‘Of course, sir. But it is available on a first come, first serve basis, and sometimes we do run out…’

Oh my God, there had been a run on Australian currency! Poor Kat will be wandering around The Land Down Under without legal tender paying exorbitant ATM fees!!! The horror! The unadulterated horror!!!!

I gave myself a few quick slaps to sober up, but she spoke first: ‘Depending on when you’re coming in, I could hold the money for you.’

The rain that has been crashing down on Avon, CO suddenly eased, the clouds parted, and, I swear on a stack of books that aren’t the Bible, Handel’s ‘Messiah’ was sung by strong, disembodied voices in the fresh new light.

The wonderful, dear, sweet, lovely young woman on the other end of the line promised, swore, crossed her heart even, that fresh, clean, unmarked Australian currency would be waiting with our name on it, and they accept cash, credit/debit cards, and checks.

What service! What hospitality! What the heck was I thinking?!

Now to start packing…

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We just recently found out that Kat needs to finish raising the money for her People to People delegation to Australia by May 14th! If you are able, please make a donation of any comfortable amount by clicking on the Chip-In button to the right of this page. Kat and my wife are working on hand drawn thank you cards that will be sent to you from Australia, time allowing, or when she gets home. If you’ve already donated, you’re already on our mailing list!

A work in progress by my wife...

One of Kat's Thank You cards

In other news…

Calli, the 3 year old, has become increasingly bossy, despite the constant reminders to say thank you. The establishment of who’s boss seems to be constantly on her mind. A few nights ago, as we were getting ready for bed, Calli pointed at me and said, ‘You can’t boss me, Daddy. Mommy can boss me. That’s her job.’

She must have doubted that fact a couple nights later. ‘Mommy, you’re not the boss of me!’ Only to quickly recant, ‘Oh. Wait. You ARE the boss of me!’

This post brought to you by Dad-Blogs' FatherHood Friday. Be sure to swing by for all the other great Dads and Moms who love to share their lives online!

Although the winner was chosen through the use of Random.org, I would like to repost his comment here:

This is a great way to keep it going! I love the pay it forward idea. I’ve waited all day to post about this because I wanted to give it some thought. The idea that I came up with was to have my 3 year old go to Walmart and look for gifts to place in the local giving tree at the hospital for a child in need of a christmas gift.

What a cool idea. This will not only pay it forward now, but it will help instill in the future generation a sense of giving and compassion!

Jason said that he will post the result of his daughter’s Pay It Forward, and I’ll be sure to pass the link on here as well. In the meantime, keep your eye on The Devoted Dad!

Way to go, Jason! Feel free to spend the money all in one place!  ;)

As a father, I worry a great deal about the sheer volume of waste that my family and I produce. We dilligently sort the recyclables from the normal trash. Luckily for us, the recycling bin at the apartment is comingled, so we don’t have to separate the glass from the paper, etc.

But what do you do when it can’t be recycled?

Today I was happy to find the blog ‘Riding With No Hands‘, a review site of, well, near as I can tell, everything!

The entry that brought me there was a review of a company called TerraCycle, Inc. TerraCycle takes the unrecyclable material you find around the house and turns it into a new product. 

A few examples:

The Drink Pouch backpack

The Waste Wrapper Notebook

Even Firelogs made from unrecyclable wax cardboard!

They even have natural household cleaners and lawn and garden products.

Not only are these products very affordable, but TerraCycle will even pay you for your ‘unrecyclable’ material! Everybody wins!

Riding With No Hands is giving you a chance to win a TerraCycle product. Please see the blog post ‘Mama’s Got A Brand New (Used) Bag… *Giveaway*‘ for details!

***Update***

I guess I could now call this a sponsored blog, because, yep! I was a winner! WOO-HOO! Can’t wait to see my messenger bag! 

Thanks again to Riding With No Hands and Terracycle for this giveaway!

You can see the list of winners at ‘This Week’s Winners‘ at ridingwithnohands.com

For the month of March, Redbox (you know, those vending machines popping up everywhere with movies in them?) is letting you rent a movie for free every Wednesday! Just pop over to the redblog and snag your code.

With good family flicks like Wall-E and Madagascar 2 in there, you can make tonight a family movie night!