Posts from the ‘Travel’ Category

Apr 16

{Giveaway} Where In The World Is Mavis, The Girl Who Thinks She’s a Bird and The Travelocity Gnome?

Today I am giving away a $25 gift card to Starbucks!

Want to Play?

Simply Guess: Where in the World is Mavis, The Girl Who Thinks She’s a Bird & Henry the Gnome?

There are 3 ways you can enter to win.

Leave a separate comment for each form of entry. Comments must be made on Onehundreddollarsamonth.com to count as a valid entry. {You may leave three separate comments}.

#1 Answer this question: What City and Country is Mavis, The Girl Who Thinks She’s a Bird and Henry the Gnome currently in?

#2 “Like” Onehundreddollaramonth on facebook, follow me on Pinterest, Twitter, and/or subscribe to my daily email and leave a comment below telling me you’ve done so {or already do}.

#3 Leave a comment on the Onehundreddollarsamonth facebook page telling me if you could go anywhere in the world, where would you go?

This giveaway ends on Friday, April 20th, 2012 at 10pm PST.

1 Comment will be randomly selected from all correct entries via the random generator on random.org. You must have the correct answer to win. The winner will be notified via email and have 48 hours to respond to claim the prize.

Good Luck! I hope you win!

♥ Mavis

Apr 15

15 Comments

The Art of Packing Light : Forget About Clothing, Leave Room For Souvenirs

Being spontaneous and packing light is something I do well. Not only have I honed in on my skills over the years, but so has my daughter, The Girl Who Thinks She’s a Bird.

Last week, before The Girl Who Thinks She’s a Bird left for school, she asked me if we were going anywhere for spring break.

I was like, “I don’t know, would you like me to see if I can get free tickets somewhere {by cashing in my credit card miles}?”

“Yes, please” she said.

An hour later I sent her a text message while she was at school:

Mavis: I can get free tickets to Washington D.C., Hawaii or XXX. There were no free tickets available for anywhere in Europe. Not even Sweden, can you believe it?

Mavis: Do you want to go to XXX?

The Girl: But I don’t speak XXX…. Hmmm. Maybe.

Mavis: Who cares! We’ll just get a book and point to stuff if we can’t figure it out.

The Girl: Umm. Okay.

And that was that.

After a quick call to the Handsome Husband asking him if he wanted to come along on a little last-minute adventure {okay, so maybe it was a courtesy call because I only had enough points for 2 free tickets} he said no, that he and Monkey Boy would rather sit at home in their underoos, eating Doritos and playing video games all spring break rather than going on an adventure. I quickly booked the tickets and ordered 2 travel guides off Amazon.com. And then went about my day.

Fast forward a few days and well, here we are. Packing. For a trip. To a foreign country. Where we don’t speak the language.

Did I mention we have not had time research this trip at all?

When Gustaf {my hottie of a UPS man} delivered the guide books, we only opened them long enough to find a recommendation for a centrally located hotel.

I mean with chickens, gardening, BLOGGING, and loads of homework for The Girl, who has time for research? Isn’t that what the plane ride is for?

UPDATE

I started writing this post right before we left. Before heading out the door I went on-line to print out our boarding passes to CHINA {yes China!} only to discover you NEED A VISA to enter China. Hole.Lee.Crap. Who knew? So I quickly called the people who issue expedited visas only to find out the fastest you can get one is within 24 hours of supplying documents.

We had to cancel the trip.

You want to know what The Girl said? “Oh well, I was a little worried about the food and language barrier anyway.”

So I called the airlines to see if we could cancel our free tickets to China and go somewhere else instead.

Luckily, 2 tickets to ______ had just been released, and so with just a few hours notice, we are now on our way to ______! Wahoooo!

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did”
~Mark Twain

*Check back tomorrow for a super awesome giveaway! Trust me, you’ll want to enter!

Jan 8

3 Comments

Tacoma Art Museum: Folk Treasures of Mexico

Yesterday The Girl Who Thinks She’s a Bird, Monkey Boy and I went to the new Folk Treasures of Mexico exhibit at the Tacoma Art Museum.

