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If you have friends or family who has moved abroad, sending them gifts can be a challenge. What are you allowed to send? How much it will cost to ship it? Will it get there safely? There are still some things you can send if you’re trying to level up your gift-giving, that your friends will love. 

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1. Send flowers. Flowers might not seem like the obvious choice, but you can send flowers abroad if you choose the right company. This will be a great gift, as your friends abroad won’t be expecting flowers from you. You could choose a bouquet made from flowers from home, for something to remind them of where they lived before. Flowers are always well-received, as they’re a great way to brighten up the home. 
2. Gift cards. If shipping costs are a problem for you, then a gift card is still a thoughtful gift. You could choose a card for a store you know that your friend loves, or choose somewhere more generic like Amazon, where your friend will have a broad range of choices of what they spend their vouchers on. For something a bit different, you could give a gift card for an airline or accommodation, to help with the costs of their next trip home to visit friends and family. 
3. Skype credit. Skype to Skype calls are free, but to call a landline with Skype, you need credit. If your friend has elderly relatives who aren’t online that they stay in touch with, credit to call them is a very thoughtful gift. 
4. A care package. Even if your friend is very happy living abroad, there will be some things about home that they miss. Pack up a care package of things that they can’t get where they live now. This could be things like cookies and other snacks, tea bags, local coffee, or candy. Dried goods ship well too. Find out what things they can’t get where they live now and include those. Add a thoughtful note inside. 
5. Language lessons. If the big move happened recently, then your friend might be trying to learn the local language. You could buy them a subscription to a language learning app or vouchers for a course to help them on their way. This could also be a good gift for a friend who is planning to move abroad but hasn’t done so yet. 
6. A membership. What does your friend like? Could you buy them a subscription or membership to fit that? For example, buy a subscription for a wine of the month club, or a beer subscription service. There are memberships and subscriptions for just about everything, from magazines to memorabilia. The big advantage is that you don’t have to cover the shipping costs. 
7. Donate to a cause. You could make a donation in their name to a cause they care about. This could be an animal charity, a children’s charity, or anything else. This is another one that doesn’t need shipping, so is good if restrictions are tight for what you can send to them.

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The pandemic forced a complete halt to the old way of doing things and brought along a new normal. Paramount in the safety protocols is the need to observe social distancing, which has intensified the reliance on technology to make that happen. That notwithstanding, avoid getting left out because there are helpful ways technology can help you carry out your old routines. As proof of this, in 2020, WSJ Gear & Gadgets discovered a 70% increase in FaceTime than in previous years. So, what things are you using the web to do now? Read on as some are highlighted here.

1. Virtual concerts

In the past and even as recently as 2019, virtual concerts in the US were not popular activities people willingly signed up for. However, during the raging pandemic and the need to maintain normalcy, virtual concerts took over. Hosted on pay-per-view platforms, Americans quickly opted for safe ways to have entertainment while maintaining social distancing. Surprisingly, in 2019, the average number at a real-life concert was pegged around 5000 people. However, according to vox.com, virtual concerts seem to have raised the bar even higher. It said the average number for any single virtual show held in 2020 was 10,000 people! 

However, the numbers are dependent on the success of virtual concert marketing and advertising techniques employed by organizers. In other words, this statistic meant a lot more people are beginning to prefer enjoying themselves from the comfort of home. Celebrities such as John Legend and Pink are among many successful musicians who have employed this means to entertain fans during lockdowns and a raging pandemic. Today, virtual concerts are here to stay and will gain more ground in 2021 and beyond. Besides, parents can also enjoy these shows without missing out on child care.

1. Virtual mailbox service

Before the pandemic hit, it was a traditional habit among Americans to pick up their physical mails. However, with the Coronavirus pandemic and the need to reduce the physical handling of items, the virtual mailbox service has held an upper hand. Moreover, with over 500,000 postal service workers on the line, the debate for an online postal service is rife. That notwithstanding, PhysicalAddress.com’s virtual mailbox service has gained popularity since 2013. With over 40,000 clients in over fifty countries, you can opt for mail box access online. 

