When the Cleaver clan gets together for some family fun time, we have several tried and true activities that always bring us closer together and puts a smile on our faces!  Here's a list of our faves:

1. Go outside and have a backyard camp out! We love getting out our tents, sleeping bags and lanterns and having a good old fashioned camp out right in our own backyard.  Of course, we try and top each other that night by telling the scariest of ghost stories!
2. Family Board Game Night! Our household loves to play cards, dominoes and board games and we frequently have a marathon game night.  Sometimes if we have enough friends and family over, we even make a tournament out of it and the winner is "king or queen" of the day and gets to pick the board game we play at the next family fun night.
3. Family Movie Night! There's nothing better than cooking up some buttery popcorn and piling on the floor with blankets and pillows to watch a great movie!
4. Put Together a Puzzle as a Family! Some of the best conversations I've had with my loved ones have come while sitting together and putting a huge puzzle together.  As soon as Riley gets older, we will be instilling that tradition in this household too!
5. Work on an Arts & Crafts Project Together! Carving a pumpkin, sewing a pillow, and making our own Christmas cards are all terrific ways to have fun with your family.  Find a cool and unique arts & crafts project to do and then get everyone involved!

I hope these few ways that my family has fun together has inspired you to share some of your fun family activities!  I'd love to hear more about what you do with your family for fun!

1) Turn on Image Stabilization and Use a Tripod! – When it comes to shooting fireworks, or any low-light scene, don’t go it alone. No matter how advanced your camera may be there is no better image stabilization than a tripod. If you don’t have access to a tripod, try using any surface to steady your camera, whether it be a tree, fencepost, chair, etc.

Because you’ll be using longer shutter speeds, you must keep your camera perfectly still in order to capture crisp, clear images free of any blur caused by camera shake.

2) Setting Your Camera’s Shutter Speed –if you have a digital camera which offers a manual shooting mode, you have the ability to adjust your shutter speed.

But wait, there`s more! »

My husband absolutely LOVES potato salad made with mayonnaise only, but around here, it only seems that the mustard variety can be found.  With the great Spring weather upon us and summer just around the corner, I thought I'd include this recipe for today's Mmm Monday especially for my husband and other mayonnaise potato salad lovers like him.

Original Potato Salad with Mayonnaise

Ingredients:

• 2 pounds potatoes, peeled and cut into 3/4 inch chunks
• 1 cup Hellmann's® or Best Foods® Real Mayonnaise
• 2 tablespoons vinegar
• 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1 cup thinly sliced celery
• 1/2 cup chopped onion
• 2 hard-cooked eggs, chopped (optional)

Directions:

1. Cover potatoes with water in 4-quart saucepot; bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Reduce heat and simmer 10 minutes or until potatoes are tender. Drain and cool slightly.
2. Combine Hellmann's® or Best Foods® Real Mayonnaise, vinegar, salt, sugar and pepper in large bowl. Add potatoes, celery, onion and eggs and toss gently. Serve chilled or at room temperature.

As many of you know, my daughter Riley is 18-months old, and sadly, I'm the most overweight that I have ever been in my life.  You see, I breastfed Riley for a full year and in that time, my body seemed to do everything against what was the norm.  First, I've always heard that if you breastfeed immediately after giving birth, the weight will just "melt" away and you'll be back to your pre-pregnancy size or even BETTER in no time!  Well, that didn't happen for me!  It took me over six months to get back to pre-pregnancy size, even though I nursed Riley exclusively.

Next, I always heard that after you weaned your child from breastfeeding, that you would gain a few extra pounds because most women eat more calories while breastfeeding and they continue to do so after they quit.  I made sure that I was eating MUCH less than I did while breastfeeding and still the scale continued to climb...and climb...and climb!  This was very disheartening to me since I've never really had much of a weight problem before in my life.  Now, I can no longer fit into any of my clothes and I feel like a total cow!  I have always heard that your hormones take a while to "reset" themselves and so I basically tried hard to give my body a pass for the six months after I weaned Riley.

That six month period ended on April 24th.  I am currently 14 pounds over what I'd like to weigh again and so I'm going to get into shape, get my old body back and I'm taking no prisoners!  I've decided that the Jillian Michaels 30-Day Shred is just what I need to get back to my old self again right before the summer swimsuit season hits!

Every Wednesday, I will be updating you on my progress while working this program.  I hope to write some helpful suggestions I've found to aid in losing belly fat and any other tips and tricks I pick up along the way will also surely be shared!  I've even included a linky here so that anyone who is also fighting the "battle of the bulge" can join in and we can cheer and encourage each other to victory!

I found this site today and thought that not only would I participate, but I'd pass this on to all of my readers too!  There is a group called Kaufda, based out of Germany, who is partnering with the Arbor Day Foundation, to plant one tree for every blog that does the following:

1. Write a blog post about the initiative and display the button on your sidebar.
2. Email the link of your post to [email protected]
3. That's it!  One tree will be planted this spring in Plumas National Forest in Northern California.

I think this is an extremely easy way to help the environment and beautify the landscape at the same time!  Here is the link back to Kaufda's site so that you can choose which button you'd like to display on your own blog:

http://www.kaufda.de/umwelt/carbon-neutral/how-you-can-join/

If you participate in this project, please leave me a comment letting me know that you've done so!  I'd really like to see how many trees we can plant together!