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Multitasking And Keeping Your Family Happy

September 8th, 2011

This past labor day, I took my wife and kids out to a little place called Rinky Dink Family Fun Center.  Basically it was an activity place that has what seems like a ton of fun stuff for kids (and to a lesser extent adults too).  It has three putt-putt golf courses, an arcade, a go-kart course, bumper boats, a bouncy inflatable to jump in, a batting cage, food, ice cream, etc.  Pretty much it’s basically a kid’s paradise, but not for me.

 

putt putt golf

putt putt golf

 

I decided to take the latest book that I borrowed from the library along with my new laptop and was going to go to town and crank out a few posts for my blog.  Once I got there, my daughter convinced me otherwise (yeah, she’s got me wrapped around her little finger).  So, I bought 4 rounds of golf (at $6 per person) and we played putt-putt golf.  We all had a great time, and the kids, wife and I were heading to the arcade portion of the family center, when I noticed something very unusually.  There, in the room where they hold birthdays, tucked out-of-the-way sitting by a small table, was a man with a book and a laptop.  I thought, “he stole my idea“, but good for him!

As I stood there in disbelieve, a party of four young teenagers went over to him, asked for their dad’s credit card, then got in line for some food (ice cream I believe).  Apparently, he was multitasking by taking his teenage kid(s) along with some friend to the Family Fun Center.  You see, the Rinky Dink center has a pay one price and the guests can do anything that they want all day long, and I’m betting that is what the guy decided to do.  In my head I was clapping and congratulating him for living what I preach and multitasking to get more done.  He’s being a great dad, by letting his kids have a great time, while doing some serious work while keeps a close eye on them or at least know where they are at and what they are doing.

I was going to do the same idea as he was doing, but my daughter’s wish to have me participate in put-put golf, won out (and always will).  But in this guy’s case, his teenage kids and their friends would have a better time goofing off around in the park.  So for this man, he had a win-win scenario!  He got his work done and scored big points with his kids (and their friends).

I have to admit, I was dumbfounded to see my idea being practiced by another person.  And I thought I was so clever…  I believe that I just saw what I will be  doing and look like in another 3 to 5 years from now.  I heard the twilight theme sounds in my head as I left the future version of myself back at the Family Fun Center, very weird experience!

Do you multitask in cases like this one, effectively creating win-win scenarios for you and your family?

MR

 

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Yoda Is The Ultimate Frugal Jedi Minimalist

August 23rd, 2011

Think about it!  The Ultimate Frugal Jedi Minimalist was Yoda!

Yoda

Yoda

Yoda was so good with money that not only was his thumb green, his entire body was green (as far as I know).

And as for Yoda being a minimalist (I’m not ragging on his size), he lived in a swamp using candles as lights!  You don’t get more minimalist than that my friends!

He had a cane, but I don’t remember him having his own car (or spaceship)…?

And as for his clothes…  If he did buy them new, the store must have been called “Rags R Us”.  I mean geez, the towels that I use to wash my car look better than the ones Yoda would wear…  Plus, I don’t really recall much of a variety in his wardrobe either.

And as for his shoes…  Yoda didn’t even have shoes!  Now that’s frugal!

Let’s talk about Housing now!  First, check out the model of his house in the picture below:

Yodas House

Yoda's House

 

This house wasn’t very big huh!  I would guess that it’s the size of a six man tent.  I’m willing to bet that it was an abandoned house or a house that Yoda built himself.  This means that the costs to purchase or build the home would be incredible cheap!  It’s obvious that Yoda didn’t have any running water or any other type of utility either.

So in conclusion, Yoda was the first modern minimalist.

If you made it this far, thank for reading my silly spill about Yoda.  And now for my favorite quote from Yoda: “Do or Do not, there is no try”!

May the force be with you!

MR

 

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End of Summer – Last Night at the Drive-In

August 9th, 2011

Yeah, it’s only the start of August, but for my kids school will start early this year (in mid-August).

Drive-In

Drive-In

 

We just got back from Vacation and already it’s time for us to go on our last Drive-In theater experience for the year.  Boy, this year really flew by… 

Another reasons that we want to go now instead of some later movie is because “The Smurfs” are playing, and we thought it would be something that entire family would enjoy.  So far, it’s pretty cool (I’m watching it and typing at the same time).  I still have a hard time imagining Katy Perry as Smurfette, to me it seems like Jeniffer Aniston would be the more likely pick for that role.

Well, the movie has just concluded and to my surprise, it was much better than I expected.  Admittedly, I came in with very low expectations…

I’m somewhat sad that this is the last movies this year that we will see at the Drive-In, but at least I’m not disappointed with the quality, it was a great conclusion!

Today, I decided to take a closer look at the wiring of the speaker system on the Drive-In poles.  I was lucky because the particular pole that we used had it’s wires exposed.  Based on the wiring, I’m guessing that it’s like an old christmas light string, where if one of the wires gets cut, the entire row goes out.  What a fascinating system that had to use back in the old days.

Well, I’m back at home now, everybody had a great time.

Cheers,

MR

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Boating Birthday Party For Kids

July 25th, 2011

In the past, we’ve had kid parties at mini-golf  and other kid places like Chuck E Cheese’s.  This year we decided to try something different!