From the comfort of your home or anywhere else, you can check your postal mail from a trusted web interface. Keep in mind that it’s not the same as your email. The virtual mailbox service functions by scanning and uploading your mails to a secure online server. Therefore, with your smartphone, tablet, or computer, customers can access their postal mails virtually. With additional features such as forwarding and even shredding, your privacy and need for confidentiality are assured.

1.  FaceTime

Developed by Apple Inc., FaceTime is a patented video telephony product/service. This service recorded a tremendous increase in 2020 when the pandemic hit the United States for the first time. From February 2020 to October of the same year, FaceTime usage surpassed twelve months of use in 2019.

The stats proved that while people maintained social distancing protocols, the need to remain connected to loved ones through virtual means sharply increased. It was no longer the preference to hear the voices of loved ones. Instead, seeing their faces on the screen boosted emotional, professional, and social connections.

Technology has been around for decades, but its significance in communication has been strongly felt in these trying pandemic times. The next time you want to do something that entails personal contact, maybe you should consider how technology can help carry out that task or activity.

With a planet filled with wonders, fascinating destinations, and unique scenery, selecting the perfect spot for a vacation can be challenging. Before you decide, it is essential to look into the beauty, culture, food, scenery, people of each destination. Your choice should suit the experience you seek. For instance, jungle tours are more available in Australasia than in Paris.  Below are some of the top rating holiday destinations around the world and their unique features.

1.      Bali, Indonesia

Anyone who has been to Bali will tell you that the place is a real-life paradise. The destination is filled with beautiful beaches, volcanic mountains, and jungles filled with tigers, Komodo dragons, orang-utans, and tigers. You have probably seen an image of Bali on social media- most people who traveled there labeled it as iconic.

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2.      Kerry, Ireland

Located in the far west, Ireland is counted amongst the most scenic countries in Europe. Kerry’s lakes, coasts, and mountains are among the best holiday destinations that you can explore in the country. You may also opt to visit the Killarney National Park to feel the outdoor and unique wildlife and scenery. Small towns in Ireland, such as Dingle, add to its charm.

3.      Sydney Australia

Sydney is renowned as one of the most iconic and advanced cities of the modern era. Furthermore, the city is filled with top rating hotels and cafes, gorgeous beaches, and world-class entertainment. There is never a mediocre day in this city.

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4.      The Maldives

Located in the Indian Ocean, this tropical nation is made up of over a thousand coral islands. It is also home to some of the most luxurious underwater villas and hotel resorts. The Maldives is a place of bright blue waters and sandy beaches, and it has been rated among the top holiday destinations for romantic getaways.

5.      Marrakesh, Morocco

Marrakesh, an ancient walled city, is home to numerous palaces, mosques, and lush gardens. The color of the city’s walls caused it to gain the moniker “The Red City.” UNESCO also recognizes it as a World Heritage Centre.

6.      Paris, France

Referred to by many as the city of love, Paris is one of the most iconic and scenic centers. It sits at the top of most people’s holiday destination bucket list. People adore Paris because it is filled with famous landmarks such as the Notre Dame cathedral, the Eiffel Tower, and Arc de Triomphe. There are also numerous top rating restaurants where you can taste world-class French dishes and wines.

7.      New York

New York is one of the most exciting states in America. It is filled with world-class cuisine, charming upstate scenery, and culture. There is so much to do in this city that a single visit will leave you yearning to go back. Each of the five boroughs in the city is unique with special features, and it is nearly impossible to narrow them down.

8.      Rome Italy

Whether you are visiting this wonderful city for the first time or as are a resident, you will always discover new sites daily. Rome is filled with scenic streets that are a sight to behold for explorers.

9.      Cape Town, South Africa

Cape Town is a dream destination for many people. The city is pleasant even in the dry season, making it a top holiday location in the summer. The prices are relatively low, and it is a great travel destination if you are exploring on a budget. It is filled with awe-worthy scenery and enjoyable activities such as a dining experience on the Victoria & Alfred Waterfront and a cable car ride at the top of Table Mountains.

