The Little Library

I really want a little library in front of my house.  I think it's a perfect location.  I live at a point in the road that forms a T. There is a crosswalk on the edge of the property and we are the second to last house from a park so lots of people walk by.  It just makes sense. 

I've been trying to explain the little library to my husband. I've given him articles to read about them. I want him to get excited about it. After all, he loves to build things so this makes perfect sense.  As we were heading out for dinner, we came across one.  Now he is excited.  I can't wait to get started.

Supermoon

Supermoon 2013

The full moon falls on June 23, 2013 at 6:32 a.m. CDT in the U.S.  Thus, for us here in the Midwest, the moon appears about as full in the June 22 evening sky as it does on the evening of June 23. This full moon is not only the closest and largest full moon of the year. It also presents the moon’s closest encounter with Earth for all of 2013. The moon will not be so close again until August, 2014. In other words, it’s not just a supermoon. It’s the closest supermoon of 2013.

Astronomers call this sort of close full moon a perigee full moon. The word perigee describes the moon’s closest point to Earth for a given month. Two years ago, when the closest and largest full moon fell on March 19, 2011, many used the term supermoon, which we’d never heard before. Last year, we heard this term again to describe the year’s closest full moon on May 6, 2012. Now the term supermoon is being used a lot. Last month’s full moon was also a supermoon. But the June full moon is even more super! In other words, the time of full moon falls even closer to the time of perigee, the moon’s closest point to Earth. The crest of the moon’s full phase in June 2013, and perigee, fall within an hour of each other. (copied from earthsky.org)

Ride to King Veterans Home

Today we went with the Legion Riders on a ride to King, Wisconsin.  I had no idea where King was so I googled it and found it to be west of Appleton, around 130 miles from our house.  We met the ALRA group at the Harley plant parking lot at 8:30 and left there at 8:45.  It was almost a 2 hour ride to King so we did stop halfway to get gas.  It was a nice break from the ride and the weather was perfect.

We got there and parked the bikes.  We were on our own until 1:00 when the parade started.  So we purchased their famous chicken dinners and enjoyed some of the best chicken ever.  The side dishes weren't great so I skipped them.  We sat with our group and ate while people watching.  Since it was Fathers' Day we noticed lots of family members with the residents.  There were people in wheelchairs everywhere. 

The campus is beautiful.  It is located on Rainbow Lake and is like a mini-village.  There were plenty of small housing units all located on the lake.  The Wisconsin Veterans Museum is also located on the lake, right on the grounds so we walked through it. There were two large buildings that housed the residents and a very pretty little park with a fountain and a bandstand in the middle of the grounds.  This is a gorgeous place. We watched a man carve eagles with a chain saw.  That was pretty amazing.
We really enjoyed visiting the residents and the ALRA members from the other chapters.  There were Legion Riders from all over the state here.  This was my first visit, and others who have been there in years' past, who stated that this was the largest turnout of motorcycles ever.

The parade lasted a whole 20 minutes.  We rode through the compound, which was probably equivalent to 4 or 5 blocks.  There were motorcycles, a few antique cars, a convertible with dignitaries, a Gold Star mom vehicle, and a firetruck.  There was also a high school band who were very good.

We took the back roads home and didn't pull into the driveway until 5:45.  It was a long day but a rewarding one. I am so glad I went along. 

New Brick Shed Approach

When Jeff originally built the approach to the shed, he used leftovers from the deck.  It was the cutest mini-deck and it matched the deck so nicely.  However, because it was built on a sloping yard, it was prone to be wet and water-logged after heavy rains and winter snow thaws.  So it rotted over the years.  We tore it out and replaced it with bricks. 

Jeff was really hoping I would pick some nice big bricks so that there weren't many to install. I didn't do that.  Instead, we had to put four bricks in three different sizes together to make a pattern. It wasn't terribly complicated, but it was putzy.  And as always, he had to install them perfectly which made the project take even longer.  He started the work on Sunday late in the morning and by supper time he had almost all of it done. On Monday, he finished the last two sets of four, then filled the cracks in with sand and watered it down, as required.

I was instantly inspired to finish my chair planter I found on Pinterest. I painted the chair red, dug an old hanging basket out of the shed, and attached it to where the seat used to be. With the addition of a coconut liner and some potting soil and a few annuals, it is done and looks perfectly perched on the new brick shed approach.

 

Wine Bottle Path Border

I got this idea off of Pinterest.  I saved up our wine bottles since winter and placed them in the garden as a path.  It seemed like a lot of bottles when they filled up a large garbage can, but once I got them in the ground they really didn't go as far as I would like.  I guess we will have to keep on drinking. I think it will look much prettier when the beans start to climb up the poles.