It was boring. A total dud.

Besides a few creepy pets, wool rugs and and a handful of wood carvings there was not much to see.

But hey, it was *free.

*Did you know if you are a Bank of America card holder you can get in to over 100 museums for FREE on the first weekend of each month? Yep, it’s true. Head on over HERE to see if there is one near you because there are over 100 participating Museums, Zoos, Science Centers, and Botanical Gardens across the US.

Dec 6

4 Comments

Come Fly With Me: How To Survive Your Next Flight

Last week I headed to Boise, Idaho to talk about coupons and eat cookies. This was a totally different trip than last months plane ride to Virginia to attend a pie party. Totally. Different.

As usual, I snapped a quick photo on my phone of my parking space. If you don’t do this… you should. It sure beats wandering around several floors of the parking garage a Seatac airport mumbling… “Where did I park… WHERE DID I PARK?” to Romanian tourists.

While travelling alone, I park in the ridiculously overpriced parking garage. The fee is like $22 or $24 for 24 hours. CRAZY! But, because I don’t have my personal bodyguard (HH) travelling with me, I don’t feel safe parking over at the $11 park and ride lot. Sometimes the drivers over there are weird… Plus they want a tip. I really have a hard time giving someone $2 for dropping me off at the airport when

1. I have already paid my parking fee.
2. I don’t need help with my luggage.
3. It is their job to drive me the 1 mile distance to the airport.

I don’t think I am cheap (the HH does). I think I am being rational.

Moving on…

My seat assignment had me sitting next to Biker Guy with a Grudge. And, in true Mavis fashion, once the cabin doors were locked, I made no apologies and bolted for an empty row. Sitting next to undesirable cabin mates scare me.

1. They are creepy.
2. They tend to smell (body order, liquor, cigarettes… you name it).
3. They typically want to ask questions like… What is your name? Where are you from? What do you do for a living? Do you have any kids? What are your hobbies? (Seriously… why do they need to know this? Why do they care? What are they going to do with the information? Didn’t their mother tell them not to talk to strangers or to give out their personal information when they were younger?)

Anyway, once I was settled I grabbed the latest copy of the Alaska Airlines in flight magazine.

The first ad that caught my eye was for a hotel. At first I thought maybe this particular hotel chain was for carnie folk… allowing tigers to stay in hotel rooms and such. Then after staring at it a while longer, I came to the conclusion that the advertising company promoting this magazine must be channeling Joan Collins from the 1980′s show Dynasty. Either that or Sigfried & Roy.

I believe this hotel company is promoting something a little kinky too… I just can’t put my finger on it. I mean really, how many men out there paint woman’s toenails like the guy portrayed here? I don’t even like walking around barefooted let alone want the HH to touch my feet. Blech… No thanks, I don’t want to stay at that hotel either.

Now these are nice… too bad I don’t go to rodeos. Or wear bagazillion dollar boots.

Take a look at this company… They want to do your grocery shopping for you. Dude. I think I will always be able to find the time to bake my daughter a birthday cake rather than have your granola eating, tree hugging arse buy her a giant bagel and try to pawn it off as a cake.

And if those ads were not bad enough… Who the heck are these people? I have been to Boise four times in as many months and have never laid eyes on these merry makers. Who are they? And why are they dancing in someones front yard?

Luckily, by the time I had read my magazine, drank complimentary orange juice and ingested my 3.2 peanuts it was time to land. I made it. I had survived another flight. I didn’t have to sit by anyone weird, or that smelled and nobody talked to me.

Now that’s my kind of flight!

Oh, and one last thing.

Attention 55-year-old males. Stop wearing your kids clothing. Skater shoes and dark acid washed jeans don’t look good on you. They make you look like you are trying to hard. Which you are. Be a man. Wear man clothes.

