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I am counting down the days until The Lone Ranger comes out. I love, love, love this series when I was a kid, and as soon as I found out that Armie Hammer and Johnny Depp were Tonto and the Lone Ranger, I knew I had to put this on my radar to see this summer! Have you seen the newest trailer? Check it out below! About the movie From producer Jerry Bruckheimer and director Gore Verbinski, the filmmaking team behind the blockbuster “Pirates of the Caribbean” franchise, comes Disney/Jerry Bruckheimer Films’ “The Lone Ranger,” a thrilling adventure infused with action and humor, in which the famed masked hero is brought to life through new eyes.  Native American warrior Tonto (Johnny Depp) recounts the untold tales that transformed John Reid (Armie Hammer), a man of the law, into a legend of justice—taking the audience on a runaway train of epic surprises and humorous friction as the two unlikely heroes must learn to work together and fight against greed and corruption. Native American warrior Tonto (Johnny Depp) and man of the law John Reid (Armie Hammer) are opposites brought together by fate and must join forces to battle greed and corruption. “Like” THE LONE RANGER on Facebook: www.facebook.com/theloneranger  “Follow” THE LONE RANGER on Twitter: https://twitter.com/disneypictures Visit THE LONE RANGER website: www.disney.com/theloneranger THE LONE RANGER rides into theaters on July 3rd!

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I spent approximately two hours today trying to turn a half-formed zygote of a blog post idea into something publishable. Or at least something longer than 140 characters, because otherwise I could just tweet it but then I still wouldn't have anything to publish on my blog but I can't publish a goddamn tweet on my blog because then what? I go on Twitter and link to my blog and people click over and are like, GODDAMN YOU AMY, YOU COULD HAVE JUST SAID THAT ON TWITTER, WHERE I JUST WAS. AND YOU WERE. WHAT THE FUCK. UNSUBSCRIBE AND DISLIKE. Basically: Blogging a tweet and then tweeting about a blog that's basically a tweet would be a dick move, or worst case, rip a hole in the fabric of the social media universe and the whole Internet would collapse in on itself, and then Yahoo! would come buy the smoking, hollowed-out ruins for fifty bucks, we'd be all "KHAAAAANNNNN!" except it'd be like "YAHOOOOOO!!!!" and POINT IS, I saw the new Star Trek movie on Friday and it was okay. (Wait.) No. I mean, POINT IS, I scrapped the blog post I was writing because it was only 12 words long. I wrote a hell of a lot more words than 12, mind you, but there were only 12 words that were really any good. The rest were terrible and try-hard and I kept deleting them. But it's not like the first 12 words were good enough to justify me leaving them alone and being like, "Fuck this, close enough, enjoy these 12 words, Internet!" Does that make sense? (Don't answer that.) No. I remember now what my point actually is, and what I decided to tell you about instead: After realizing that my sad, tortured and overworked 12-word post was never, ever going to be sponge-worthy (HEY-YO), I was like, "If I was a GIF, I would so be that GIF of Snape flipping over a table right now." Then I was like, "Waaaaait. Snape never flipped over a table." And yet, if you start typing "Snape flipping" into Google, the top suggestion is, in fact, "Snape flipping tables" and you will see a million and one versions of the very GIF I was thinking of. POINT IS, poor Alan Rickman.  For some reason, I found this to be INCREDIBLY amusing on MANY levels, from the whole idea that I now apparently think in GIF form, and off the top of my head can picture the perfect GIF for any situation, including "deleting 12 words of a shitty blog post," but ALSO I can't come up with Alan Rickman's actual name on the first try, but ALSO ALSO I am clearly not alone in basically thinking Alan Rickman = Snape, anytime, all the time, even when flipping a table over in some slow-motion YouTube art...thing that...okay, it's really kind of weird; I just watched it and lost my train of thought. WAIT. NO. I REMEMBER NOW. So I tried to compose a tweet about the whole thing: About needing find the perfect GIF to summarize my bloggerly failings today and how that's kind of weird, right? And probably all I would ever do with one those Google Glass things, basically, just walk around being all "WAIT WAIT I HAVE THE PERFECT REACTION GIF FOR WHAT IS HAPPENING RIGHT NOW," but then I would ask Google to find me that "GIF with Spock" when I actually meant Zachary Quinto and the results would be all Leonard Nimoy and EVERYTHING WOULD BE RUINED. Also, if you search for "Snape Flipping Tables" you get the GIF I was thinking about even though it's not really Snape, lolololol. Anyway. POINT IS, that turned out to be way too many words to fit in a tweet, so I wrote it on my blog instead. You're welcome. 

