This is porch week over on the Holiday Grand Plan. I'm not quite ready to add mums.. but after all of that cleaning, I wanted to spruce the decor up a bit. I found these fake flowers at the Dollar Tree, and made a quick swag out of them -
A few more for in the crock, with some added peacock feathers (donated by our peacock)
and I added a fresh coat of black paint to the stand. I got the stand for $1 at the amish sale a year or so ago.
(the flag is my daughters color guard practice flag)
The porch still needs a lot of work, but this is a start.
Love You More by Lisa Gardner - mystery from a series, but I haven't read the series, just this book - the series characters are pretty much background in this story
Now You See Her by James Patterson - mystery - & a really good one
Sisterhood Everlasting by Ann Brashares - beach read/friendship/romance.. but not just fluff. It was surprisingly good!
Moonwalking With Einstein by Joshua Foer - nonfiction, about the American Memory Competition. Fun read! It was nice to have this background before reading the fictional Before I Go To Sleep.
Smokin 17 by Janet Evanovich - I love the Stephanie Plum series!
10th Anniversary by James Patterson - a lot of Patterson's books are way too graphic for me, but I love this series. This one and his Michael Bennet series are on my all time favorites list.
Night Road by Kristen Hannah - I'm not a fan of Jodi Picoult, so it's kind of odd for me to compare this to a Jodi Picoult style book and say I loved it, but that's the best way I know to sum it up. There must be a name for this genre - but I don't know what it is?
Learning to Swim by Sara J Henry - this book is a mystery, but almost as a sideline to the drama? I'm really looking forward to more by this author.
These Things Hidden by Heather Gudenkauf - another chick lit/drama/mystery. This genre really needs it's own name. :-) While I did NOT like the other book I read by this author, I loved this one.
Winter Garden by Kristen Hannah I need to learn my book categories. I think of this as historical fiction, but if that conjurs up images of bodice rippers for you too.. then that's not what this is. LOL! It's fiction, but with some history woven in. Informative, and a good story. One of my absolute favorite kinds of reads.
The Flower Shop Mysteries by Kate Collins - cozy mysteries. Light, fun summer reads, no deep thought required, but not so ridiculous that you have to completely shut your brain off. It might be a stretch to say I "loved" these - but I liked them enough to keep reading the next in the series.
One Summer by David Balducci - not a mystery. I've never read Balducci before, my husband likes his books though.. this is apparently NOT his normal style, but it was really good! A drama of sorts. Engaging, a good story.
$3 lanterns from Family Dollar. I love them because I can fill hem with citranella oil and burn them on my deck to keep the bugs away.. but I really am not a fan of the bright colors our store had in stock.
I had some "hammered brown" spray paint leftover from painting my bike. Much better! :-)
Wow, was this ever a long book. The story covers about a decade of time? Enough that at the end if you think back to how the book began, it's rather unbelievable that it was all one story. I love books with some historical background. The chapters on the war can be overwhelming - there's so much sadness, but the book is so rich in detail and feeling.. it's worth reading. There's enough sex that I wouldn't put this on my 14 year olds reading list, but not so much that it ruined the book. There have been so many books written about the 2nd world war, but this one is based on the view of a jew, in Hungary, and is different than any other perspective I have read. Granted it's fiction, I wouldn't use this as a text book, but it's thought provoking enough to make me want to learn more, which is a sure sign of a great book in my mind.
"To be able to claim a find on this cache, you will need to first find at least one cache of every difficulty/terrain combination (81 unique combinations). As part of those finds, you'll need to have at least one of each of the cache types below (the different cache types DO count against the 81, so if you find a 3.5/3.5 multi-cache, it fulfills both requirements.)"
And if that was not complex enough -
All finds(except the Event and CITO Events)must be on caches that were"Published BEFORE March 26, 2008"
At first I was confused as to how to even start tracking this - It's Not About The Numbers, which is referenced in the cache description, no longer exists. Then I saw in the logs that others had taken screenshots of their stats from their geocaching.com profile. Go here: http://www.geocaching.com/my/statistics.aspx
Scroll down, and you will see:
Difficulty and Terrain of Caches I've Found
and under that will be a grid like this:
This doesn't tell me if all of the caches were hidden prior to March 26 2008. But this clearly shows what I am definitely missing, at least.
GOAL - Log a cache in each of the following towns listed in the Pennsylvania adaptation of Johnny Cash's song, I've Been Everywhere (In Pennsylvania) By Earl Pickens
To prove that you 'have been everywhere' find a cache within the following 93 places in Pennsylvania:
*Some of the smaller towns may not have caches. After doing your search choose the cache closest too the city.