The Worst Case Scenario Survival Handbook: Travel

Nov 19

2 Comments

Mavis Ignores 3 Texts & 2 Phone Calls… Part 3

I walked into the house and found the Handsome Husband half asleep and exercising with Nancy on the television screen. I did a double take and then asked how he was feeling. “I feel like someone hit me in the shin with a baseball bat… How do you think I feel?”

The next day I picked up his perscription and then played nurse-maid for the next week as he laid in bed all hopped up on pain meds and taking long naps. He went in for a half day this past Monday and then it was back to work as usual. He refused to use the crutches and tore off the soft cast on the third day… But besides that, he has taken this whole chainsaw accident in stride.

Stuff happens. Scars are cool. Life goes on.

The End.

Nov 18

1 Comment

Mavis Ignores 3 Texts & 2 Phone Calls… Part 2

My next phone call was to Mrs. Hillbilly. I gave her a quick update and told her the paramedics had decided to NOT take the HH back to the hospital and kindly asked if my husband and kids could stay at her house that night just in case anything else exciting happened. She said absolutely… don’t worry about it. I’ll have Mr. Hillbilly talk the HH into staying at our house (which given his condition and the fact that he was hopped on pain meds probably was not that hard). “Don’t worry about a thing” she said.

From what I understand, after the paramedics had left, Mr. Hillbilly and Chino the Handy Man helped the HH to the upstairs guest bedroom and got him settled. Mr. Hillbilly cleaned up the HH’s face and made sure he was comfortable. The kids decided to lay on the floor next to their dad and kept good eye on him.

The next day, Mr. Hillbilly left for work early in the morning and so Chino the Handy Man brought the HH back home, got him situated and drove The Girl Who Thinks She’s A Bird and Monkey Boy to school.

By this time I had already flown from Charlottesville, VA to Chicago and was now boarding my second flight of the morning. As I walked down the center aisle of the plane I began to count seats. I also had my eye on the over-head bins. Crap. There was not one single vacant bin in front of my row. That meant I would have to stuff my luggage over-head several rows behind my seat. As I approached my row and the dreaded center seat I always seem to get stuck with, my eyes lit up. A thin, short man resembling Woody Alan was reading a novel and had pressed himself against the window. Sweet! More room for me I thought. Then, I spied the eye candy. I was about to be sandwiched between the Woody Alan look-a-like and the most gorgeous Air Force Captain on the planet. With every ounce of my I know I look like crap because I only slept 45 minutes last night and have not even showered but BOY ARE YOU FREAKIN GOOD LOOKING I’m so excited I get to sit next to you voice… I smiled and quietly said… “Hi… That’s my seat. I’ll be right back, I have to put my luggage a few rows back.” I walked past him, placed my practically empty suitcase over-head and turned around. Uggg… People had started shuffling past my seat… Now I was going to have to wait until they all passed by before I could make my way back to my row.

Then, all of a sudden, Gorgeous Air Force guy stood up and moved to the center of the aisle. He stood there, blocking any new passengers from walking down the aisle until it was all clear. For me. To walk back to my seat.

I tried hard not to smile like a HUGE DORK and made my way to my seat.

“Thank you” I said.

“You are welcome. I’m just glad I’m sitting next to you. The center seat is a total crap shoot. You never know who you are going to get stuck next to (HA!). On my last flight I had to sit between two Soman men… ” He said.

I didn’t know what to say so I just smiled.

The plane took off, and for once on this journey I wasn’t sitting next to anyone that smelled (unless I did?) or was encroaching my personal space. I put on my head phones, turned the iPod on low and slept for the next 4 hours.

When I had finally landed I called the HH who was now home alone laying in bed.

“How are you doing?’ I asked. “Did you take your medication?”

“I don’t have any” he said.

“What do you mean you don’t have any medication?” I practically yelled.

“I left my prescription in Mr. Hillbilly’s truck last night and he already left for work…” said the HH.

Hole.Lee.Crap.

The man almost cuts off his leg and he is now laying there with no pain medication. Lovely.

