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Summertime is Quality Family Time!

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Each year, we try to maximize the amount of time we can in our trailer trailer, affectionately known as the #SilvaBulletRV.

Last year, we took an amazing trip down to Florida with our trailer. The girls really wanted to visit the Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal Orlando. We are all huge Harry Potter fans, so when they asked, we all got really excited.

Next thing you know, we are planning our trip. We decided to tow our trailer down, and make it an extended 3 week trip. By doing so, we were able to visit places we had never been before, and see some of the great places in the US along the way.

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The trip south

We booked 3 campgrounds on the way down. Our first campground was Wally World in Loudonville, Ohio. We had stayed at this campground before, and absolutely loved it. We stayed at Wally World for 2 days.

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Volunteer Park Family Campground in Heiskell Tennessee was our next stop. We stayed there for one night.

Our third stop was Southern Trails Resort in Unadilla Georgia. We stayed there for one night. While there, we met people from our home campground in New York State. Such small world!

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Florida!

When we arrived in Florida, we stayed for 3 nights at Ellenton Gardens in Ellenton. It was a small RV park with an awesome pool.

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We visited friends, and spent some time at the beach on Anna Maria Island. One of the best beaches I have ever been to. The kids loved it there!

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Our second destination in Florida was Sherwood Forest RV Resort in Kissimmee. This was a beautiful park, and would be our home base for the time we spent going to and from Universal Orlando.

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Universal was awesome, and the Wizarding World of Harry Potter did not disappoint.

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It was time together we will never forget!

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The trip home

The first campground we stayed at on the way home was Barnyard RV Park in Lexington South Carolina, where we stayed for 2 days. This was less than an hour from where Wendy’s cousins live, so we were able to get in a visit before we left.

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Our next destination was Fort Chiswell RV Park in Max Meadows Virginia. The scenery was stunning! We were in the mountains, so cell reception was not the best… but none of us cared.

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Our last 2 nights were spent at Rocky Fork Ranch Resort in Kimbolton Ohio. Wendy and the girls got in some geocaching while there.

All hands on deck

As you can imagine, with an itinerary like this, we needed all hands on deck. Wendy and I shared the driving, and the girls helped in every way they could. They helped cook meals, clean up, and pack up the trailer.

When we arrived at a campground, they helped put the wheel chocks in, set up the stabilizers on the trailer, and unpacked the trailer. When it was time to leave, they helped with clean up, and the reverse order of set up. Having all hands on deck makes easier work for everyone.

Quality Family Time

21 days on the road + 5517kms traveled + drove through 11 States (New York, Ohio, Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia, Florida, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia, Pennsylvania) = Quality Family Time.

While it was tiring at times, I wouldn’t have passed up this opportunity for anything. We love spending time together as a family, and this was the perfect time to do it.

As well, we couldn’t have done this trip without the organizational skills and superb planning of my tag team partner for life!

If you are thinking of taking a road trip, be sure to check out Furkot to help with your trip planning. It helped keep us on track, and gave us a very detailed itinerary.

Cheers,
Big Daddy

What an amazing summer it is going to be!

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My amazing Summer started off with a trip to Montego Bay in Jamaica! It was awesome, but I will leave that for another post.

I’m so excited for the rest of the summer! So far, I have been hanging out with my friends and having a great time. We’ve gone to the park, the mall, and the movies. We saw the new Wonder Woman movie… it was amazing!

Volunteering

I volunteered at the grade 8 grad with my Dad, and my friends Lauren and Ben. I handed out programs to the parents, while Lauren helped with audio. Ben helped back stage. My Dad was taking photos for the yearbook, which he also designs.

This week, I am also volunteering at my church’s VBS summer camp (Vacation Bible School) with my friends. I haven’t been to VBS in a couple of years, as we usually are away camping, but this year, we came back just so we can go.

Another Amazing Summer at Niagara’s Lazy Lakes!

Tonight, we will be heading back to the #SilvaBulletRV at our home campground Niagara’s Lazy Lakes (in Lewiston, New York) for the weekend. We’ll get a couple of days of relaxing at Lazy Lakes before heading off to Ohio with our camping family! I am so excited to be spending a whole week with them at Wally World in Loudonville, Ohio.

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Wally World in Ohio!

Wally World is one of my favourite campgrounds. There is so much to do around there. They have an activity complex a few minutes down the road with go-carts, high ropes and low ropes courses, a mini golf course and lots more. You can also rent canoes, kayaks, or tubes to float down the Mohican river.

