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If you have been accepted to college then you are likely to need to find specially sized bedding for the extra long twin beds they use in residence halls. These twin xl beds are the same width as normal twin beds but are 5 inches longer. While that extra length does not sound like much, your bed becomes your couch/guest/dining/tv watching/video game playing and of course bed in a 15 x 15 size room for several months a year.

Don’t freak out as we will showcase to you what special size bedding you need to invest in as well as ways to stretch your limited dorm decor dollars for the end goal of a comfy dorm bed. While not every school uses twin xl beds we have seen statistics show that 90% or more of college dorm rooms use a 39 x 80 size bed – or as we call it a twin xl bed (or xl twin bed). These dorm beds are designed to be used in several ways including loft style bunk beds or the symmetrical room layouts of your imagination.

In general we always liked the non loft bed set up’s because of the practical nature of dorm rooms. For example if you decide to go with loft style bunk beds and your roommate has a friend come over – they will likely want to sit on the bottom bed to watch TV. So if you’re the ‘bottom’ bunk person your space is seriously crimped. The dual or side by side bed layouts allow a functional walkway with equal sides of the room – thus keeping everyone happier.

Not all of your bedding needs to be ‘twin xl’ only some specific items need to be so – especially your sheet sets, mattress pads and for the lucky feather beds. Dorm mattresses are firm and usually covered in a bio hazard like plastic material to prevent spill seepage. This means your sleep experience will be stiff, hot (because plastic does not breathe well) and crunchy at best. So we recommend a couple bed toppers plus your twin xl sheet set to be labeled ‘twin xl’. Items like your comforter would be nice if they were longer but they are not a firm requirement – only your basic bedding is. Actually to call it basic bedding is a misnomer because the bed is basic – those items are added for comfort.

When it comes to adding comfort to your dorm room – we recommend a mattress pad and a feather bed for maximum comfort. The twin xl featherbed needs to measure 39 x 80 and will add 3 to 4 inches on top of your mattress. Feather beds provide soft squishy comfort like home. An xl twin mattress pad on the other hand provides protection from the bed as well as preventing any stray feathers from poking through. As for materials – down and feather blends are the ultimate choice for softness, plus feathers allow air to circulate versus being trapped like plastic or foam. Sometimes finding a twin xl down mattress pad is touch so we recommend even adding an extra twin comforter on top of your twin xl featherbed in place of a mattress pad. This will make the feather bed extra soft and create bed envy amongst the dorm.

Finally sheets are pretty straight forward – make sure you buy two sets for laundry changes and be sure the fitted sheet is 39 x 80. The flat sheet is optional and in a pinch you can grab an extra one from home assuming it matches and you like it.

The nuclear family has changed over the years and continues to adjust and grow and the dynamics that once made families strong can be a bit too easy to let fall by the wayside. It’s important to bring people together and enjoy family time, and this doesn’t include watching television in the family room. While television is nice, it’s also addicting and it doesn’t promote healthy, heartfelt interaction between members of the family unit.

Getting outside and playing games with adults and children is one of the best, and healthiest, ways to spend time with your family. It doesn’t really matter what you do as long as you’re all together and enjoying it. There are numerous sports and activities that families can share including baseball, volleyball, badminton, soccer, and tennis, to name a few. But if you’re looking for something a bit more exciting, and something that everyone can compete at and laugh with, then the cornhole game is the answer for you.

Cornhole for the ages

The cornhole game became popular in the Midwest a couple of decades ago, though its origins are considered murky. Some claim that it started in Cleveland, but there are references to a very similar game dating back to Europe in the fifteenth century. Wherever it originated, cornhole has increased in popularity in recent years.

It’s a simple game that is played with bean bags and two cornhole boards in which the players toss the bean bags with the intention of getting them through a six-inch hole in the board. While the regulation distance for the boards is 27 feet apart from one another, families can determine, on their own, what works best. It is also perfectly normal and natural to allow younger children to stand closer to the cornhole boards since their strength and agility will be less than the adults.

Cornhole doesn’t discriminate

Perhaps the best thing about the cornhole game for families is that it doesn’t discriminate based on age, size, or strength. Certainly ability and practice will make a difference, but it is easy to handicap a member of the family who has either natural talent or simply practices a great deal more than anyone else in the family. For example, you can make Uncle Rob -who plays in cornhole tournaments around the country- stand ten, fifteen, or even twenty feet further back when he throws his tosses. Wherever he has to stand to even the playing field will work.

Cornhole boards are simple to store and setup, which means that anytime is a good time to play cornhole. It doesn’t have to be reserved for special occasions, such as a birthday or anniversary party or even a reunion; cornhole can be played everyday, if a family chooses.

