proper logo. When we changed up our name last year from Last Night Ago to BareNeckers I threw together a simple logotype with our name in it. It was alright, but we always wanted some kind of graphic or badge that would be easily recognizable.
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Ashley Longnecker / February 05, 2016
Jonathan Longnecker / January 13, 2016
We’re Jonathan & Ashley Longnecker. We love weird ideas, great food, travel, drawing, music, homeschool, tattoos, dreads, woodworking, design and our 4 amazing kids.