I was in Austin, TX. all last week and got home on late Friday afternoon. I am already packing to make the turn and head to New Jersey on Sunday. With all this travel it has really sidetracked me from my hiking. I have also been trying to wrap up a few projects that I have been working on.

Today I planted five trees, and I sure hope they take. They should as the holes were deep enough and I mixed the dirt with some good dirt that I had. We just need to make sure that we water them everyday for 10 days then every other day for ten days and then once a week. We planted three Crabapple with white flowers and two Japanese cherries with red flowers. If all goes well they should look pretty nice next year with they bloom.

I also managed to get my wall planter completed today. We had ordered a mirror to go on the back and Candy was able to get me the hanging brackets and stuff I needed. We ended up hanging it in our bedroom. I must say it looks pretty nice.

Your Awesome!

Managed to get my two restoration projects completed today.   I think they both came out pretty decent!   I had the seat and the planter frame sand blasted.  Today I just finish up some sanding and then applied the primer and paint.  For the wood window frame I did the finish sanding and then applied a golden oak stain and two coats of polyurethane.

For the planter we are going to have a mirror cut to go behind the window frame and then it should be ready to hang up on the wall.

Home for a few days

Oh man the last couple of weeks and the weeks to come, have me on the road.  Just returned for Seattle and already packing for next week’s adventure.   We are really busy with work and I have several home projects that I want to finish or get started.   So those are all great excuses as to why I haven’t been our walking/hiking.  That’s what I tell myself to feel better.

Last weekend I went to over to the auction house to do a quick walk through to see if there was anything interesting I thought I needed.   The other reason was to get me a beef and cheese burrito off the food truck that is parked their.    The burrito is just a burrito, nothing special but they have a green sauce that is just killer.   In addition the price is right!

There wasn’t much of crowd that day so a lot of the items, decent stuff if you needed it were going for $5 bucks.   Well this window frame with a metal wire planter on the front came across the block.   I was thinking it would look good on the shed in the backyard with some plants in it.  So I bid on it and got the planter and a box of other stuff for $15 bucks.   The other stuff included 4 vases, 4 humming bird plates and a little stained glass church.  It was mostly junk!

But the window frame with the metal planter definitely had some possibilities.  I loaded up my goods and started to head home.  On the way I stopped by an auto shop/salvage yard to see friend of mine,    while there I inquired about a tractor seat that was welded to a stand.  I thought it would look good a cleaned up and sitting in my yard.  So I got it for nothing and loaded it up.

With me leaving town I tore down what I needed to so that Candy could take the pieces over to a guy that does sandblasting.   They came back looking good and are now ready for primer and paint.

Today I was able to get the window frame sanded and glued together.  I should be able to finish the sanding in the morning and start on the stain.  Hopefully I can get these done before I leave as they are going to come out pretty nice.  I share more pictures tomorrow of where I am at.

Where did the time go?

I was on vacation this last week and you would think that I would have been hiking everyday. You know what? I didn’t hike at all.  I spent most of the week working around the house and on my shop that I am trying to finish.

Happy to say I did make good progress at the shop and was able to knock off several items that had been piling up around the house.   Made a couple of trips to Goodwill and hauled off trash/limbs to the dump.  In the shop I have the two end walls just about framed in but I need a taller ladder to finish.

Well this week I have to make a road trip up to the Seattle area.  Will be meeting with clients and doing sales calls.   Tomorrow I will get back on track with logging my miles and tracking my diet.

Made it home

Had a great 4^th of July!  Started the morning with a fly-inn at one of my dad’s friends who lives on an airstrip in Colwich, KS.  We didn't fly inn we drove over.   They were serving up pancakes, ham, coffee and juice.  Guessing around 35 to 40 people were in attendance.   This was all being served up in a hanger.

On the field there were 10 to 12 planes.  Mostly antique planes’ including a couple of Stearman’s a J3 Cub and several others, even a replica of the Red Barons Triplane.  I walked around and checked out the planes while dad swapped stories with his flying buddies.

We then headed back to dads house and started setting up for their party.  They were expecting a big crowd.   We were setting up in the hanger.  Cleaned all the tables and chairs and set up all the food and supplies.   Around 2pm everyone started showing up.  Most of the attendee’s were family.  Mostly in attendance were aunts, uncles and their families as well as some of my dad’s buddies.

Oh man was it hot and humid!  Everyone was looking for shade or a spot in front of the big fan in the hanger and when that didn’t work you just needed to hop in the pool and cool off.

Dad picked himself up a new to him crane.  Long story on how he got it but basically just had to get it home and it was his.  Here is a picture of him showing off his new find to some of his buddies who were at the party.

Dad fired up the grill and cooked up a mess of burgers and dogs and whatever people brought with them.   Ended up eating way too much and tried to work it off on the horseshoe pit where we got our butts kicked.

All afternoon everyone was shooting off fireworks out on the runway.   Once the sun started setting we started setting up for the night show.  We setup three tubes where we started shooting off 4 inch shells.   In addition we had some large cakes and a roll of 20,000 fire crackers.   Glad to say that no one got hurt!

 Sorry to say that I didn’t do a very good job of taking pictures this trip.  Shame on me, I was busy seeing friends and family that I hadn’t seen in awhile.

I could say more but it has been a long day of driving and I am done for the day.

Let’s go Fishing

We woke up early and headed over to my parents house to pick up my dad.  I think we got to there house around 7:15AM.  All five of us loaded up in the truck and away we went.   My dad has a buddy who has a nice little farm pond loaded with large mouth Bass.   We usually run over there when we are town to wet a line.

 This morning we had pretty good luck.  Everyone caught fish!

Clark caught the first one and away we went.  Eric caught a couple and so did Candy.  I caught two nice size fish but my dad caught one that I am guessing weighed at least 5/pounds.

The pond was way down as parts of Kansas are in a drought.   We did get some rain this afternoon that helped cool things off but not enough to help with the drought.

After fishing we headed over to Stearman Field to have breakfast. (http://www.bentonairpark.com/index.pl?id=0)  They sure have a nice setup there.  A nice restaurant on the airfield.   While we were there we had one bi-plane and a helicopter buzzing around and giving rides.   We didn’t get a ride today but it did look like fun.

Thank you Kansas

We headed home to Kansas to celebrate the 4th of July with family.   It's an 8/hour drive across I-70 and then you drop south on I-35 to Wichita.  One of the state slogans is   "Land of Ahhs" Once again a reference to 'The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'. "Ahhs" is pronounced "Oz" .   

For me when you cross the border into Kansas from Colorado it used to be Ahh F*(K! or Ahh Sh&t because the speed limit would drop from 75 MPH in Colorado to 70 MPH in Kansas.  When you still have 350+ miles to go and traveling across western KS that is flat and hot, you want to move as fast as you can to get where you want to be.

Well low and behold guess what?  The state of Kansas finally got with the program and increased the speed limit to 75 MPH.  Boy this sure made the trip a little quicker and was pleasant surprise to see the new sign.   For a minute I still thought we were in Colorado.  Well thank you Kansas you definitely made my day!

Here is a link on a news story talking about the increase.

http://www.kctv5.com/story/15004154/kansas-speed-limit-increase

Thank you Kansas!