To be continued…

Nov 16

9 Comments

Mavis Ignores 3 Texts & 2 Phone Calls… Part 1

You didn’t really think my adventure to Virginia ended at the pie party did you? Ha! Not even close. Have I ever told you how the Handsome Husband likes to text and/or call me about 10 times a day? Well, he does. So when he texted me YET AGAIN during JJ’s party… I ignored him. For like 2 hours. I was too busy eating pumpkin pie.

Then, as I pulled my phone out from my front pocket I noticed something odd. There were 3 text messages AND 2 phone calls I had missed. The funny thing is… The HH typically does not leave messages on my phone because I have been known to ignore messages for weeks at a time simply because I don’t know how to retrieve them. But 2 messages in one day? That.Was.Odd. Especially since one of them was from Mr. Hillbilly.

Hmmm.

So, instead of retrieving the messages (because I don’t know how) I called the HH.

Ring Ring…

Hello.

Hi.

What are you doing?

I’M AT A PIE PARTY!!!

Are you having fun?

Yes. What are you doing (translation: please hurry up so I can get back to the party)?

Well, I just want you to know that everything is okay… the kids are fine… but I’ve had a little accident.

Uh huhhhhhh. ARE YOU OKAY?

You know those 3 trees in the backyard…

Yes.

Well I was cutting them down and one went the wrong way and landed in the neighbor’s yard.

Which neighbor?

The new ones.

Oh.

The tree broke the fence.

Did it hit their house?

No.

Oh that’s no big deal… we’ll just fix it. Where are you?

At the hospital.

Why are you at the hospital?

Well, when I was cutting the limbs from the tree (that landed in the neighbor’s yard) I sort of cut my leg.

With what?

A chainsaw.

How did you get to the hospital?

Mr. Hillbilly took me.

Okay, do you still have a leg?

Yes. But the chainsaw hit my shin bone and now they are going to transport me to another hospital to operate.

Are you serious? Where are the kids?

At home.

By themselves? Where is Mr. Hillbilly?

And so on and so on…

At this point I know my husband is being taken care of and my neighbors are looking after my kids. There is nothing I can do from Virginia. So I tell the HH to call me in a little while with an update. Meanwhile, I write-up a few coupon posts, then proceed to hang out with JJ & Mr. Handsome in the living until it is time to go to bed (and YES, I would agree with you that it’s probably really strange I am able to compartmentalized such drama and carry on). I’m weird that way… okay?

Once upstairs, I noticed a NEW message on my cell phone. “Because a line on your account dialed 911, usage controls have been suspended on that line.”

Hmm. Now, I know I didn’t call 911… so it had to have been The Girl.

Hmm.

So Instead of calling The Girl… I call the HH.

Hello. Where is The Girl? Can I talk to her please? The HH hands her the phone.

Did you just call 911?

Yes.

Why.

Because Mr. Hillbilly told me too.

WHY DID YOU CALL 911?

What I didn’t know was…

Luckily they did not have to transport him. The ER Doctors picked all the debris out of his leg, feed him a bunch of drugs, stitched him up and sent him home with Mr. Hillbilly.

Then, from what I understand, Mr. Hillbilly parked his truck, the HH limps out of the vehicle and proceeds to pass out. He did a face plant, knocking himself unconscious right in our driveway. His eyes roll back into his head, he stops breathing and Mr. Hillbilly yells for The Girl Who Thinks She’s A Bird to call 911. The HH finally comes to, his phone rings and then he hands his phone off to The Girl.

Dad fainted and the paramedics are on their way. Ya, he just fell. Where is Monkey Boy? He is inside. Let me talk to him. The Girl walks into the house. Then, as if on cue, Monkey boy passes out on the couch (note to self: passing out on a couch is much better than passing out on an aggregate driveway). Then The Girl (who is rather calm… and very matter of fact) says… Monkey Boy just fainted. (ARE YOU FREAKIN’ KIDDING ME?).

I hang up and call my other neighbor Chino The Handy Man.

Girly Girl answers the phone… I need to talk to Chino. Chino, yada yada yada run down to my house and take care of Monkey Boy. Mr. Hillbilly is taking care of the HH until the paramedics arrive… Hey, maybe you should bring back up in case something happens to The Girl (this is all happening around 1 am Virgina time).

