When we are on the road we try to continue to encourage our kids to try new foods, but sometimes chicken tenders and french fries are just what the traveler ordered! When we were staying at Wilderness at the Smokies in Sevierville, Tennessee, we decided to help save our budget one afternoon and eat off of the hotel grounds. The Diner was right down road so it was the perfect lunch spot. This 50s diner is reasonably priced and had so much to choose from. Daddy J and I just had burgers and the kids had chicken tenders. They loved it when their chicken tenders came out with the smiley fries. They did say that they did not taste very good but the chicken was a hit!
Stay tuned next week because I will sharing pictures of all the yummy seafood we gorged ourselves on while staying on the Eastern Shore of Virginia!
This post is part of Wanderfood Wednesday. Stop by and see all the other delicious foods travelers are talking about today.
I have been drooling over Travelers Barista’s Maui pictures for the past few weeks. While we are not heading to Maui, we are heading to Hawaii in October and I have been reading all things Hawaii! I love her Travel Tip Tuesdays and right now you can see her zip lining through Utah (one of my top ten adventurous things to do)! She is also a fellow Traveling Mom and blogs as Northwest Traveling Mom. Some of my favorite articles are:
We just got back from the first road trip of the summer that took us 2400 miles through seven states twice! This is just road trip number one of 5. My friends think we are crazy but with a little planning our road trips usually have minimal issues.
Have you stopped laughing yet? Minimal issues…yeah right.
Ok…I might have lied. On this road trip I actually turned the wrong way down a street. After we remedied the situation, I turned to my husband and said “I always wondered how those idiots ended up going the wrong way on a major highway and now I know.” Once our heartbeats returned back to normal, we were able to laugh about it. We can’t control every thing that happens on our road trips, but with a little bit of planning the screaming moments in the back seat might not happen as often.
This year instead of buying a bunch of coloring books and maze books, I made the kids their own travel journals. For about a week I collected pages and pages of stuff to do in my Favorites folder on my computer. When I had some time (and bought new printer ink), I printed out all of the pages, took them to an office supply store and had them bound. It was probably more expensive than buying a couple of coloring books at the dollar store, but the look on their faces as they read through a travel journal made with each of them in mind was worth the money and time spent!
What did I include in the book?
Most importantly, I included blank journal pages for them to write their own stories and color their own pictures showing what they did on the trip.
Then I headed to Mom’s MiniVan and printed out a bunch of road trip scavenger hunts, the license plate game, and car bingo. The license plat game was a hit. We ended up finding 44 states, three Canada plates, and 2 plates from Mexico!
At their cartoon sites, I printed out coloring pages with their favorite cartoon characters.
At the Crayola page, I printed out state coloring pages for each state that we were going to be driving through. These coloring pages have the state flower, state bird, etc. Everytime we passed through a new state, I would have Big S find it in his book and color something (if he was awake of course!).
The kids spent hours looking through these books, coloring and writing things that were important to them. I even brought the books into a high school graduation with us to keep the kids occupied.
Today I am dreaming that the next four road trips go just as smoothly. If you will excuse me, I need to go print some more coloring sheets for the next book!
For more Monday Dreaming, stop by Mara’s at Mother of All Trips. Be sure to come back and visit us this week. I am going to share our adventures from the road trip. The kids mined for gems in Sweetwater, Tennessee, Big S went surfing in Sevierville, Tennessee, and we spent two great days exploring the Eastern Shore of Virginia…bridges and tunnels, Mister Whippy, and wild ponies…oh my!
This oil spill is not just destroying a way of life for beach goers and condo owners right now (despite what many people seem to think), but it is affecting the tourism industry, the restaurant industry, the seafood industry, marine life…the list goes on. I am not going to pretend to know or understand all of the politics or the workings of this catastrophic event. Instead, I will share my sadness for all involved through these pictures. Please keep all those affected in your thoughts. If you are looking for ways to help, do a quick Internet search and locate a reputable organization.
This was then:
This is now:
Here is a video by pcolagregg of the beach covered in pools of oil:
Stop by DeliciousBaby to see where other travelers are talking about!
A few weeks ago we took a walk through the Yellow River Marsh State Park in Milton, Florida, which is home to hundreds of pitcher plants in bloom. Pitcher plants are carnivorous plants. Like the Venus Fly Trap, they “eat” insects. You can read my review of Yellow River Marsh State Park at Pensacola with Kids. For today, Photo Friday, I wanted to share pictures of the pitcher plants.
Stop by DeliciousBaby to see where others are traveling!
The World is Calling…Can You Hear It? What a name for a travel site! I have told my husband several times that I feel like the world is calling me. I love that The World is Calling has all sorts of travel categories: couple travel, packing, travel with kids, travel prep, traveling with grandparents. Recently they went on a trip to Jeruselum and I can’t wait to read all about it. Some of my favorite articles:
Today I am dreaming about appreciating what I have in front of me in my own hometown. This post was inspired by a recent post at Dim Sum, Bagels, and Crawfish. Lucia posted a picture of her holding some of the teeny tiny shells that she found on an Italian beach. That picture called to me.
As I looked at those beautiful shells, I thought about all the times that we decided that we were too tired, too lazy, or too preoccupied to head out to the beach. I thought about all the times we walked right over the perfect shells and sand dollars as we tried to get a good spot on the beach. We love to travel (obviously!!! and we spend lots of time planning our trips and dreaming about the far away places that we want to visit. We do a pretty good job as a family to explore our hometown and surrounding areas, but we often forget to revisit some of our favorites.
Oil is beginning to wash ashore. I am so glad that last weekend, despite the pouring rain, we decided to head to the beach. We wiggled our toes in the sand (don’t be too jealous of the Florida flip flop tan!).
We ran around the sand soaking in the snow white color.
We stared at the rows of news trucks.
And of course, we hunted for shells. And of course I had to take that picture!
We have a couple of trips planned for this summer, but for now I am appreciating what I already have right in front of me. Thanks, Lucia.
Do you ever see a t-shirt on someone while traveling and think that you have got to get a picture of it?!? I just had to share this picture of an employee t-shirt at one of our favorite seafood restaurants on the beach. Shirts are available for purchase on Peg Leg Pete’s website!
Stop by DeliciousBaby to see where everyone is traveling!
I discovered Carolina Nomad just this week and I am so excited to have found this website. As you can imagine from the name, the website concentrates on the Carolinas. Some of our favorite travel memories are from when we traveled through North Carolina. We will be traveling that way this summer and then I will be headed to Asheville for the Type A Mom conference in September. You better believe I will be heading to Carolina Nomad for some ideas! Some of my favorite articles:
Now that my kids are old enough to enjoy swimming but are still young enough to fear nothing (well, just about!), I would like to take a long weekend trip to Homosassa Springs to camp and swim with the manatees. These gigantic sea cows lumber around the river and it is something that I would really like to see.
What better place to camp than a place called Manatee Springs State Park! The Ellie Schiller Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park is another state park where you can view the manatees from their observation areas. Even if we decide to skip the swim with the manatee tours, we can still support our state parks and see the manatees.
I have been drooling over 
and we spend lots of time planning our trips and dreaming about the far away places that we want to visit. We do a pretty good job as a family to explore our hometown and surrounding areas, but we often forget to revisit some of our favorites. 