10. Waikato, New Zealand

 Waikato is located in New Zealand’s North Island. It is home to lush rainforests with massive rock caves and the beautiful city of Hamilton. However, the main attraction is the Middle-earth adventure-featured on the film set of Lord of the Rings. The area still has the original Hobbit holes that were used in making the film.

11. Antarctica

Being the southernmost continent on earth, Antarctica is a once-in-a-lifetime travel destination. It offers unique scenery and extreme remoteness that you are unlikely to find anywhere else. The trip to Antarctica is not an easy one. However, once you get there, you are rewarded with the breathtaking views of the icy sea kayaking, the white wilderness, and unique whale sightings.

12. Santorini, Greece

Santorini, Greece, is a group of islands filled with magnificent beaches. The beaches are lined with volcanic red or black sand, and clear blue waters. It is also home to unique architecture and world-class hotels and villas. It has famous scenery and sunsets, which makes it one of the most popular holiday destinations.

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13. Singapore

Located in the southern parts of Malaysia, Singapore is a small island city-state that has gained popularity as a top travel destination. With futuristic bridges, colorful buildings, cloud forests, and rich culture, Singapore offers a unique experience. It is also home to top rating restaurants and hotels, but if you are on a tight budget, you can easily find a room rent and explore the city at affordable rates.

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14. Moscow, Russia

Moscow, Russia’s cosmopolitan capital,  is a beautiful holiday destination in any season. Moscow offers an immense sense of history.  It is filled with colorful domes and bell chimes that ring from over 600 churches around the city. The museums and ballet in the city are impressive to European culture lovers.

15. Hong Kong

Renowned for its vibrant food scenes and skylines, Hong Kong is a top holiday destination.  The city is also filled with lush parks and mountains that leave many nature lovers longing for a second trip. Its sci-fi themed apartments and colorful playgrounds give Hong-Kong an enviable edge.

As you select the perfect holiday destination for yourself and your loved ones, ensure that you consider factors such as your budget, season, and the amount of time you have to be on holiday. Any of the destinations on the list above can serve as the perfect holiday destination for a memorable experience.

To a lot of people, a family isn’t complete without a dog or two to round it out. These constant companions, four-legged friends, and great snuggle buddies can bring a lot of joy to a household. They can also teach your kids important lessons about responsibility, caring for the needs of others, and the benefits of exercise. However, aside from getting the right dog for your family, you also need to make sure that your family is ready for a dog. Here are a few ways to make sure everyone is prepared to give a pooch a place to live.

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Everyone is comfortable with animals

First off, don’t even think about taking a dog into the home until you are sure that everyone is going to feel safe and comfortable with it around. If one of your children has apprehension or a fear of dogs, you can try and get them acclimated to being around them by, for instance, helping out at your local shelter. However, you should not be trying to get a dog if your family doesn’t, to a person, express that they are happy and comfortable with doing so. It doesn’t matter how much any one person might love having a dog, that doesn’t supersede the discomfort that another person might feel and no-one should feel uncomfortable in their own home.

You have enough time to look after a dog

If you are the main proponent of buying a dog for the family, then you need to make sure that you can make time for it. Your family can help take care of core needs like feeding, walking, grooming, and so on, but usually, there is one key decision-maker, one person who should be ready to assume responsibility for the dog when no-one else is able to. Get a good idea of how much time it takes to meet a dog’s needs every day, and understand that your family needs to dedicate even more time to show them the love and bonding that they need, on top of that.

Be ready to share your home

You’re going to have to give your new dog more than just your time. You’re going to have to give up your home for it, as well. A room by room guide to dog proofing your home can help you ensure that the place is made safe, gating the dog off from anywhere necessary, while moving any other hazardous items out of reach of the dog. If it’s a puppy, expect it to be doubly curious about exploring what it can get into. However, you also need to teach your kids about not leaving their toys or food or even their shoes lying around as they might have once done. Otherwise, they’re going to get a lesson in the form of a severely chewed up possession.

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What type of pet would suit your kids?