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A couple of years ago when we were camping there, I canoed 7 miles down the Mohican River with Mom and Lauren. The end point is right by the campground, which is really convenient. Dad followed our journey in the truck and took some awesome pictures.

Another one of my favourite things is visiting the Amish market near the campground. When you walk in, it’s like you just walked into bakery heaven. The awesome thing is that everything there is homemade. I especially like the apple butter and the ice cream.

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Camping at Lazy Lakes and Bronte Creek

After a week in Ohio, we will be heading back to Lazy Lakes for a couple of weeks, then a week at Bronte Creek Provincial Park, and then the last two weeks of my amazing summer will be at Lazy Lakes.

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At Niagara Lazy Lakes, there are two pools and a playground. But we always have things to do, whether the weather is good or it is raining. We have lots of games to play, movies to watch, and colouring books. We also have Storm, who loves our attention all the time, and loves to cuddle and run around.

We also get to spend a week camping at Bronte Creek Provincial Park, which is close to our house. We have only been there to visit the petting zoo and play at the activity barn. We have never camped there, so I am really looking forward to spending the week there.

The most amazing summer ever!

This is going to be the most amazing summer ever, and the best thing is I get to spend it with the best people in some awesome places!

Cheers,
Rachel

Let The Summer Begin!

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My favourite part about the summer is spending time with friends and family! In the summer we go camping in our travel trailer. It’s called the #SilvaBulletRV.

Camping is so much fun because we get to see our camping family. We have become very close with some friends at our campground. They are just like part of our family. I am so excited for when we go to Ohio because I will get to ride in a go-cart by myself! Ohio is going to be so much fun because we are going with our camping family. I am so excited!

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l love to go to the park and play with my friends at camp. Going swimming at the campground’s pool is so much fun. I get to make big splashes when I jump in! Swimming is the best this year because I can go to the pool with friends, and not have to have Mom and Dad come with me. I never swim alone, because it is not safe.

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Summer break is awesome because we don’t have to do any school work! Lots of popsicles and freezies for all those hot days. Even if it rains, we still have fun! I like to ride my bike and go on bike rides with my friends!

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Last year in the summer was lots of fun. We went to Universal Studios! I went on a few of the roller coasters!

We went to 3 campgrounds on the way to Orlando. While in Florida we stayed at 2 campgrounds. We stayed at 3 more campgrounds on the way home. We were so excited to go to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter. It was amazing! We tried some Bertie Botts every Flavour Beans, Butterbeer, Frozen Butterbeer, and Chocolate Frogs. We had lots of fun at Universal Studios.

I cannot wait for the rest of the summer. We have a lot planned. It’s going to be so much fun!

TTFN,
Lauren

It’s all mine!! (aka Goodbye Blogger…Hello WordPress!)

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This has been a long time coming…looooong time!

Blogger to WordPress

Being the techie geek that I am, I wanted to do the move myself.  I have read countless posts on how other made the switch.  What to move first, how to move the domain, importing the posts, what plugins to use and how not to lose your SEO.

It was almost too much information. My head was spinning.  I didn’t want to make a mistake. I didn’t want posts or comments to be lost.

Comments was a big issue.  For the longest time I have been using Disqus.  I really like Disqus and wanted to continue using it.  But how do you get the 1000’s of comments from Blogger to the new WordPress site moved?  Disqus has online tools and plugin and it worked…for all but 10 posts.  With the help of the awesome customer service people at Disqus (folow them @disqushelp), I got all of the comments moved.  All of them!! Woohoo!!!

So I had all the blog posts moved over to the new development blog.  All of the comments were working.  Last thing to do…redirect “mapsgirl.ca” away from blogger and point it at my new WordPress blog.  A few days ago, I called GoDaddy and talked to their amazing customer service people and made sure I had all of the steps in the right order.

Craig made an awesome new logo and header for me!  It was time to move away from a title that didn’t really fit my blog anymore.  “Funny things are everywhere” was fun for a while, but I wasn’t a humour blog.  Now I’m just me!  Mapsgirl!

Last night, I clicked the right buttons. Made all the changes required.  And here we are!!

Everything is mine.  My domain. My hosting. My blog is mine!

I moved over 800 blog posts and 1000’s of comments!

My feed is pointed at the right place and people are getting updates! My SEO still seems to be intact (*crossing my fingers* that is stays that way)

This is a very proud moment for me! I hope you enjoy my new blog!

 

It’s like ripping off a band-aid!

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Over the next few days, I’ll be making some exciting changes.
These changes are a long time coming….and I can’t wait to share them with you!
If you experience difficulty accessing my site, please be patient as this will be temporary.
Thanks for your understanding!
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