The Sewing Mom

This post brought to you by My Coke Rewards. All opinions are 100% mine.

This is fantastic, and so easy!  Coca-Cola has come up with a way that allows us to purchase and drink our favorite Coca-Cola products and give to our local schools at the same time.  If you have school aged children then you probably all ready know that public schools, no matter where you live, are always in need of funding for one thing or another.

With My Coke rewards for schools , purchase Coca-Cola products including Coke, Sprite, Fanta and Mr. Pibb, among others. On the products you’re purchasing, you’ll find reward codes, visit mycokerewards.com/schools and enter your reward codes.  Pick you specific school and specify the amount of reward points you want to donate.  That’s it, you’ve just helped your school!

Schools who want to participate, and what school wouldn’t want free support, simply have your designated school coordinator  register your school at My Coke rewards for schools and then spread the word to your school’s parents and extended family.  Use the points that are donated to get supplies ranging from No.2 pencils to music systems for the classroom.  It’s a great way to help keep class rooms supplied with the essentials for learning.

In addition, from July 13 through September 30, Sprite is hosting a give away of 25 playgrounds, worth $25,000, to schools and they are giving consumers who purchase and enter a code from any package of Sprite/Sprite Zero an entry into the sweepstakes to help their school win. Also, every three points donated to the school through the Sprite Spark Parks for Schools sweepstakes will give the school additional chances. Any new school that registers will be given a chance to win.

What are you waiting for?  Visit My Coke rewards for schools to register or start donating!

I can’t believe it, we so rarely get away, and here we are, getting away for the 3rd time in the same month!!

We are leaving tomorrow for a secret destination.  I can’t tell you where it is we’re going because my husband is sitting next to me and the destination is a surprise birthday present for him.  I can tell you that we’re not going to far, not leaving the state of Texas.  We’re just simply taking advantage of the fact that we have no softball this weekend and no other activities, so getting away for a birthday weekend just sounded like the right thing to do. 

Anyway, once again I will miss my EC drops, we leave tomorrow afternoon, Friday, and return home Sunday.

Have a great weekend everyone!

My daughter’s best friend from Chicago is in town staying with us this week. Today is her last full day and she leaves to fly home in the morning. To celebrate, my daughter and her friends have decided to spend the evening having a cookout and swim party at our house tonight. I’m all for it, I just wish we had time to install some Kichler Outdoor Lighting before they all come over!

You see, there is almost no outdoor lighting in our back yard. We have a lighted ceiling fan under the back patio, but that’s pretty much it. There is the tiniest little light I’ve ever seen inside our pool, it’s totally worthless and we’ve always wondered what the pool builder was thinking when they installed it! I wonder if Kichler Lighting sells any type of pool lighting. Well, back to the point, I did install solar lights after we moved in, but they don’t work any longer. I think the solar panel wears out on them. So right now, the only extra lighting we have out by the pool are the tiki torches my husband lights to keep the mosquitoes away! Well, I guess that will have to do for tonight, because I definitely don’t have time to get patio lighting installed.

Speaking of lighting makes me take a look at the rest of the house. Since we moved in I’ve wanted to update the 1/2 bath downstairs. It’s a small bath and I really like it, but it has a super boring mirror and super boring lighting that I would like to replace. Besides visual appeal, I’m always looking for ways to cut our electric bill. Speaking of which, did you see where UC San Diego recently completed a lighting retrofit that is going to save them over $200,000 a year on their electric bill! WOW! Anyway, I’m going to be looking at Kichler Bath Lighting to see what I like. As for the mirror, I like the octagonal shape, so I’m thinking I may just take it in and have a frame put around it. That would certainly dress it up and I would like it much better.

Well, rather than sitting here dreaming of patio lights and bathroom mirror upgrades, I best get to the store and get the groceries for the cook out tonight!

Oh my goodness! What a week we had last week!

We left over a week ago and spent 2 nights in Hillsboro, Texas for a softball tournament. It was super hot and the fields were in absolutely terrible condition, but the team pulled through it all and played very well, coming in 3rd place against some very tough teams. I was just glad we had opted to get a hotel so we didn’t have to drive back and forth. It also gave us a place to go cool down between games.

We came home last Sunday night, just long enough to get some laundry done and get a bit of sleep before getting up on Monday morning and driving to Branson, Missouri. We had such a wonderful time! We met my family up there and, although it was also super hot up there, but we managed to squeeze a lot of activities into our 3 day mini vacation, including riding the zipline! OMG! We had a blast! Here’s a photo of me (on the far left), my husband, daughter, brother-in-law, great-niece, and sister (far right), after completing our zipline experience. I highly recommend it!

We came home Thursday night and spent Friday cleaning house, laundry and doing yardwork. Saturday morning we headed to Denison, Texas for another softball tournament. If it was at all possible, I think it may have actually been hotter than the previous weekend. The girls played 5 games on Saturday, although we had to leave after game 3, run to the airport to pick up my daughter’s best friend from Chicago, and then drove back to Denison for the final night game. We got home around midnight, then drove back to the fields for 3 more games on Sunday. Once again, the girls played like champs in miserable conditions and this time, they took 2nd place!

We got home last night around 8 and I fell into bed at 9, completely exhausted. I got up this morning to return to work, thankfully it was a slow morning because my brain still wanted to be on vacation! I just have to get through the next 4 days and then we’re leaving for the weekend. I can’t tell you yet where we’re going, it’s a surprise for my husband’s birthday!

Have a great week, and go zipline if you get the chance!

We left Friday night and headed about100 miles south to spend the weekend at a softball tournament. I decided to take advantage of some special hotel rates and we spent Friday & Saturday night in Hillsboro, Texas, the same town as the tournament. There’s not too much in that town, at least not the parts of it we saw. Although, they do have a beautiful old courthouse that I would’ve enjoyed walking through, wish I’d taken a picture!

I did take one photo this weekend:

The girls played a total of 8 games over 2 days. The fields were in horrible condition and had no shade, for anyone. It was 102 degrees both days, miserable heat. But, the girls played like champs and were so much fun to watch. We are all very proud of their 3rd place finish. They were only 1 run away from playing in the championship game, that would have been like icing on the cake!

We are leaving in the am for Branson.  I’ll be gone all week so I apologize to those of you dropping EC for not reciprocating.  See you on Friday!