This afternoon my mom and the older of my younger sisters are on their way from New York to Illinois to visit me on their way to Kansas. Currently they are in Ohio and still about 5 1/2hrs away. My mom is making the trip to take my sister to college at MidAmerica Nazarene University in Olathe, Kansas. This is her first year away from home for school after being at home for a year taking classes from local schools in NY. My mom also just got her conversion van that allows her to get in the van in her wheelchair as well as drive without getting out of it. So it's kind of a big trip.

Since they are coming to stay with me and see me, I decided that I needed to do a little something. It's one of those moments when I find it necessary to do a tangible big sister thing. So I decided to make a care package for her to take to college. I spent some time searching Pinterest for some ideas of things to put in it, as well as some ideas for what to use as the box. After spending a little time searching I decided to just head to the store and see what was available for a reasonable price. I ended up at Dollar General when I found what I needed to start it and I went from there. I was going to post pictures and explain how I did it yesterday, but since it is a surprise and they weren't on the road yet I decided to wait to post it. So today i'm going to share what I put in the care package. 

To start it off I picked up this small storage container from Dollar General ($2). It's a pinkish purple and white chevron print with a small piece of cork board on the front.

 

It's nothing huge but it's fun and it's functional. Two things that can be a big deal for a girl decorating her dorm room. As I was gathering the items to put in the box I wanted to make sure I had some fun things as well as some practical things. I also threw in some food and candy. What care package is complete without some??

First I got this navy blue floral tumbler from Dollar General. It was on sale for $1.87. Again, it is fun and functional...and it was a bargain! I then picked up some To-Go drink packets from Dollar General and Dollar Tree. They were all $1 a box. I got Tropical Punch Kool-Aid, Diet Snapple Peach Tea, and Wyler's Light Pink Lemonade. I used these to fill the cup.

I then grabbed some functional items from Dollar General & Dollar Tree. From Dollar General I got the following: Magnetic Dry Erase Board ($1), 3-Pack Kleenex ($1), 3-Pack Over The Door Hooks ($1), Sticky Notes ($1), and Thumbtacks ($1). From Dollar Tree: Student Calendar ($1), Outlet Extender ($1), and Halls Cherry Cough Drops ($1). These are some functional items that are practical for school and organization of a college dorm room.

While the dry erase board is functional, it is also fun. It has a cute blue and white polka dot print. It is a great item to put on the dorm room door so that she can leave messages for her roommate and her hallmates can leaves notes when they drop by and she isn't there.

I also picked up some other fun things from Dollar General, Dollar Tree, and JoAnn Fabrics. From Dollar General I got the deck of playing cards ($1). From Dollar Tree: Avengers Coloring & Activity Book ($1), Avengers Crayons ($1), Mini Jenga Game ($1), Blank Note Cards ($1), and Monsters University Hand Wipes ($1). From JoAnn Fabrics I got the Owl & Bee Sandwich Bags ($1) and the Blue Bracelets ($.97). These are just some fun items, although some are practical as well.

To fill up and round out the basket I got some food and candy. I got the Honey Teddy Grahams ($1), Spearmint Trident ($1), Peppermint Trident ($.50), and the Mega Smarties ($.38) at Dollar General. I got the Jolly Rancher Crunch & Chew ($1), Reese's Miniatures ($1), 3-Pack Jif To Go ($1), and 3-Pack Monsters University Fruit Snacks ($1) at Dollar Tree. It's not a lot of things, but enough to have a decent snack stash for the first couple of weeks.

I got home and took some time to arrange the basket with everything. It took a bit of time to arrange things so they fit and did so in a way that things weren't moving around while it is riding in the back seat of the bus tonight.

 

I tried not to show all of the fun stuff in an attempt to make her think I just got her practical stuff. For me that was hard because as I am going into my fourth year of college I would find all of it to be fun. Haha i've clearly been in on campus housing for far too long!! :)  Anyways, I then bagged it up using a Basket Bag that I got from Dollar Tree. They sell them in 2-Packs for $1. 

I then tied it with some ribbon that we had the office. This was not my first choice of ribbon, but the first choice didn't tie well and fell apart when being knotted. So I found this purple and pink striped ribbon. I actually think that I like this better. It turned out pretty cute! There are a lot of other things that I thought of that could be put in their, such as highlighters, pens/pencils, bubbles, and so on. It can truly be tailored to the student or individual that you are sending it to.