Dogs of almost any breed can learn to get along with children. However, you also need to think about what kind of kids you have and what kind of dog personality might be best suited to them. For instance, American Lab dogs and Saint Bernards are great caretakers, often used as “nanny dogs” and well suited to children of a young age. Beagles are typically much better suited to energetic kids who love to play (but know how to play nice, as we’ll talk about later), while dachshunds are typically better company for children who are more mannered and gentle. Bear in mind that dogs should be supervised with young children at all times.

Make sure everyone respects animals

If your child is confident and friendly around animals, that’s a very good sign. However, it’s worth teaching them two things to balance it out: restraint and caution. For one, they need to know not to go near a dog if it’s showing signs of anxiety or aggression. Secondly, even if they know that the dog is friendly and actively wants to play with them, they have to show that they’re able to be gentle with it, avoiding pulling their ears, their tail, and knowing when the dog wants distance or to stop being touched. Children that aren’t taught to respect a dog’s boundaries can end up thinking of them as a toy, which is not going to foster a good relationship between them.

Learning about their health

Given full reins of their life, most dogs would end up eating garbage, covered in fleas, and otherwise living a pretty rough life. It’s us, the humans of the home, who are responsible for their good health. As such, you should make sure that your family learns about how to keep dogs healthy. This means, for one, knowing what not to feed it. It’s a good idea to generally avoid giving your dog any kind of “human food,” such as table scraps, but your kids should at least be aware of what foods are toxic to the dog. Otherwise, find a good vet and they will educate you on the aspects of a healthy lifestyle you should be trying to satisfy, which you can then teach your kids about.

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Are the kids willing to take on chores?

A child who is excited to have a puppy might promise that they’re going to walk them, wash them, feed them, and do backward somersaults if that’s what they need to do to get a dog. They might even mean it, too. However, the novelty of having a dog begins to wear, while the reality of chores remains consistent. If you’re planning on having the kids help with the chores of looking after a dog, then you should make sure that they’re already used to doing chores around the house that they don’t especially enjoy doing.

Living to a routine

You need to make sure that you’re able to free time to take care of your new dog when they need it. However, your whole family can have a much easier time pitching in if you put together a routine that everyone can follow easily enough. Most of the time is going to be allotted to walking, feeding, and bathing the dog, as well as cleaning up after them, whether it’s the hair they might leave around the house or the “surprises” out back in the garden. Put together a dog routine and make sure that everyone in the family gets their turn doing everything. If some people are happier to take on certain duties, you can let them take care of it, so long as others pick up the slack in other regards.

You have the budget for a dog

It’s not right to deprive anyone of the companionship of a dog based on what they can afford, but in order to give them the right level of care that they need, it is crucial to have a budget towards taking care of it. Even a dog that comes free from the local shelter is going to come with a range of costs. Vet fees, pet supplies, food, insurance, all of these can start to add up. What’s more, many of these costs are recurring so you’re going to have to budget for them as they go. What’s more, it’s a good idea to have a pet emergency fund put aside for any sudden costs, too.

Before you make the final decision to welcome a pup into your place, make sure that your family is ready to offer the warm, welcoming, and responsible home that they need.

Currently, children all around the world are being homeschooled due to the pandemic. The normal figures show around 2 million children in the US are homeschooled as standard, and this is a number that is currently increasing. More and more parents are choosing to take their children’s education into their hands to ensure that they get a more balanced, concentrated view on the things that they need to learn without the worry that their children are being given a biased history of the world. Globally, there are 40 countries that have banned homeschooling, preferring children to be in a school environment and learning based on the curriculum set out by the government and its advisors.

Now, parents who are happy to send their children to school have been thrust into an environment that is unfamiliar. Trying to work from home full time while trying to teach children when they are not teachers? Parents have it very hard right now, and homeschooling can feel like the most negative thing in the world. Yes, as parents, you are taking a bigger, more active role in helping improve your child’s reading fluency, but this is a positive thing! You get to be a part of the education in an even bigger way than you would have if they were in school. Despite the pressure and the worry, there are plenty of benefits to homeschooling. So much so, some parents are even considering continuing home education after the pandemic is over. Before you go ahead and make the same decision, worrying about your children and their future, let’s go ahead and talk about the positive side of homeschooling.

