Uniquely Daddy: Ginger Beer Kit

Spring has sprung!  And that means Mother's Day & Father's Day are just around the corner!  I already have a great list of Mom Gifts here.  It is constantly growing since I am a mom myself and I have the chance to review great products.

However, finding gifts for Dads can be much more difficult.  And, in honor of my Hubby's first official Father's Day, I've decided to do a review series focusing on unique gifts for Dads entitled 'Uniquely Daddy.'  There will be a growing list of great ideas here.  So without further ado, let me introduce you to the first great gift idea:

I was given a free Ginger Beer Kit in exchange for an open & honest review.  All opinions are my own.  

Hubby and I have recently discovered the wonder that is Ginger Beer (like Root Beer...it is alcohol free).  I enjoy it.  But Justin is obsessed.  He wants to try ever brand of ginger beer we can find.  So when I started looking for unique Father's Day gifts, I immediately thought of ginger beer.  And I stumbled across Manor Farm Hardwick.  They have a kit to make ginger beer!

Super fun right?

Not only can he have his ginger beer!  He can make it!  And let's face it, guys feel pretty macho when they can do something themselves, whether it is fixing the car, fixing the light or the sink, you name it.... I think it gives them a sense of accomplishment.  ;)

Here is what comes in the kit:

Ginger, Sugar, Yeast, and Directions.  Everything to make your own "Ginger Plant"

Here is what ours looked like:

Not really much of a plant but....

You do have to "feed" it every day so I guess that's where the idea comes from...

For a week your "plant" gets a little bit of ginger and sugar.

After a week, you get to prepare your ginger beer.

Two cool things here:

1. You could definitely make this a part of a date night.  If you can stand each other in the kitchen that is....haha.  But, really, we had a fun time putting it all together.  Even Hubby said if we had planned a little better, it could have been a really fun date night... Dinner and then making ginger beer!  

2. After you make the ginger beer, you can split whats left of the plant "start," split it in half and start TWO ginger beer plants!  The gift that keeps on giving!

Anyways...here are a few sneak peeks at what our night entailed:

Juicing lemons...

Cooking on the stove...

...and pouring the finished product into bottles.

After bottling, you have to wait three days to enjoy the delicious brew.  So, if the Daddy in your life is not a patient man, this may not be the best idea.  ;)

However, the end product is worth it!

Ginger Beer.   Mmmmmmm

We had 4 bottles and a little more out of our one ginger plant.  And it is good.  To be fair, it isn't quite as "gingery" as some of the ginger beers you can buy in the store...but there is something refreshing about the fact that we did this.  Hubby and I as a team.

And isn't that the best gift you can give?  You and your husband working together, spending time with him, giving him a sense of accomplishment, and a refreshment to enjoy after a hard day's work.  And at only $5, it's a great deal!  Get one for the man in your life here.  They also have a Salt Beef Kit that you can get here.

And guess what!?!  Manor Farm Hardwick sent me an extra Ginger Beer Kit so I could give one away!  To enter, use the Giveaway Tool form below.  Good luck!

Entry-Form

"Thai-ed Together" Date Night...or Day...

This might be a little bit late but I wanted to share about our Valentine date this year!  Hubby and I have decided to switch off who does Valentine's day and our Anniversary each year.  He chose to start with our Anniversary so that means I got Valentine's day this year!  Thanks to some inspiration from the girls over at The Dating Divas, I had a great time planning a whole day full of fun!

Since the holiday was actually a Thursday, I decided to postpone our fun until Saturday.  But I did surprise Hubby with a large part of his gift and an invite for our date on Thursday!

While I was at work, he came home to find this:

I got this free printable here from Erika at The Dating Divas.

This tiny little printable gave me the inspiration for our whole day!  Since it talked about being "tied" together and we love Thai food so much...I thought it was perfect - we would have a Thai/Asian themed date day!

Well, Hubby followed the string to his gift where I attached the invitation to our date (I made this one all by myself).

 Cheesy?  Yep.  Love it!

Saturday morning Hubby went to the men's fellowship breakfast at our church giving me just enough time to set up and prepare for the day.  I couldn't find a lot of budget friendly asian decor but I managed to find bamboo placemats at Ross and some paper lanterns and fans at Walmart (on clearance!).  Set up with the tea set my brother got me for Christmas and traditional Thai music playing on Youtube, we had our own little Asian oasis!