Teresa B, 5m4m contributor, shares her insights on how to have family devotions around the dinner table. We were compensated to write this post, however all opinions listed are the writer’s own. The dinner table is a great time for family devotions. Dinnertime provides an opportunity to connect over food while having fun, joyful and meaningful faith-building conversations. So what exactly are family devotions? The words suggest the idea of devotions with your family, which is a small snapshot of the bigger picture really. Family devotions could be described as home fellowship or parent-led devotions. My husband and I want to model for our children the reality of a genuine relationship with Christ. We teach them how to pray, how to study and memorize scripture and how to show Christian love to those around them. My husband and I are not leaving it to chance that our children will absorb a biblical worldview on their own without our instructions. We can’t simply rely on Sunday school or youth group to take on these tasks. The responsibility lies squarely on our shoulders. How We Have Devotions At Our House Our children are still quite young and we want to make studying the bible fun. A great way to inspire dinner table devotions is with wordplay. Each evening we begin dinner with a prayer and a question. Everyone is given an opportunity to answer the question. Sometimes I will even use strips of paper as a table cloth and let the children write their answers at their place setting. “Are you careful about the words you say?” “Are you as kind to your brothers and sisters as you are to your friends?” “Do you do lots of good things?” After the question has been answered, my husband will lead us in our family devotions. He has a daily family devotion schedule planned out with a story and bible verse{s} that relate to the stories. The stories help our children understand the bible verses that he reads. Each story is a lesson and the daily question, story and bible verses all connect and relate to one another. It is a time commitment, which may take us away from other pursuits. However, missing a television program or a load of laundry is a wonderful trade off to keep these devotions in our daily lives. Having this set time for fun and spiritual growth as a family demonstrates to our children what is really important. We always end our family devotions with an ACTS prayer. A(Adoration) C (Confession) T (Thanksgiving) S (Supplication) Remember to take time for prayer, worship and the study of God’s Word with your children. What do you do to nurture your children’s relationship with the Lord? Here’s Another Great Devotional Help Your family’s gathered around the table. What’s on the menu? Cold stares? Stale prayers? The same old leftover questions about “what happened at school today”? Next time you sit down to eat, enjoy some spiritual food too! Get everyone talking—and learning—with the nourishment of Whit’s End Mealtime Devotions! Encourage quality family time and pass on a strong spiritual heritage with these 90 devotions created to engage children in fun, lively, productive dialogue. Whit has always been a family favorite and will make mealtime fun, and encourage lots of great conversation. Teresa is a family lifestyle photographer who is happy homeschooling her three children in the Christian classical education theory in the suburbs of Chicago. You can find her on her blog Tiaras & Tantrums or on Twitter as @tiarastantrums.

