Category: Featured

Fall brings many opportunities for fun family activities, both at home and away from home. Two of the most popular holidays — Halloween and Thanksgiving — occur in the fall. Football season and the school year also begin in the fall. Fall weather allows the last few opportunities to barbecue on the patio and the first few opportunities for hot soup by the fireplace. Still running low on ideas? Here are eight ideas for fun family activities for fall:

Leaf Peeping

Deciduous trees shed their leaves in the fall in a multi-step process intended to protect the trees during the cold and dark winter months. Nutrients, sugars, and water stored in green leaves are pulled back into the trunk and roots to fuel the tree as days shorten after the autumnal equinox towards the end of September. And by cutting off circulation to the leaves, the trees conserve energy that would otherwise be wasted trying to keep leaves green when they will just freeze once the temperatures fall below 32 degrees Fahrenheit.

 

This biological process produces a spectacular show. Fall foliage usually peaks in mid- to late-October, depending on your weather and location. New England has the best-known and most vibrant leaf-peeping opportunities as maple forests turn red, orange, and yellow. However, many of the forests in the Midwest, Mountain West, Pacific Northwest, and Southeast — particularly along the Smoky Mountains — have oak, birch, beech, and aspen trees that will turn yellow, with some flecks of orange and red, in fall.

Many weather websites track leaf color throughout the fall. When fall foliage season hits your locale, one of the most popular and fun family activities for fall is to pack a lunch for the entire family in a soft side cooler and rent a Jeep Wrangler or other SUV for a drive into the mountains. There you and your family can experience this annual event in its full glory. Just remember not to bring the dog unless he or she has had some dog training. While most national parks and national forests allow pets, they must be leashed at all times and you must clean up after them.

Tailgating

 

Football is an American fall tradition. Football (or American football as it is known outside of the U.S. and Canada) evolved from soccer and rugby over the first 70 years of the 1800s. In the fall of 1869, the first intercollegiate football game was played between Princeton University and Rutgers University. A standard set of rules was developed over 15 years from 1880, when the line of scrimmage and the center snap was codified, to 1895, when the first forward pass was completed. Walter Camp, a football player at Yale from 1878 to 1882, invented some of the most important and significant rules in football and is recognized as the “father of football” for his efforts.

From the beginning, football was a fall sport. Whether at the Pop Warner, high school, college, or professional level, the end of summer and the beginning of the school year are accompanied by football season. And football season has not officially arrived until the first tailgate party of the year.

Fun family activities for fall include gathering the family together for a tailgate party before a high school, college, or professional football game. You can even host a get-together before your child’s Pop Warner game so friends and family can show their support for the child’s nascent football career. While any party in the parking lot of a football game is technically a tailgate party, the traditional tailgating spread is a soft side cooler full of beer and burgers hot off the grill.

Block Party

Fall block parties can be an opportunity to get to know the neighbors and blow off some steam after a hectic summer. Block parties can be themed to any of fall’s big occurrences, such as the end of summer, back to school, Halloween, Veterans Day, or Thanksgiving. The best part of these fun family activities for fall is that you do not have to do all the work by yourself. If you hold a pot luck block party and get a few neighbors to help out with the decorations, the burden will be more-or-less shared equally among all the families in the neighborhood.

Some neighborhoods even hold block parties in lieu of, or in addition to, trick or treating on Halloween. Not only is this a safer option than trick or treating, it allows everyone, both young and old, to join in the Halloween fun.

Another idea for a block party is to combine the block party with a service project such as helping out a neighbor or raising money for a worthy cause. It is often easier to hit up the neighbors for help when you are supplying food, beverages, and entertainment than just going door to door.

For example, on Veterans Day, you could hold a block party to help veterans and families of deployed service members to clean their yards and get ready for winter. It should be easy to round up volunteers with the promise of a pot luck lunch and games for the kids after the work is done.