Cornhole is such an easy and versatile game and offers hours of entertainment for the entire family. It goes without saying that family time should be spent laughing, talking, and simply being together. With cornhole, you get the added bonus of being outside with the ones you love.

Pegs are a boon for people who dry their clothes on the clothesline. At the same time they are pain too, because, you just can’t find one when you need one. Sounds familiar, well the peg bags are designed to relieve you of that very pain. Well that was the original intent, nowadays though these bags are as much about utility as they are about creative expression.

Most popular peg bag designs include a clothes hanger that is used to hold the bag in place. There are other variations too like the use of handles to have the bag hanging from your shoulder rather than from the clothesline. But hangers seem to be the most common ones. If you are planning on making your own clothespin bag pattern, going for the hanger-based model is simple. The best pattern would be a dress pattern. We hang our dress on the hangers all the time, so why not make a dress-like clothespin bag?

You can choose any dress that would fit an infant. For the boys it can be shirts and for girls it can be a frock or some other cute dress. Cut out the shape accordingly and stitch it along the edges. Now place the hanger appropriately and you have your clothespin bag ready.

The next question is the size of the bag, how big do you want it. That to a large extent is determined by the hanger you choose. The bag cannot be too small that the hanger sticks out nor too large that it doesn’t fit the hanger. So fix the shape and size of the bag based on the hanger. You can use multiple pieces of cloth to make your bag or fold a single large piece as you desire.

Lastly come the finishing touches. Use some props to enhance your peg bag. Pockets, and other accessories stitches on the bag pattern enhance its looks.

It’s fairly easy to use a dryer as they have preset cycles. Using these cycles cuts the drying time needed and can save the need to iron afterwards. Let’s look at some tips and guidelines that will help you use your dryer in the most effective and cost cutting way.

Overstuffing the dryer with clothes can be a big problem. Instead, split the clothes into categories and give each one its own cycle. This is the main reason you need to leave some room in the dryer. In a washing machine, you need some space to allow the washing action to be most effective, and it’s the same with a dryer. The items must be able to rotate easily in the drum so they can dry effectively and be wrinkle free.

To make sure you don’t burn the garments, read the labels on the clothes for guidelines on which temperature you should use for drying them. It’s also important to clear the filter after each cycle to prevent fires or burn out. Also, it’s better to under-dry the garments than burn them. When you leave them in too long, they’re more likely to wrinkle, shrink in size,and lose their color. If you make the effort to fold your garments when they come out of the dryer, you won’t need to iron.

There are some safety guidelines to follow, such as not throwing something with rubber in the dryer to heat. Also, any garments that have had contact with chemicals (e.g., wax, acetone, turpentine, and cleaning chemicals) that will ignite, don’t dry them in the dryer unless you can guarantee you got these chemicals out in the wash. It’s better bet to hang them on a clothesline.

Special hand-knitted sweaters and other heavier items may require you to lay the garment flat to dry, and you’ll need to tug them back into shape as they dry. It’s important to flip them over at some stage so both sides are exposed to the air and they can dry thoroughly. If you’re going to hang laundry on the clothesline, take it out of the washing machine as soon as the cycle is done, so it doesn’t wrinkle.

Fabric softeners are now available to add to your wash cycle, and you can always dry the garments in the dryer for a few minutes before hanging them out. If you prefer not to add fabric softener to your wash, throw the garments in the dryer with a dryer sheet for some minutes and then hang them out to dry. Remember, the sun can lighten colors depending on their material so it might be an idea to hang them inside out or dry them indoors.

There are many times that you receive your parent’s advice and purposely choose to ignore it. This is often because you think they know nothing about things today, whether it is about something as simple as fashion or as complicated as child care.

Experts say that you may only be harming yourself and losing out on some valuable insight if you choose to ignore your parents in that way. One of the most common excuses for not listening to their parenting guidance is that thing called the generation gap. However, while it is true that the world does change constantly, there are some basics that remain the same. There is no substitute for life experiences, which is exactly what your mum and dad have. They have been through trials and errors in many aspects of life.

Today’s parents stubbornly refuse to ask for their parent’s advice. Often they claim they want to be better parents that the previous generation, so why bother to ask them. Instead they will turn to doctors who do not even have any experience with raising children. Or they will peruse parenting books, yet when it comes down to it many of these books are basically cultural documents that repeat acceptable ideas about the correct way to bring up children.

When first time parents go to their pediatrician asking for advice on everything from sleep habits, discipline and even toilet training, they are looking for someone to tell them how to bring up their child. The problem is that a second or third year pediatric type of residency is completely hospital based; meaning that they have been trained to treat sick kids, not the ones who simply refuse to eat their vegetables. If you think about it most pediatricians have no idea what to do with a healthy baby who doesn’t want to take a nap or even what can make a toddler smile.