This post on why you should exercise in your home is made possible by a review item.  This post may contain affiliate links.  All opinions are mine and mine alone. If you saw the title of my post and immediately understood what I meant, read on.  I try really hard to work out every day. I do this because, at 46, I am not really impressed with the way I look. I’ve had two children and my weight has fluctuated up and down several times. I don’t have time to lay out in the sun in our short Vermont summers or the money to travel to Bermuda. Those things combined mean that instead of toned and firm with skin that has a healthy glow, I tend to be slightly flabby and pasty white. There is no way that you’re going to find me in a gym working out next to those 20 year old, hard body college students.  My self esteem is just not that strong. Instead I have been looking for ways that you can exercise in your home and avoid the embarrassment of going to a gym. Nobody is going to see me but the cats and my husband and he knows better than to laugh at me. Exercise In Your Home One of the ways I’ve found it’s possible to exercise in your home is to invest in a Journey Gym.    Journey Gym is a health and fitness system for people who have not and will not join a gym. In other words, it’s for your average person – not someone training for a marathon or who wants to look like a body builder.  Their system addresses the top five things your average person says prevent them from working out. Their workouts are 5 to 20 minutes max. I waste that much time in a day playing Candy Crush so I know I can work out that long. They offer support. I don’t have a circle of friends that wants to exercise and eat healthy with me. It’s hard to do this on your own. Journey Gym offers Star Trainers, an online Health Community, Persistency Centers, and a Medical Team to support you. This is a system that shows results. In about 85 minutes a week (that’s the normal time of just one movie), youcan lose as much as 25-40lbs in 10 weeks. The gradual changes they suggest give you the tools to make this a success.  You start out with 5 minutes of exercise for 2 to 3 days a week. You don’t have to wake up one morning and exercise 2 hours a day for the rest of your life. The Journey Gym is affordable. There’s no monthly gym membership payment and there are no recurring fees. I don’t have room in my budget for that. So what is it? Journey Gym is a light weight, compact universal gym that will allow you to exercise in your home. It provides a total body workout and you can use it as your primary source of resistance, cardiovascular, and circuit training. It comes with 30 different resistance bands and a set of adjustable handles so you can customize your resistance level. It also comes with a set of legs so you can raise the gym and use it as a stair stepper.  Plus you get a workout DVD specifically designed for the gym with a 5 minute set up video, a 10 minute circuit tone workout and a 20 minute circuit strength workout. They have an online community at www.healthisajourney.com where you are able to create exercise videos, track your activity and nutrition, and share your progress with friends and family. When I received my Journey Gym, it also came with a fitbook which is a really handy book that allows you to make a plan for your health and fitness and then record your progress. You can track everything from exercise (strength training, cardio, flexibility) to food, nutrients, water and sleep. This is a system to get you healthy. It’s much more than a piece of fitness equipment. I also received “The Five Pillars of Perfect Nutrition” booklet from Journey Gym.  Kim Lyons (from The Biggest Loser) shares advice on nutrition, recipes, and lifestyle changes to live a healthier lifestyle.  I really love the ideas she offers in this. A healthy lifestyle is a must. You can’t

we run we play embrace the day make laughs give hugs hunt monsters, bugs play tag throw balls build forts, high walls draw maps find treasures cherish simple pleasures get wet feel joy i so love this little boy

What’s Cooking Wednesday Recipe Linky Turning The Clock Back and Confessions of an Overworked Mom have teamed up to bring you this What’s Cooking Wednesday recipe linky. This is your chance to showcase your recipes each and every week! Just to make things even sweeter— each week, post your fabulous recipes for the opportunity to have your recipe featured on What’s Cooking Wednesday the following week!! Here are a few suggestions on how to make the most of this recipe linky: While not required, I would love it if you would: Link back to this blog in some way. You can grab my button at the bottom of this page or add this blog to your list of places you link up to/party at on your Link Parties page. The more people who link up to this recipe linky, the better it is for all of us. Please follow this blog in some way, shape or form…you can see all of my social media links at the top of my blog. Please only post directly to your recipe link. No giveaways, etsy shops or anything not family friendly. Make sure your recipe contains photos of your own and give credit where credit is due…if you were inspired by another blogger, make sure you link back. By linking up you give me permission to use these photos (with proper link backs) in my feature post next week. Come back next Wednesday and link up! Our Featured Recipe This Week is: Orange Creamsicle Homemade Cupcakes Recipe from Sassy Girlz We encourage you to stop by other blogs and their recipes! Feel free to leave comments for your fellow bloggers too… we just love comments! Also, please DO NOT post your main blog page here, POST RECIPE LINKS ONLY! The post What should I make for dinner? appeared first on Confessions of an Overworked Mom.