Fall Festivals

Pumpkin patches and other festivals can provide excellent opportunities for fun family activities for fall. While pumpkin patches primarily have games and activities geared toward children, hayrides, corn mazes, arts and crafts, and every type of pumpkin spice flavored food and drink under the sun can provide endless fun for parents and teenagers too.

Also, do not forget the most adult of all fall festivals, Oktoberfest, which happens in the fall as well. The largest Oktoberfest in Munich, Germany traditionally took place during the 16 days preceding the first Sunday in October. After German unification on October 3, 1994, the Oktoberfest schedule was modified to run until Unification Day if October 1 or October 2 falls on Sunday. Thus, if you and your family are headed to the airport to fly to Munich for Oktoberfest, it ends on the first Sunday in October or October 3rd, whichever occurs later.

Many state and county fairs also take place in the early fall or late summer after the harvest. While these festivals are largely known for their fun family activities for fall, they are also agricultural and animal husbandry exhibitions and competitions. With the shift in the U.S. economy away from agriculture and toward services and finished goods, however, you would be forgiven if you skip the livestock barns and exhibit halls of award-winning fruits and vegetables and head straight for the amusement park rides and food vendors.

Pick Your Own Fruit and Vegetables

Harvest time not only brings state and county fairs, but it also brings pick-your-own season. Depending on where you live, apples, figs, pears, and Concord grapes all ripen in the early fall. And no discussion of fall would be complete without noting that pumpkins ripen in the fall. Many orchards and farms are open to the public, allowing you to pick your own fruit and vegetables and pay a fee based on the weight of the produce you take home. Picking your own produce can be one of the most fun family activities for fall. It also helps you to teach your children where their food comes from.

There are many benefits to picking your own fruit and vegetables:

• Often, the price you pay at a pick-your-own orchard or farm is less than you would pay at a grocery store because you have supplied the labor.
• Produce sold at grocery stores is picked before it ripens to take into account travel time and its lifetime in the store. By picking your own, you can pick fruit and vegetables at their peak of ripeness.
• You can pick only those that meet your criteria and are not stuck with old, bruised, or under-ripe produce because of a limited selection at the grocery store.
• Supporting local farmers creates a more sustainable and carbon-friendly way to get your food.

Once you have picked your produce, cooking, preserving, and eating your bounty provides even more fun family activities for fall. These days, people forget that pickles, jams, jellies, dried fruit, and fruit roll-ups were invented to preserve fruits and vegetables through the winter. Learning the lost skill of home canning provides you and your family with knowledge and a source of delicious food throughout the winter.

Even if you decide to eat your produce rather than preserve it, you and your family will enjoy finding fun ways to use your fruit and vegetables. No fall season is complete without pumpkin cookies, apple bread, hot soups and stews, and, of course, pumpkin pie.

Field Trips

When kids head back to school in the fall, their fall fun does not need to end. Field trips offer educational opportunities along with the fun of traveling to a local educational museum or art gallery.

Moreover, field trips are not just for school-age children. Volunteering to chaperone a school field trip can provide fun family activities for fall. Many schools allow chaperones to bring younger children as long as they ride with the chaperone. This will allow you to introduce your younger children to both the experience of going on a school field trip and the educational or cultural lesson to be learned from the field trip.

If you live in one of the unfortunate school districts where field trips are a rarity, you can use weekends to plan your own family field trips. These field trips do not need to be elaborate. Most kids are happy to take the behind-the-scenes tour at a bakery, watch an educational IMAX movie at the planetarium, or stroll through the zoo. As a bonus, many museums, zoos, and galleries host educational events tied to fall holidays like Columbus Day, Halloween, Veterans Day, and Thanksgiving that offer special exhibits and activities for kids.