Boating Party Idea

This year we asked my son what kind of kid’s party he wanted and he said he wanted a Boating Birthday Party.  “Wow, that’s a great idea” I said, while thinking “the only problem is that we don’t own any boats”…

Yeah, we have friends that have both boats and jet skis, but I can’t really tell them, “Okay, my son wants a boating birthday party so I’m going to invite people you don’t know to use your boats and jet skis at this certain lake…, is that cool?“!  That certainly wouldn’t go over well with me, so I can imagine it would go over well with them either…

Luckily my son’s grandfather recently purchased jet skis and since he’s a great guy, he offered to bring over his jet skis and help out with the party.  Next, my wife called her good friend that has a nice newer shine boat and asked if she could bring her kids and come to the party.  The friend said she would do one better and bring their boat for everybody to use too.

 

Boating

So my son’s boating party had all of the necessary equipment lined up for use.  Since this is the first year trying this, we decided to keep the list of kids that he could invite to a minimum so that we could test the waters so to speak (no pun intended).  So my son picked four of his most solid friends, with such friends, we could have some party fumbles and they wouldn’t really mind.  So we had a great pilot test group of friends for our first boating birthday party.

Notes For The Next Boating Birthday Party

While we were successful at getting the equipment lined up, there were times when all the adults were socializing on the beach.  During this time the kids were bored and wanted beach toys to build castles.  Normally we have such toys, but both my wife and I forgot them this time.

Well, that’s a major mistake because the kids don’t want to listen to adults at a party, so I had to jumped in the car and went out searching for some beach toys for the party.

It took me 20 minutes to locate a store that carried the sand toys and then another 10 minutes to get back to the beach.  While not a party stopper, this was a major miss on our part and something that needs to be considered for any future boating party.

Boating Party Mishaps

No, we didn’t have any accidents or crashes!  But our friends with the boat had to leave early because they had to travel to Virginia that day for a small vacation!  So the kids didn’t get to go tubing in the boat much, but it was still fun for the short time that they were able to.  Big thanks to our friends for coming out and adding to the fun by bring their boat!  This wasn’t expected and was a great treat for the kids.

After our friends had gone, one of the jet skis mysteriously stopped working after we turned it off at the beach!  Oh no, now we were down to one jet ski!  The kids all took two additional turns, then we had to tow the broken jet ski back to the dock to be loaded back onto the trailer.

We were luck that the four friends that he asked to come didn’t complain and just made the most of the time they had out in the lake with the jet skis and boat!

Jet ski

Boating Party Conclusion

We had some rough moments, but overall, the friends had an awesome time (not of they had gone boating before).  Asked if they want to try it again next year, all enthusiastically said “YES”!!!

I think if we didn’t have such family and friends to have the party, we might have been able to rent the jet skis (and maybe even the boat for all I know).  While it might be expensive if you rent them for too long a period, it might not be that bad if you only use them or an hour or two.

I think it would be a blast to run the jet skis on the ocean someday.  Perhaps we’ll rent them when we are on vacation this year…

I’m happy my son and his friends had a great day, life is good!

MR

 

 

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Surprisingly Good Time Watching Skits By Girl Scouts

July 16th, 2011

My daughter went to Girl Scout camp this summer (which was really just 3 hours after 6:00pm for the week), I can’t even tell you how much it cost because it wasn’t even a blip on my financial radar.

I did notice that each night my daughter brought something home and was always excited about what went on at camp and seemed very happy about it.  This registered on my ‘how is my daughter” radar, but I just smiled and went about whatever had my attention before noticing.

Yesterday evening was the last day of Girl Scout camp, and my son and I had to go watch Girl Scout skits (my wife had already signed up to help at the camp so she was there by default).  My son said he was going to bring his new iPod touch (he loved that thing), because he expected it to be boring (as did I truthfully).

So we went to our local park for the Girl Scout’s skits event.  The park is beautiful, with large established trees and a very picturesque pond and a massive but classic, rustic pavilion that is made of huge logs.  Right away, the setting instantly reduced any stress that one would experience, so I was feeling very positive about the event right away.

Next my son and I waited for the entertainment to begin (which it wouldn’t until 15 minutes later), I looked over at him as he sat in one of our foldout canvas “soccer” chairs, and as expected he was already playing on his iPod touch.  This made me smile because the iPod touch was expensive and I was glad to see he was enjoying it.  Money well spent!

Shortly there after, the Girl Scouts started their skits.  At first, we both were not too interested, but then we realized that the skits were humorous in form.  So while I paid attention the entire time (clapping after each skit to show support), I was surprised to see my son start to listen too.  About 10 minutes in he turned off his iPod touch and started to laugh along with the skits too.  To my surprise, most people in the audience started laughing too.

While most of the skits were things I’ve seen or heard before, the enthusiasm and sheer happiness each girl put into the skits made it extra special somehow.  So while most of the skits were cheesy, I ended up having a truly feel-good experience.  And I think most of the audience had the same experience, including my 11-year-old son.

Another awesome experience was seeing how extremely happy my daughter was afterwords!  After the skits were done, she ran over and gave me a hug; she was very happy!  Then the next 15 minutes she was jumping around and running around the small group I was in.  It was very cute in that special way that a young girl that is excited and happy can be.

I can’t vouch for every Girl Scout event, but that one event on that one night was well worth the time to see.

Cheers,

MR

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