Then as soon as I hang up with Chino… I see another text from yet another neighbor. Hey, there is an ambulance in your driveway… is everything okay?

To be continued…

Nov 15

6 Comments

Mavis Goes To Virginia Part 3… The Pie Party

JJ’s Cookbook & Magazine Collection

After my little adventure to Luray Caverns, I headed to JJ’s house. I had tried to time it right so I would have about an hour before JJ and the crew came home. An hour would give me plenty of time to get settled, make a cup (or 3) of tea and get a post or two written. As I sat in the extra bedroom that’s not a bedroom and started typing, I looked out the window and suddenly felt right at home. And why wouldn’t I feel at home…It was the same view I had seen hundreds of times on her blog… the only difference now was, I was inside her house looking out at the view of the rolling hills… instead of being on the outside looking in from my computer screen.

As I was unpacking my luggage, I decided it would be fun to place the party hat I had brought from home on the porch railing… as if to announce “Mavis Is Here.”

About 30 minutes later, the tribe arrived home…

And then finally, I met JJ, Mr. Handsome, Yo-Yo, Miss BeccaBoo, Sweetsie and the Nickle in person. With one minor exception… they were in fact the people I had thought they would be in real life.

Later at the pie party, JJ’s mom and I were talking and she said something to me that has stuck ever since I came home from Virgina… “On a blog, you are only telling part of the story, you show people what you want them to see.” And, its true. But on the other hand… when we read a blog… WE only see what we want to believe as well.

JJ’s Pie Party was just as I imagined it would be… I knew her house would be filled with people, I knew there would be (lots) of pies and I knew both strangers and family members would make an appearance, but most of all, I knew myself and others would have a good time. And we did.

As we sat on the porch swing we talked about gardening, Mr. & Mrs. H (and how awesome we think they are) about our children, and how exciting it was to watch car after car pull into the gravel driveway… For a moment there it almost felt like we were on a reality t.v. show… “Who’s Coming For Dessert.”

We wore hats, we ate pie and then we ate some more pie… It was the coolest party I had ever been to.

Very relaxing, very low-key, very much the way a Sunday afternoon should be.

For once in my life I was at a party in which not one person was bragging about their car, their clothes, or their latest vacation. There was no trying to one up one another, no snide comments, no trash talking. It was a little unsettling and amazingly genuine all at the same. It was very clear to me, from the moment I stepped foot in her house, I was not in suburbia. Not even close. In a way it was as if I had stepped back in time… to the way it use to be (or at least how I imagined life years ago would have been). And for those few hours… it was pure bliss. Something I have never experienced nor do I think I will have many more opportunities to explore. At least not where I live.

Maybe I’m just looking back at that afternoon through rose-colored glasses, or maybe I was just sleep deprived from only getting in a mere 7 hours of sleep over the previous 3 days… But I’ll tell you something, I enjoyed every minute of it. And if I had known all I needed to do to enjoy a little slice of heaven was to hop on a plane and fly a few thousand miles to spend the afternoon with my two favorite bloggers… I would have cashed in my frequent flyer miles years ago.

Nov 12

2 Comments

Mavis Goes To Virginia… Part 2

As the plane landed in Charlottesville, Va I had zero expectations. I’m not sure if it was because I had only booked my ticket a few days earlier, or because I had been working up to the very last second before I left for my trip and had never actually taken the time to process the absurdity of just how crazy flying from Washington State to Virginia to attend a party with a group of complete strangers (minus Jane & JJ) was. I had simply read one of JJ’s posts announcing she was having a party… and spontaneously accepted an invitation.

As I had stepped off the plane and retrieved my carry on luggage all I knew was that I was going to rent a car, and drive to Jane’s house and then the next day attend JJ’s pie party. That’s it. That’s as far as I have gotten in my mind.