Conshohocken,
Millview,
Rockview,
Waterloo,
Lackawanna,
Fairview,
Bellevue,
Sweet Root,
Susquehanna,
Lewisburg,
Stroudsburg,
Elysburg,
Orbisonia,
Harrisburg,
Pittsburgh,
Wellesrburg,
Robesonia,
Mountain Top,
Glen Rock,
Flat Rock,
Sunbury,
Saint Marys,
Shickshinny,
Big Shanty,
Bellefonte,
Southmont,
Westmont, Womelsdorf, Nordmont, Dormont, Lebanon, Hummel's Wharf, Cedar Springs, Boiling Springs,
Chest Springs, Center Bridge, Centerport, Leesport, Williamsport, Brackenridge, Lumber City, Central City, Lake City, Clearfield, Westfield, Winfield, Richfield, Beech Glen, Wilpen, Tunnelton, Conestoga, Bakerton, Curry Run,
Smoke Run, Sanatoga, Slickville, Smithville, Flicksville, Maxatawny, Youngwood, Edgewood, Hopwood, Punxsutawney, Whitehall, Blue Ball, Centre Hall, North Apollo, Delano, Renovo, Loretto, Stump Creek, Penn's Creek, Pine Creek, Chambersburg, Middle Creek, Blakeslee, Falls Creek, Shippensburg, Johnstown, Allentown, Shepherdstown, Lords Valley, Daisytown, Doylestown, Downingtown, Cherry Alley Cafe, Plain Grove, Mill Grove, Mechanics Grove, Swissvale, Ferndale, Carbondale,
Monongahela
Logging The Final -
The physical cache location is only about an hour east of us (East of Watsontown PA)
I started with an after picture. Because it makes me so happy! :-)
I didn't take a good before photo of the deck. It was last stained in a dark brown, more then half of which was peeling, and a good half the deck was green with mold and mildew - it's a fairly shaded area.
This is the "during" photo. This is after spraying it with a deck wash, and then hours of power washing. At this point I've just started spraying the railing
I didn't really choose the deck stain color. We went to Lowes for me to choose it, and in the "oops" pile was a huge can of deck stain. $30, for $150 worth of stain. Yes, that color will work just fine.. :-)
Next is the furniture I got free along the side of the road.
When I saw the price of replacement cushions, I knew why it was free. You can buy new furniture cheaper then you can buy new cushions! Thankfully, I can sew. :-)
A close up of one of the chairs, before -
First I stained all the wood - along with an adirondack love seat and a few tables that I'm using on the deck, using leftover stain from the last time we stained the deck. Then I went to my favorite outdoor fabric store - Surplus City, and bought outdoor fabric - $30 for 5 yards. 5 yards was almost exactly what I needed - I used the last scrap to make a pillow for on the swing/hammock.. so there is literally not a one inch scrap of this fabric left. Not bad for guessing how much I would need!
I'm so happy with the result. Here's the same chair, after -
I bought a flat of the flowers shown here, and added them to two old metal pans I had kept in the shed to use for something like this.
On the other side of the deck I added a new hammock/swing, and to the far right I am fixing my broken table (the glass shattered in one of our storms last year) and I got a pretty new umbrella.. I'll have more pics later.
Each morning I come out here with my coffee, open the canister of sunflower seeds I keep on a table, and sing to the peacock, peahen, and 5 peachicks.. who come running as soon as they hear me sing, knowing I'm going to toss them sunflower seeds. It's the favorite part of my day!
This is actually 11 challenges in one. There is a coin for each county that you find 6 caches in, then an additional coin if you complete all 10 counties.
Brand new - just started June 1st, in time for GWS11
" If you want to earn a commemorative NCT 2011 Medallion, you will need to find 50 of the 100 caches and get the hidden code word written on the inside of the lid of each cache. There is a coder sheet you can download on the cache pages. Find the cache, get the code word, write it down on your coder sheet, and once you get 50 caches, you can submit it to the ANF Chapter communications director for verification. If the codes match, you will receive your Medallion. There are only 100 Medallions being offered, so first come first served."
The Clearfield County Geotrailis now open. Log ontowww.geocaching.comto get the official cache cordinates, register now its Free! 2011 theme is cemeteries of Clearfield County. First you need to pick up an official Clearfield County GeoTrail Passport book, then you need to find 25 out of the 30 geocaches spread throughout the County. At each geocache location there is a unique stamp to use inside your passport. After collecting 25 stamps you can bring your passport book into our office or send it in for validation, then we give you a unique wooden coin for completing our geocaching trail.