Holidays With the Family

It may not require a trip over the river and through the woods, but grandma’s house always offers fun family activities for fall. Just a few of the benefits to spending time with your family, particularly during holidays and special occasions like birthdays and anniversaries, include:

• Traditions and culture. Children learn family traditions and cultural values by experiencing them first hand. Moreover, they learn the value of carrying those traditions on by seeing their importance to grandparents, parents, aunts, and uncles, and other relatives.
• Fun. Spending time with family is fun. Many of our likes and dislikes come from our families. For a family of football fans, there might be nothing more fun than sitting down together to watch the big college rivalry football game.
• Family bonds. Knowing family members and spending time with them is the way to build family bonds. These bonds can last a lifetime. Close family members can provide a support structure in difficult times and share in the good times.
• Memories. If you think back on your life, you will likely find that many of your best memories involve family. Whether it is trick or treating with your cousins, attending your sister’s wedding, or singing at your grandmother’s 90th birthday, family time often makes the memories that we value the most and bring us the greatest happiness.
• Health. People with larger social networks are scientifically proven to have a lower risk of dementia. Moreover, people who experience bouts of loneliness are more prone to depression and have a shorter life expectancy.
• Social confidence. People, including children, who have closer relationships with their family are more confident in social situations and are better able to form stable and lasting friendships.

Fly Somewhere Warm

When you live in a cold climate, finding fun family activities in fall may require a family trip somewhere else. If you enjoy traveling with your kids, you are not alone. According to surveys, 44% of Millennials travel with their children. This is logical since most people have a cherished memory of a family trip and many of our own behaviors are attempts to recreate the best memories from our childhoods.

To involve the entire family, plan vacations where everyone can spend time together. Some trips naturally require the family to split up. For example, amusement parks may require older children to separate from younger children since they will be drawn to, and meet the height requirements for, different rides. However, a trip to the beach, boating or camping trip, or even a cruise can keep the family together for family time.

For older families, you may even want to consider a team-building trip, such as a river rafting or a mountain biking expedition. Working together to accomplish a common goal or overcome a common challenge can bring a family closer. If the trip is a guided expedition, you and your kids might even learn something new.

The end of summer does not necessarily mean that family fun time is over. Cooler temperatures and shorter days can bring relief from the heat that allows you to find fun family activities for fall in the great outdoors. The beginning of the school year does not mean seeing less of your kids if you volunteer to chaperone field trips or set up weekend field trips of your own. With a little creativity, fall can bring many family-friendly activities for you and your children.

In 2006, it was thanks to used clothing purchases that the United States kept 2.5 billion pounds of fabric out of landfills.

You may have noticed trucks or bins throughout your neighborhood dedicated to collecting old clothes to be reused. This shows the considerable importance of donating unwanted clothing, rather than simply throwing it away. Besides the environmental benefits, there are several reasons why it’s a good idea to donate clothes to charity organizations. The following are just a few such reasons.

Help Those Who Can’t Afford to Buy Clothes

Often, thrift stores operated by charity organizations offer the only possible way for disadvantaged people to buy the clothes they need. Obviously, it would be impossible for these charity organizations to do their good work if people like you were not there to generously provide the merchandise. Then, charity organizations use the money made from used clothing sales to further their own good work in other avenues, such as helping those with disabilities.

Keep Your House Organized

We all have clothes that have been sitting in our closets for months, but which we never wear for some reason or another. Perhaps we don’t like the style or the fit. These are the perfect items for donating, as they are typically in decent condition, and would help keep someone warm and clothed. By clearing out your closets once in a while, you not only put these unused items to good use — you also help eliminate clutter from your life. This can be a dramatic emotional boost since mess and clutter can cause unnecessary amounts of stress. On top of that, cluttered rooms and closets are actually a fire hazard.

Help Victims of Natural Disasters

While the Federal Emergency Management Agency says they prefer cash donations to help with disaster relief efforts, donations of old but useful clothing are also helpful. But instead of donating directly to FEMA, you can choose a great charity organization that helps disaster survivors. They will make sure your used clothes are put to good use from there.