There's nothing wordless about me. Sorry. This photo shows 29 jars of jam. Add in 10 that I gave away and 3 that we ate and you have 42 jars. I packed up three gallons in the freezer and have three more huge bowls of whole berries ready to either freeze or consume.I'm going to make a pie this weekend, and my kids want to make ice cream. I'm thinking about making Strawberry infused vodka as well. I'm tired of strawberries.

Jennifer here to share with you about a product that will definitely help us be more organized. We were compensated for posting this guest post, however all opinions remain the writer’s own. As parents we know too well the daily chaos of coordinating our family’s schedules.  Coordinating our own schedules between spouses, among all of the events in our kids’ lives (class schedules, school events, practice/games schedules, Sunday school, ballet, swim meets-  It can get a bit hectic. For those of us needing a way to tame the chaos, a new platform called LivingTree has just launched nationwide. Good news is, it was created by parents for parents. LivingTree offers a web and mobile (iOS and Android) service, a cutting-edge system that aims to make it easy for busy parents to organize things with one another, coordinate and share the most important moments of their children’s lives with loves ones, as well as enabling the organizations that are helping teach our children (teachers/schools, coaches/leagues, etc) to more effectively communicate and coordinate with us as parents – all in one safe, and integrated place. How it works…   LivingTree’s offering is focused on three key functions: Organization:   LivingTree makes it easy to organize the everyday chaos.  The LivingTree shared calendaring system keeps spouses on the same page to ensure personal events, family events, and events for each child in your family are organized and communicated efficiently. The platform is designed to automatically integrate the children’s classes, teams, schools, and leagues for easy coordination of the classroom or school events, parent teacher conferences, volunteer opportunities and commitments, or a season’s practice/games, etc. When locations or other details are changed (by a parent, a coach, or teacher) the calendar updates in real time, and all spouses or co-parents are automatically notified on their mobile devices.  The LivingTree shared calendaring system also supports subscription to other calendar types like Outlook, Apple Cal, Google Calendar, etc.  Engagement: LivingTree simplifies communication between all the people participating in our children’s daily development. LivingTree’s “Conversations” provides tools for parents, extended families, youth leaders and organizations to privately share posts, photos, media, files, and converse in the context of our children’s lives. LivingTree aggregates all conversations into one secure place, providing a quick and easy way to converse with schools, teachers, leagues, coaches, etc.  No more emails, reply-alls, or series of websites. Sharing and Remembering:  LivingTree’s “Memories” feature offers parents an easy (yet private) way to chronicle the lives of their children.  Quickly post a set of photos or media to a “Memory Mix” per child, and share it with other extended family members.  It not only helps you capture the important moments and experiences, but instantly arranges them in the way you want to remember them. For example, chronicle the changing interests of one child— construction, superheroes, marine biology—while showing the steadfast interest of another—Shelby sings her heart out, age 3 to 15. And when connected to a child’s classroom or team, users get instant access to other photos or media the teachers, coaches or other parents have shared privately into the class or team – grab any of those, and chronicle for future posterity. Finally, a secure and private way to coordinate our lives all in one place. To check out LivingTree and sign up for a free account,  visit www.livingtree.com. How could Living Tree help you out?

For the past few years, I have been super busy and I haven’t had as much time to garden and work on our yard as I needed.  This year is the year I am reclaiming my yard and getting everything back under control again. We live in an 1865 farmhouse in rural Vermont.  My goal isn’t to turn our yard into something that ends up on the cover of Better Homes and Gardens.  I love the distressed look and prefer a casual look when it comes to how my gardens are set up. This area is right outside our side door.  I see it multiple times a day and it has been annoying me for quite a while.  Our thimble berries have been growing out of their home and taking over other areas. I pruned them back a bit to work on this area and took care of a bit of the clutter.  Lots of our gardening supplies come from friends or from Freecycle so most of the time nothing matches. That ends up giving the area a slightly distressed shabby chic look that I like. Before This is after: After What do you think? Does your garden have a manicured look or a more casual feel? The post My Distressed Yard appeared first on Confessions of an Overworked Mom.