I had met Jane & JJ online about 2 1/2 years ago thru blogging. We all shared an interest in gardening, our children and PANERA. And now I was going to meet the two of them… in real life. In person. Face to face. I had talked to Jane a few times on the phone but never to JJ. And if it were not for the map app on my (stupid) smart phone I would have never made it out of the parking lot. I estimated the drive time to be about 1 hour. And as I drove past the old houses, farms and wide open spaces, I suddenly felt as if I was on a movie set.

All I could think about was The Waltons. Walton’s Mountain. The Blue Ridge Mountains… and how odd it was, I was there.

After driving for about an hour, I finally reached Jane’s road. I pulled over. I stopped the car. Looked in the rear view mirror and said “Mavis… you.are.crazy”. Then I started the car and drove past Jane’s house. Not once, not twice, but three times until I finally found it.

Jane, Jamey, and her 3 children turned out to be just as I imagined them. Kind. Sweet. Humble and Real.

They showed me around their garden, feed me dinner and helped me look up some Virgina State trivia for a little project I was working on.

After the kids went to bed… Jane and I made our pies, cut out fabric (for party hats) and stayed up late talking about life, kids, blogs and anything else that came to mine. It felt like I had been there before. And I had been… just not in a physical sense. At times I felt as if I was stepping into one of her daily blog posts. I guess “surreal” would be the correct word. It felt surreal. I was comfortable and I felt at home and by the time my head hit the pillow it was about 3am.

Mir & Mavis in footed pajamas

Breakfast came and went and soon we were all out the door. Jane and her family were headed off to church, and I decided to take a little road trip out to Luray caverns. The plan was to meet up later at JJ’s house for the Pie Party.

Nov 9

6 Comments

Mavis Goes To Virginia… Part 1 Getting There Is Half The Fun… Or So They Say

My alarm went off at 3am on Saturday morning. I quickly hopped into the shower, got dressed and kissed the HH goodbye. BE CAREFUL he yelled… (as he pretty much always does anytime I head out the door). I will… YOU BE CAREFUL I said annoyingly… And stay out of trouble too!

I parked my car, took a picture of my parking spot on my phone and headed into the airport to print my boarding pass. As I took my (crappy) center seat on the plane I sat motionless as I eyed every single passenger walk down the aisle. Sitting in the center seat on any airplane is a crap shoot. And this time… I lost. BIG TIME.

In a matter of 45 seconds I found myself suddenly sandwiched between a rather large woman who should have bought an extra seat and another woman who (I would bet my house) had not showered in AT LEAST 2 WEEKS. Plus… she had a child with her. I heard the flight attendant ask her how old the baby was and the woman said 2. All the while I’m thinking 2 what? 2 years 11 months and 29 days? Huh lady? Are you freaking kidding me? I want to see some proof.

As the doors were about to close I turned to the woman to my right and asked her if she had any Vick’s Vapor rub. TO STICK UP MY NOSE. She just shook her head helplessly and stared at the 2 year 11 month and 29 day old child kicking me and said Sorry… I don’t, and then she looked out the window.

I think I sat there another 5 minutes before making a b-line to the back of the plane. I calmly asked the male flight attendant if there were any available seats and if so could I have one because I was stuck next to Mrs. Stinky and being kicked and I felt like I was going to throw up if I had to sit there the entire flight.

He looked genuinely concerned, and moved me to the last row of seats on the plane. This time I was stuck between Marky Marky and some Gangsta dude. At least they didn’t smell. So I was okay with it. Plus I could tell that Gangsta dude would have pummelled Marky Marky if he got too chatty… So I felt at the very least I would be able to sit in a quite row with a neutral order and no kicking (or so I hoped).

Then, as the plane started to taxi down the runway… My new boyfriend, the flight attendant said, Excuse me Miss… I found you an aisle seat, grab your bag.

As I settled into my aisle seat (with an empty middle seat) I noticed the man in my row (next to the window)…sleeping. Ahhh… Peace at last I thought. And as I took a deep breath to soak in my good luck I smiled as the plane took off.

And then smelled it.

Mrs. Stinky.

I had been moved diagonally across from Mrs. Stinky.

Awesome.