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Homeschooling can improve test scores

You may feel like you’re not doing anything to contribute to your child’s education, especially when you are feeling overwhelmed by the pressure of homeschooling for the first time. However, there have been studies that show that homeschoolers often do better in testing environments. There was a study of 20,000 children that showed children homeschooled through high school scored 60+ points more than the national average. While parents may not feel adequate enough to teach their children, this study proves otherwise.

Children feel free

A school environment is great for children to develop among their peers, but there is a lot of emotional freedom with homeschooling that cannot be achieved in school. Schools are a fishbowl for children where every move they make, everything they say and every emotion they have is catalogued and saved for later. Children fight to be the top of the hierarchy in the classroom and being educated at home removes all of this emotional stress from the shoulders of your child. The stresses of the usual classroom environment are removed and there is no pressure to fit into the ideals of other people. Children can be as expressive as they like without limits, without fear of retribution and without a loss of self-esteem. Teenage girls in a school are more vulnerable to peer pressure and image issues – this isn’t a problem in a home environment, which allows them to become more mature adults.

Homework? What homework?

At home, there is no set work. Children sit in school for upwards of six hours per day being talked to; homework is a factor on top of those hours which leads to children becoming exhausted, burnt out and reprimanded if they don’t complete their tasks. At home, there is no pressure to continue working for hours and hours per day. There is no homework to be done beyond the schooling hours and parents never have to try and struggle with this homework set every night. School children have a lot more pressure on them than necessary, homework is an added burnout!

“But what about making friends?”

It’s a sentence said to all homeschooling parents who do long-term home education with their children. The belief that children learning from home are not socialized properly is just a myth. Homeschooling families often meet with other homeschooling families and create their own communities so that their children can socialize together. Not only this, but children mix with people of a variety of ages when they are homeschooled. They attend clubs with children and grown ups outside of their age group and they join sports clubs and swimming clubs, giving them the chance to have shared interests with others beyond the confines of a class of thirty. This is a huge benefit to homeschooling that most parents bump up against.

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Flexibility

No school runs. No rushing. No school uniform shopping. No asking permission to go on vacation away from school. There is no rigidity to the schedule of a homeschooling family. The flexibility in your schedule with the kids allows you to have far more time with the kids for fun and not just school work. The best bit? You can join reading groups and museum groups, take on annual passes to fun attractions and enjoy educational breaks with parents outside of the busy seasons. There is more of an opportunity to enjoy hands-on learning, which school-based children are often away from.

Paced learning

Some children are “behind” in school, but it’s not because they are actually behind their peers. The school model is based around all children of the same age learning the same thing at the same time. The thing is, this is not how children work! Children learn at different rates and it’s important that parents are able to accommodate those rates. Homeschooled children often progress faster because they are not closed in by the pace of the classroom. Instead, children can take more time to learn what they need to learn with one to one tutoring from their parents. The homeschooled kids learn how to take their own control of their learning, allowing them to make progress at a much faster pace – which is exactly what they need!

Needs are met

If your children have specific needs, they are better met in a controlled and closed environment than if they were in school. A school isn’t always equipped to cater individually for each child who needs it. Instead, children with additional needs are placed in a classroom away from the children in their class and are taught separately. This segregation, while good for mainstream children trying to learn, is a good way to make a child feel as if there is a prejudice against them. Sensitive homeschooling is going to ensure that their needs are directly met by people they are comfortable around.

More time together

One of the most positive benefits of homeschooling is the time spent together as a family. You and your children get more time to be with each other, learning from each other and keeping an open forum for discussion. Parenting is a wonderful way to spend time together, but children can benefit from the closed-quarters they have with their parents. The chance to build a better, more trusting relationship with children is important for their development, and it’s more achievable when children are homeschooled. It doesn’t mean that school-based children don’t have that close relationship with their children, but parents aren’t as intimately involved in the learning process thi way.

There may be a lot of social media panic surrounding homeschooling, but it doesn’t have to be that way. Homeschooling can be just as much a joy as school-based education if parents are open to learning as much as their children. Being a part of their education is a huge privilege for parents and it should be seen that way when homeschooling during a pandemic.