Mommy Went On A Brandcation

You may remember that mommy left her baby girl overnight for the first time for three nights to go on a mommy trip – Brandcation. It was tough leaving my little girl for that long, but I had an amazing trip and I am dying to tell you all about my adventures.

My four day, three-night trip was basically a blogging retreat. Hosted by MomDot, 32 bloggers from across the country (and even one from Canada) came together for a weekend of adventure. We were treated to some wonderful activities and spent a lot of time talking about blogging. It was really neat to meet people that I have corresponded with online in person for the first time, and it really solidified that I love blogging! I learned a lot about blogging and had a LOT of laughs.

First I have to give a huge shout out to the incredible Tara from Global Resort Homes. Our whole trip would not have been possible without Global. They put our group of 32 women up in 4 vacation homes in Kissimmee for three nights. The accommodations were luxurious, practical and really facilitated the chance for us to get to know each other better. Seriously, this is the WAY to travel.

Global Resort Homes offers vacationers an alternative to a hotel room. Instead of cramming an entire family in a hotel room with no room to go and nothing to do, vacation homes offer space, a kitchen, a laundry room and a place to hang — all for the price (or less) of a hotel room. The community we stayed in was 2 miles from the Disney entrance, and it was so nice. Every day, it was like coming home. And instead of the bloggers hiding out in their hotel rooms, we had a living room and a kitchen to spend time in. That was the biggest selling point to me.

My new friends Blondie from Good Golly Miss Blondie and Jessica from That Tech Chick created a video tour of the home they stayed in, and it shows off the home so well I had to share.

When I was a kid, we had a timeshare, and it was great for a lot of these reasons. But timeshares are complicated and expensive. Renting a vacation home for a few nights when needed is a much more economical and useful solution.

How would you like to win a seven-night stay at a Global Resort Homes in Orlando? Right now, Global is offering one lucky family the chance to get away. All you have to do to enter is to like Global Resort Homes on Facebook. When you do, be sure to tell them TheSuburbanMom sent ya!

In addition to a great place to stay, check out how well-stocked the pantry was thanks to Pepperidge Farm, Dole and Sam’s Club. I have a new fav Goldfish… Have you tried the Goldfish Smores? OMG – they are soooooo yummy. Marybeth at Baby Good Buys totally got me hooked on them over the weekend. (Thanks Marybeth!) I also went out and bought some of the new Dole Fruit Crisps for my hubby after trying them during the trip. If you like apple pie, you have to try these, yum!

Another great company I learned about on Brandcation is Eversave. If you haven’t yet signed up for daily deals from Eversave, I totally recommend it. One of the things that I think sets Eversave apart is that it offers a lot of e-commerce gift certificates in its daily deals (the company is branching out into local locations too, having recently added Orlando to its market, but with the e-commerce sites anyone can use them. This gives you even more flexibility in the use of your “save,” and a lot of the certificates can be used toward shipping costs too. So if you were to buy a $50 certificate for $30 (made up numbers here), you might be able to score a $40 item plus shipping with your certificate. I totally missed an awesome online toy store deal earlier this week because it sold out so quick. But I will definitely post about upcoming deals in the future. If you haven’t yet signed up for Eversave deals, sign up today and you will get a $2 credit in your account to use the first time you make a purchase.

I have so much more adventure to share with you about my weekend including dinner shows, zip-lining, SWAG and more. Stay tuned.

Thanks again to Matt at ItsAllFreeOnline for sponsoring me to go on my amazing trip. If you aren’t familiar with his site yet, check it out. He will fill your mailbox with tons of awesome freebies!