Also, just for fun since they are coming through and it may be the last time I see them for a few months, I picked up some desserts for them. I picked out two cupcakes from a local bakery in town that makes wonderful desserts and pastries! I have heard that their breakfast and lunch menu is delicious as well! This bakery is located in Downtown Kankakee and it is called Nana's 2 Cakery & Cafe. After a couple minutes of deliberation, I picked out a Peanut Butter Cup Cupcake and a Vanilla Cheesecake Cupcake. 

It's so hard not to eat these gorgeous cupcakes! Sorry for the long post and all of the pictures! I hope that y'all are having a great weekend before the school year starts in its entirety. 

God Bless!

A Late 4th of July Recap

Like I said on Saturday, the last couple of weeks have been crazy. Thus I am posting my 4th of July recap on the 19th. I'm two weeks late but at least I am posting them. For the 4th we go out to the Community College and set up there just after lunch. We bring canopies, chairs, tables, food and water, cornhole, and other games. It is offered at church as an open church event, but within a community event. People from church come out and bring their chairs, food and such and we all just hang out. It's a great time of fellowship while we enjoy a nice day, play frisbee and cornhole, as well as interact with friends from the community who are there.

The guys all look so thrilled and energetic ;)

All of us interns went out just after lunch and set everything up so that it was ready when everyone else go there. Once everything was set up we got to relax for a little bit. The guys just look so thrilled to be out there don't they lol. They actually had a good time, they just didn't know I was taking this picture. We helped monitor the bounce houses again this year which is fun but it can tedious since we just stand there and tell kids when they can go up and come down. But it is fun at the same time since we get to interact with the kids. 

Chad, Mark, Bri and David playing football

Throughout the day we had games of cornhole, frisbee, football and t-ball going on. We had some family visitors there and we always have some people from the Kankakee Valley Theatre Association group come hang out for a little while which is fun. Bri got to join us for the day since she was in town and not touring that day.

Broshi, Caleb, Andy & Jarrod (somewhere) playing football and Caitlyn was playing with a child

All around it was a great day and for the first year in a while it was a mild day. It was perfect to be out and about for the 4th. We got to enjoy the Kankakee Valley Youth Symphony Orchestra and the Kankakee Valley Symphony Orchestra. They also do a military tribute for all the branches and that was hard for some people there as it reminded them of relatives who are no longer with them. The KVSO played the some music from Star Wars if I remember correctly.

Some more of the crew

Ignore the quality of these pictures. I was taking them from my iPad one handed and in a fairly quick manner since my ice cream was melting! And the green smoke in the background was someone setting off a stink bomb. That was not pleasant in the least. Once it hit about 7:30ish we went ahead and took down canopies and tables. We took everything we didn't need to watch fireworks back to the bus so that we didn't have to take it down and carry it down in the midst of the chaos of everyone packing up and heading out. About 8:30 they started the fireworks.

 

It was a great show and it was a beautiful night for it. Minus the bugs who seemed to like everyone that night. Once the show was over we picked up all our trash, gathered the camp chairs, and grabbed the last cooler. We headed to the bus and we prepped for the best part of the night yet. See, we've become smart in how we do the heading out part of the night. There are so many people all trying to get out at once that it is mass chaos and takes forever. So we bring a cooler full of about 6 or 7 watermelon, a big sharp knife, salt, trash bags and plenty of napkins. We popped up a table and laid out a plastic cover, then out came the watermelon. We cut them up and people just come and grab them. Friends are invited to join us and it's a great time to fellowship and enjoying the evening while everyone else is stressed about getting out. We generally have a decent sized group. It doesn't take long to go through all of the watermelons as you can guess! By the time we finish though, the parking lot is pretty much empty and we have an easy time packing up and leaving. It's a great way to end out the day!!

One quick story from the night. A friend of ours, Jade, and her family joined us for watermelon after the show. She had went with us to camp the week before and had become friends with all of us interns. Well, Broshi is affectionately referred to as being "swole". He had told Jade that saying "swole" when you pick up something heavy, or in this case try to break a big triangular piece of watermelon, it makes the task easier. Jade didn't think it would work but tried anyway. So here we are all standing there talking, laughing and enjoying our watermelon when all of a sudden Jade says, "Swole!" quite loudly. At the same time she is saying it she attempts to break the watermelon. Much to her surprise and everyone else's, the piece of watermelon broke ridiculously easy. The look of shock on her face was so great! We all just busted out laughing while she just stood there amazed at what just happened. So funny!! To say the least, she believes him now.

Anyways, that's enough for the crazy stories. Have a great day! God Bless!