Preserve the Environment

This is a benefit we can all get behind. When you choose to give away your used and unwanted clothing to charity organizations, instead of simply throwing them away, you help keep huge amounts of fabric out of landfills. This is a great help to the environment since disintegrating clothing can be harmful to wildlife. Worse yet, clothes made from synthetic materials never really decompose.

Additionally, by giving others the chance to reuse your old clothes, fewer new ones need to be made to fill consumer demand. This alleviates another strain on the environment, as fewer resources are required for manufacturing these clothes in the first place.

Write Off Donations on Your Tax Return

When making used clothing donations to qualifying charity organizations, you get the chance to write off your donations on your tax return. This can mean savings for you at the end of the year.

There are lots of great reasons for donating clothing to charity. Perhaps one of the best reasons why is the good feeling you’ll enjoy, knowing that those clothes won’t be taking up space in your closet anymore, and are actually doing good in the world where it’s most needed. Consider donating your clothes to Green Drop when you’re ready to help others and streamline your life.

Imagine this: it’s a bright, sunshine-y day and you’re watching the birds flutter in and out of the trees; you’re watching the leaves blowing on the trees; you’re soaking up the sun’s rays and really enjoying the beautiful day.

You can certainly enjoy all those things by being outside, but you can also enjoy them from the comfort of your own home by looking out a brand new set of replacement windows. Not only can brand new window installation allow you to enjoy the beauty of nature, it can also save you money. Energystar.gov estimates that replacing standard windows with more energy efficient ones can lower energy bills anywhere from 7 to 15%

When it comes to replace window installation, there are no shortage of options and plenty of benefits. If you’re thinking about replacement window installation, here are some of the benefits you can expect:

• Improved Safety: When it comes to preventing break-ins, brand new replacement windows can be just what you need to stay safe. These days there are many kinds of replacement windows have reinforced glass and tempered glass that will stay together if it’s broken. Another option is laminated glass, which has an interlayer made of polymer that helps hold glass together if it shatters to aid in preventing break-ins. Bottom line, you can pick from several options that will keep your home safer.
• Better Home Value: When you go through replacement window installation, there’s a good chance that you can recoup the money and increase the value of your home. If you’ve got new tempered glass windows for example, that can be a good selling point if you ever want to sell your home.
• Easy Maintenance: Getting replacement windows with today’s advances in design can make your home safer and they can also be very easy to maintain. Window contractors can install brand new windows that will last a long time and are very easy to clean. In some cases, you might just need to give them a quick wipe or you can install shades or curtains to reduce cleaning time.
• Adding Tint: Another option for replacement window installation is getting tinted ones or using window film. Tinted windows can lower energy costs and offer comfort as well as additional protection from UV rays. It’s another layer of added protection you can use to keep yourself, your home, your car and your valuables safer.
• Lower Energy Costs: As previously mentioned, getting replacement windows can end up saving you quite a bit of money over time. The upfront cost of the window installation might be a little high, but over time you’ll end up saving money because your windows are well insulated and you’re protected from the elements.
  Depending on where you live, different window companies have different types and styles of windows are offered for different climates. Let’s face it, whether you live in the cold of Alaska or the never-ending heat of the South, you’re going to need windows that will help you regulate the temperature in your home.
• UV Protection: Natural light coming in through a window can be great when you want to curl up with a good book, but over time too much sunlight can have some negative effects. If you’ve got furniture near windows, sunlight can cause it to fade. Fortunately, a lot of today’s window styles can protect your home’s interior from the sun and can block a large percentage of UV rays.
• Looking good: Getting replacement windows installed in your home can keep you safer and reduce energy costs, but it can also make your home look good. New windows can make a home look more appealing to onlookers from the outside and can also increase your home’s value as previously mentioned.

Whether you’re looking to protect your home’s interior from sun damage, lower your energy bills or make your home a little safer, replacement windows can provide all those benefits and more. A local window company can help you find the right residential windows for all your home needs.