We started the morning with some hot tea and strawberries.  And of course, we had to eat the berries with chopsticks (I found a 10 pack at the Dollar Tree)!  Then I brought out the first activity I had planned for the day:

A 3-D puzzle of a dragon!  Micheals had this puzzle and a hand full of others for only $5!  Plus I had a 40% off coupon - we are all about being budget friendly!  :)

Hubby had popped out most of the pieces before I asked if he realized they were all slightly different sizes.  Turns out, all of the pieces were numbered and we had to pop them all back in to figure out what was what.  Oops! 

When it was close to lunch time, we took a break from puzzling to snack on the "asian" snacks I found at Five Below (if you don't know what that is, the name says it all).  When we eat out on weekends we try to aim for a late lunch/early dinner so that we can still get lunch prices and save some moolah for other things!

 We managed to get all of the peices together before leaving for our meal.  Doesn't he look great?

  
This is the part of my date that flopped.  I looked on Yelp to find the ONLY Thai restuarant in the city that served "Jungle Chicken Curry," a usual order of Justin's from our favorite Thai place in OKC.  He looks for it on the menu of every new Thai place we try...  So we get there at 2:32...turns out they close from 2:30 - 5:00 for a break between lunch and dinner.  Yelp lied to me.  :(  Fortunately, we were only 6 miles away from a Thai place we had recently tried and loved.  We had a great meal and great time but I'm still bummed that Justin didn't get his Jungle Chicken Curry...

After we got home, we painted our dragon and played the game "Wok Tok" (you can find it here from Kiirsten at The Dating Divas).  This game is a lot like Mad Gab but with an Asian title and a romantic twist.  We had a blast!

After painting our dragon for awhile (the whole puzzle took much longer than expected), we ended the night with Thai massage!  I found a few different "how-to" videos on Youtube and we took turns massaging each other.  It was the perfect end to a romantic "thai-ed" together day!

I hope this gives you some inspiration to be creative (and, yes, a little cheesy) when it comes to date night!  Marriage does NOT have to be boring.  And if you haven't already....please, please, please go check out The Dating Divas, they are truly doing a great thing!  And they have a TON of great stuff!  Thanks to them, I've got date night ideas for the next few years I think! ;)

Have a good one!

 

Organization & Date Night

Leave it to Pinterest to show me how to organize date night - and make it fun!  

Let me introduce you to what I call Date Night Pick 'N' Pull: 

I found the original idea for this here and then tweeked it a little bit to suit my taste (and I hope you will do the same if you like the idea).  You could use anything to hold the sticks - a jar, a cup (leftover from our wedding centerpieces), or even a can covered in some cute scrapbook paper!  :)  
I painted the sticks with acrylic paint because it was what I had but I'm guessing it would be much easier with spray-paint or maybe even markers... And I wrote with colored pencils (it was the only thing that would show up on black!)...pardon my handwriting.  

You could easily change the categories to suit your needs...I'm just SUPER particular about our budget so I tried to give us a lot of options.  The attached "key" was made on Publisher...which I LOVE for crafty projects like this!  

And BONUS!  - Justin even thought this would be fun for date nights...he likes to be a little spontaneous.  But, yes, I had him approve the list of date ideas before I started making the sticks!  Speaking of, after I made my own list I got a few other ideas from these two blogs: The Dating Divas and Six Sisters' Stuff.  They both have some really great ideas.  Some are simple and others are rather extravagant - just pick what suits your taste!  We haven't actually tried it but I'm very hopeful and I will definitely let you know how it goes!

Along the lines of organization, I also got this great idea from Pinterest:

A cereal box re-purposed into an organizer!

The tutorial can be found here.  I had a different sized cereal box so I had to adjust measurements but it still wasn't very difficult.  Just pick out 3 sheets of coordinating scrapbook paper and some cute stickers or embellishments and you're set!  

We use this ALL the time.  All the clutter that gets left on the kitchen table or coffee table or recliner (in our case) when you walk in the door - goes in the box!  The down side - eventually all of that clutter has to go somewhere...so, yes, you will have to go through the organizer eventually.  But being a little organized helps in the mean time!

Hopefully I've inspired some creativity!  Have fun crafting!