Jen Russum

Advent ideas for kids

Advent ideas for kids

I've stumbled upon two fun advent ideas for kids this week, and I plan to start them both today... Wrap up 25 Christmas pictures book individually. Number each of them. Your kids can unwrap one each day until Christmas, and you can read it together. We already own a few Christmas books I will include, I bought a few more from the girls' school book fair, and I'm planning to borrow the rest from the library. The book of Luke has 24 chapters. Read one chapter each day to your kids up until Christmas Eve. I will probably do an abbreviated version of the reading since my kids are so young. Older children could take turns reading aloud. I just wanted to share these two meaningful activities that don't require a ton of prep work, but promote Christ, literacy, and family time. Win, win, win. ... Read more

The Perfect Weekend

The Perfect Weekend

You know how some weekends just feel perfect? That was this past Veteran's Day weekend for us. Veteran's Day on a Friday? Yes, please. We convinced our dearest friends, the Bakers, that we could all squeeze into our tiny beach house for the weekend (they have twin three year-old boys). They took us up on the offer, and came into town on Thursday night. We rearranged rooms and had kids sleeping on the floor and it all worked out perfectly. We spent the whole weekend playing, talking, eating, and laughing. It was like the good ol' days of hanging out with them in Arizona, but possibly better because we didn't go home at the end of the night. We just woke up each morning and kept the party going. We had literally no agenda for their visit, but we managed to fill the weekend with all sorts of adventure: Sidecar Doughnuts... a must-do when we have visitors. Beach day (sand castles for the kids, surfing for the guys, hand-dipped corn dogs for lunch). Dinner (build your own pizza night) with our former pastor and his family. Game night. Bike rides. Marina Park with the kids. Picnic lunch. Family pictures on the beach at sunset. Pot roast dinner. Campfire and s'mores on the beach. Another game night. Farmer's Market. Brunch at the restaurant around the corner. It was seriously the best. Parenting together, laughing together, talking about everything - the spiritual and the silly. As we slowly build community in Orange County, it was so nice to have a refreshing weekend with close friends - people who know us well and love us deeply. The Bakers vowed to come back before we move away from the beach, and I can't wait to do it all over again. ... Read more

Why you need to use EBATES this holiday season

Why you need to use EBATES this holiday season

I am here once again with my yearly reminder... you MUST use ebates for your online shopping this holiday season and ALWAYS. I posted about this last year, but I want even more of my friends to jump on this amazing bandwagon. You get $10 automatically when you sign up. Ebates is a rebate system that gives you cash back for shopping online. And you don't have to go out of your way to use it. Just shop at your usual stores (Nordstrom, J.Crew, Kohl's, Old Navy, Shutterfly, Etsy, etc.) and receive cash back on purchases you were already planning to make. During the year, I would say stores offer an average of 1-6% cash back on most purchases (which adds up, I promise... I just got a $15 check in the mail for booking Micah's flight and car rental for his grandpa's birthday party). BUT during the holidays, some stores offer 10 or 20% cash back to drive online sales. Picture this: Buy your husband the $100 North Face Jacket he really wants for Christmas, and receive $12 back in the form of a check in January. It's amazing! Last year, I think I made at least $100 during December alone through referrals and my own gift purchases. I have been using ebates for a couple years now, and I've earned almost $300 total just for buying items I was planning to buy anyway. Sign up for your account here. (Reminder, you get $10 added to your account automatically!) Make your first purchase (the cash back will be wild this weekend after Thanksgiving). Get a check in the mail in the new year. And ebates has a few tools to make your shopping even easier. Install the extension in your browser. When you are shopping a site that offers cash back, a tiny window will pop up that says "Activate 3% cash back now." Click it, wait a few seconds as your window refreshes, and you are good to go. Anything you buy will be applied to your account. Ebates added a new trick to its service this year. Now when you go to check out, another window will pop up if ebates found any discount or promo codes online that might save you more money. You just click the button, ebates scans every code available, and they apply any available discounts to your price before you pay. I highly recommend you sign up for ebates as soon as possible. Don't make a single online purchase this Christmas season without putting money back in your own wallet. ... Read more