Any time you need a new vehicle, home, or other larger expense, there’s one important question that must be answered: to buy, or not to buy? Is renting or purchasing what you need the better option? This is just as true of storage trailers as it is for any other type of vehicle. Whether you purchase or rent this important piece of equipment truly depends on your own situation. If you’re looking for a storage trailer for sale near you, here’s what you need to consider before purchasing.

When To Rent

• Short Term Use: If you’re only in need of a storage trailer for moving homes or for a single short-term project, renting might be the best option for you. Renting for shorter time periods can save you money if you only need your storage trailer for a few days or weeks. This is a popular option for many Americans, with one in every ten renting offsite storage.
• Best Uses For Renting: If you’re looking for storage containers for lease and not for sale, they’ll be best used as temporary residential or office storage containers. More permanent uses will probably not work well with leasing; however, storage trailer rentals work very well as short-term on-site storage units.

When To Buy

• Long Term Use: Storage trailers for sale are best bought for long-term projects. If you’re going to be storing or moving items for a longer period of time, look for a storage trailer for sale. If you rent for longer periods, you might end up spending more money than it would cost to purchase.
• Projects for Purchasing: Storage trailers and containers are best purchased for long-lasting projects or if you’re going to have other times in the future where having a storage trailer will be useful. If you plan on relocating often or will need to store larger objects for a long time, it might be worth it to purchase a storage trailer.

If you’re looking for either a storage trailer for sale or lease, contact Eagle Leasing Company to see what options are available for you today. Eagle Leasing Company has a wide variety of storage trailers, shipping containers, and flatbed trailers to suit your needs; see which of these might work best for you by getting in contact as soon as possible.

Swimming pools are a great way to transform a boring backyard into a peaceful retreat that everyone can enjoy. There’s no better way to pass a warm afternoon than by jumping into a cool backyard pool. However, even the best pools require regular maintenance and care in order to keep them working properly for as long as possible. Though there are many pool maintenance tasks you can do on your own, some are best left to the pros. Here are a few tasks you should always let experienced pool contractors handle.

Shocking the Water

Roughly 85% of swimming pools use chlorine to sanitize the water. The chemicals keep bacteria and algae from blooming in the water and help make the pool a safe place for everyone. When you’re balancing chemical levels on your own, it’s easy to under-chlorinate every once in a while. When left unaddressed, the under-chlorination can allow bacteria and algae to grow in the water. Shocking the water with a high dose of chlorine at least once a month will take care of the problem. Leaving the task to the pros guarantees that the proper amount of chlorine is used each time. Once the water is shocked, professional pool maintenance contractors will be able to restore the proper chemical balance to the water so the pool can be used again quickly.

Maintaining the Heat Pump

Most pools have a heat pump to keep the water comfortably cool on those unexpectedly chilly days. Since the pump relies on electricity or gas to keep the water at an appropriate temperature, it’s best to leave maintenance to an experienced contractor. Remember, tinkering with electricity and natural gas is no joke — it requires the right tools, gear, and training to make sure the system is tuned up without damaging the heat pump or injuring themselves.

Cleaning an Already Dirty Pool

Nothing is more off-putting that walking into the backyard only to discover that the water has turned green. Unfortunately, cleaning the pool once algae has bloomed takes time and lots of elbow grease. Worse, it’s often too much for residential equipment to handle. Instead of trying to clean your custom pool once the water’s turned green, leave the task to an experienced pool maintenance crew.

Though it is possible to take care of pool maintenance on your own, some tasks are best left to the pros. If you ever feel like a maintenance task is too difficult or time-consuming to tackle, contact your pool contractors to schedule a pool maintenance appointment as soon as possible.

Did you know that the average homeowner spends approximately four hours every week caring for their lawn? That’s right, people really love their lawns, and it’s no question why. Lawns are places for fun, relaxation, and socialization, so it makes sense that people want their yards to look nice.