While getting your parent’s advice is indeed valuable, you can also look inward for some of your parenting concerns and questions. Getting to know your kids, staying close to them, listening and paying attention, using common sense and having the ability to stay flexible are all great ways for you to learn what is best for you and your family. It is not wrong to look for help in other parenting resources as they can be a good aid, but remember that you will make mistakes too, perhaps just like your own mum and dad did.

I have recently moved from a rented property which included home insurance to a property without. As I had never searched for home insurance before I didn’t really know where to start. I decided that the best thing to do would be to go online and use a search engine.

I found the experience quite overwhelming as I couldn’t work out what would be best. So many companies over different ‘great offers’ but when it comes down to it I didn’t know what I really needed out of my insurance. I decided to get my mother on board to help me decide what would be best. I always find that a older person on your side can help a lot as they’ve already gone through the same dilemma and have been dealing with the issue for many years.

As soon as my mother came over she knew exactly what I needed and we were signed up and finished. I couldn’t be happier that I now have insurance as the decision was a little difficult.

My house and furniture is now covered and we don’t need to worry at all about if the worst should happen and we get broken into. I now feel save in my house and now that if I do need to claim I wouldn’t have a worry with contacting them.

Anyone who gets into a dilemma with insurance I would recommend asking a family member for help as they have been through the experience and may even know of a company who they have used and you can trust.

Getting up in the morning is one of the most difficult things for some people, which is why there are alarms clocks these days, like Big Ben bedroom alarm clocks. You will find that there are a number of different types of alarms clocks out there like wind up alarms and vintage ones. If you are looking for a perfect alarm clock to wake you up in the morning you may want to think about Big Ben bedroom alarm clocks.

The thing with the alarm clock is that you want to make sure that it is loud enough to wake you in the morning. Some people sleep so sound at night that they tend to sleep through just about anything. This is why so many people sleep through the sounding of their alarm clock in the morning. If you want to make sure that you wake up in the morning you will need to make sure that you get vintage or old looking Big Ben bedroom alarm clocks.

Everyone know that sleep enough is important, so this means that you want to make sure that you get to bed early enough to bed at night. It is said that people need to get at least 8 hours sleep at night, so do not just wake up to your alarm because it is time for work, you need to make sure that you get enough sleep, and that does not mean that you should sleep over your wake up time, it just means that you should go to sleep early.

If you are out to buy a new alarm clock you need to make sure that you get an alarm clock that fits into the style of your room. You do not want to get the first one you find, because if you end up with a bright yellow clock in a red room it is going to look a bit funny. You will also want to make sure that you get a clock that it easiest for you.

You will find that there is digital and analogue. Now, there are a few people out there who find it hard to read analogue, so if you are buy a clock as a gift make sure that you know what the receiver of the gift prefers.

The other thing that you will want to keep in mind when you are buying a clock as a gift is the color of the person room. You need to make sure that you get a clock that is going to fit into the rooms theme. One thing that you have to remember is that most people have themes in their rooms these days.

Big Ben bedroom alarm clocks is the one brand out there that offers a great range of digital and analogue clocks and that has styles that range from vintage to modern. You will need to make sure that you know which one you are going to go for in your room or the style that need to be bought for your friends rooms.

Values serves as a guide for all our actions and decisions. As parents, one of the best gifts for our children is to teach them family values that can guide them in their life’s journey. Like us, our children will go through ups and down and will be exposed to both good and bad values. By holding to a set of core values, they will find it easier to navigate through the rough seas of life.

Children model the people and things that they come into contact with. We must keep a close watch on them. Some of these sources are parents, family members, friends, school, books and media. Remember, if we don’t impart values to our kids, others will. If they assimilate negative values and we do not right them in time, the consequence could be dire.

To help identify your own family values, try the following exercise:

1. Get the family members together to brainstorm what could be ideal family values.

2. Before starting, reinforce that all ideas are welcome, and no one should criticize any ideas.

3. Identify what are existing values in the family

4. Discuss on whether this values should stay or go. Discuss the reasons why.

5. Next identify the values that should be included that are not already included

6. Write this down in a list. Go round the room until there are no more contributions.

7. Group similar values under a single category. For example, kindness and compassion could be classified as love.

8. Strive for a final list that is short, so that your children can remember them easily.

9. Place the values around the house so that it is easier to see them. Write it on a poster and tack it on the wall or frame it up

10. Be flexible to accommodate differences. Interpretation of values may differ between members of the family and everyone should be encourage to discuss when in doubt.