July Family Favorites

This post may contain affiliate links 

July flew by and it was so much fun! We had a few weekends where we had NOTHING planned… which is a treat. I love getting together with family and friends, but there is something so nice about just spending the day hanging out at home. We enjoyed lots of time in the pool, had a family movie night to go see “Pets” and did a bunch of fun crafts and activities. Near the end of the month, a bunch of family came in town so we spent a fun weekend with everyone by the beach. My sweet boy turned 8 on the 31st too… which was a special way to end a awesome month.

Lauren
Josh Cabernet Sauvignon
I have been obsessed with this wine. Here’s the explainer of the wine from the Josh Cellars website: The bouquet is rich with dark fruits, cinnamon, clove and toasty oak flavors. The wine is juicy on the palate with blackcurrant and blackberry flavors prominent, accented by roasted almonds, vanilla and hazelnuts, finishing long with fine, firm tannins. I have no idea what all that means, but I can tell you this wine is amazing. It costs around 13 bucks.

Donnie
Automatic Pool Cleaner
My sweet husband attempts to do everything himself. He does a fantastic job taking care of our pool. However, it is a lot of work especially since we have a number of big palm trees around. For years he has refused to buy an automatic pool cleaner, since he thought they were too expensive. So he would hook up the suction and manually vacuum the bottom the of the pool, at least a few times a week during the warmer months. (and there are a lot of those in Florida) They are pretty expensive, but after doing my research I decided to get him one for Father’s Day, that was around $85. It had awesome reviews on Amazon so I figured it was worth a try. He LOVES it. It works great and I would recommend it to anyone who really wants a automatic pool cleanee, but can’t afford the $400 price tag. After 2 months, he still tells me what a great gift it was. #BestWifeEver

Mila
Anything that involves Swimming
Mila has been doing awesome with her swimming and LOVES to practice. Almost every night after dinner she asks, “Can we go in the pool so I can swim without swimmies?” Every. Night. Since it stays light out for so long we have been enjoying some family night swims. At the beach, she was first to throw on her goggles and hop in the water with my husband. He took the kids out to a sandbar area where there was a small coral reef, and even though it seemed SO far from shore, she was down to go since she loved looking at the fish.

Hudson
Nerf Rhino Fire
Nerf is huge in my house. I spend a good portion of my life collecting little styrofoam darts from random spots in my yard. Hudson has been asking for this ginormous Rhino-Fire for AT LEAST a year. But it cost $109 dollars. I could not bring myself to spend more than 100 dollars on a toy gun. Could. Not. When he brought it up AGAIN for his birthday, we decided to look online to see the best price. Well, it was $79.99 on Amazon, so I bought it. (its back up to $99 now so I guess we lucked out… as if somehow spending $80 on a Nerf gun is a good deal) He begged to open it as soon as the HUGE box was delivered, even though it was more than a week before his actual birthday. I let him… and he has been in Rhino-Fire bliss ever since. I have to say, this gun is pretty awesome. Check out my Instagram video showing it in action!

BONUS item:
LogiTech Circle
A few months ago, LogiTech offered to send me one of their Logi Circle wireless home camera systems, in exchange for a few social media posts. I had NO obligation to write about it, but now I can’t imagine not having it, we love it so much. Setup was BEYOND simple. We plugged it in, downloaded the free app, registered our device and BOOM. I can see a live stream of my house anywhere I am through my phone. It stays on a magnetic charging dock, but if you want to take it into a different room, you can just take the camera off and leave it where you need it. (it holds a charge for 12 hours) We usually keep in the garage, so we can keep an eye on Hudson while he is out front playing. You can hear what’s going on and even talk to the people you see on camera, through your phone! It is set to alert us when there is movement, so we can know if anyone is in our garage. When we went on vacation, we put it inside the house and it was so nice to be able to check in and see that everything was just how it should be. Sometimes my husband and I put it in the playroom so we can see and hear my daughter while we sit on the patio and enjoy a glass of wine! 🙂 This thing honestly has so many cool features… playback, ability to download clips, night vision… too many to name, so check out the site. Thanks LogiTech for sending me one, you knew what you were doing!! It is SO cool!

There you go! Another month of favorites and another month DOWN! This year is flying by!!