Landscaping plays a big role in how a lawn looks, but you can’t exactly get started with a landscaper unless you know where you’re going to buy your plants from. If you’ve never considered it before, now is the time to think about purchasing your plants from a local wholesale nursery. Here are just a few of the many benefits that come with buying your plants from a wholesale nursery.

Cost Effectiveness
Buying anything for wholesale price is going to be much more cost effective than purchasing it at retail price. The same is true for plants, and it’s why countless landscaping companies invest in wholesale plants for their customers. Whether you’re planting a new tree line or a big bed of your favorite flowers, going wholesale will allow you to purchase more in the long run.

Knowledgeable Staff Members
You’re not going to find the same plant expertise at a home improvement store as you will at a local nursery. Here, the staff members will be exceptionally knowledgeable about plant life, especially those plants native to your area. If you’re working with a landscaping architect, your plants will definitely be from a nursery where the employees are experts.

Native Plant Life
One of the most important things to consider when you’re planting a garden or permanently changing the landscaping around your home is local plant life. Plants that are native to your area will not only grow more effectively, they’ll be healthier and more durable throughout the course of their lives.

Whether you’re just starting out in the world of gardening or you’re a tried and true professional, there’s no arguing that wholesale nurseries are the way to go. Don’t wait to start planning your spring garden today!

Ever since “Back to the Future Part II” hit theaters in 1989 with its campy depiction of 2015, Americans have been obsessed with hoverboards. So it’s fitting that during Christmas 2015 “hoverboards” were the number three top search on Google for toys, although these so-called hoverboards don’t quite live up to the name.

Although they most definitely have wheels — that most definitely do not hover off the ground — these futuristic devices became a trending item in 2015. They operate like a Segway scooter but resemble a large skateboard, and the boards became an overnight sensation.

Unfortunately, a number of Chinese manufacturers in Shenzhen capitalize on trends like this by quickly pumping out bargain versions of consumer products, only without the regulations, standards, and oversight that Western consumers take for granted. Already, Shenzhen manufacturers have shipped millions of hoverboards, including 400,000 in October ahead of the holiday shopping season.

Some of these hoverboards ignite when overheated, posing a serious risk to their owners. Airlines banned the products from their planes, Amazon and other retailers restricted sales, and regulatory bodies in the U.S. and U.K. are sounding the alarm.

In December, the U.K. National Trading Standards service reported that fully 88% of the 17,000 hoverboards assessed at U.K. border crossings were deemed unsafe and detained.

According to a statement from the regulatory agency, “Officers from National Trading Standards Safety at Ports and Borders Teams and trading standards services in Scotland have detained the boards — a ‘must-have’ on Christmas lists this year — due to a range of concerns, such as safety issues with the plug, cabling, charger, battery or the [thermal cutoff switch] within the board, which often fails. Many of the items detained and sent for testing have been found to have noncompliant plugs without fuses, which increases the risk of the device overheating, exploding or catching fire.”

Thermal cutoff fuses are a single-use device designed to automatically cut off electrical flow in the event of overheating, and they’re required by regulators in countries around the world.

And according to Quartz.com, “Hundreds of makeshift entrepreneurs, many of whom have no engineering or technology expertise, are doing deals with white-label Chinese manufacturers to make hoverboards. They then re-sell them using names like Phunkeeduck, Swagway, Fiturbo, Hover Booster, Galaxy Board, and Cyboard.”

That means many of the hoverboards sold in U.S. stores or bought online were designed with faulty or counterfeit thermal cutoff fuses.

“All the hoverboards in the US are sold by importers, who barely even know the factories they are buying it from,” Andrew “Bunnie” Huang, a hardware analyst in Singapore, told Quartz in December. “In a hyper-competitive market that’s driven by a fad, taking six months to do a comprehensive testing program for safety means you’re missing out on a lot of business.”