Event Planting Part 2

I have been planning for months to go out to the park on Saturday and plant more of my event boxes but they are calling for rain.  So I decided I would go out today with Lil Ewok.  There was an issue with my kids school, Turtle Boxer & Daddy's Favorite Princess were off today, and I had extra "help".

There is a big road construction project less than a block from the school.  They turned off the water and when they turned it back on again something at the school broke.  They tried to fix it during the night but were not able to get the job done.  They had to have the water off to work on it.  That meant no sink, toilets, or school.

We headed out to the park to plant another 28 boxes.  The kids about drove me crazy.  (Short trip, I know.)  They wanted to just put the box in the hiding spot and run off to find another spot.  I had to explain to them that I had to make notes, write down landmarks, tree names, get left/right correct, etc.  After a while they did settle down.

It sprinkled on us for just a few minutes but being in the woods we didn't really get wet.  We mainly heard it hitting the leaves of the trees.  I only took one picture on the trip.  Lil Ewok played games on my phone the whole way over and ran my battery down.  My phone died and I don't know how many steps I walked!!

I just have 38 more boxes to plant.  I will watch the weather on Saturday and if the rain holds up I will have to go out on Tuesday.  The event is just over a week away :D

Event Planting Part I

Planting selfie 

I went out on Saturday and started planting boxes for my event.  The weather was perfect.

I started off looking for an old box in the park because I wanted to plant on the same trail.  As soon as I got to the hiding spot and big group of people came up.  They were geocaching and asked if I was too.  I told them that I was letterboxing and we discussed the differences.  I showed the kids our new signature stamps and signed in the cache with them.

Snake skin between branches

Once they were gone I started looking for the box again.  The finder notes said that the log had decomposed but the box was there under some bark and leaves.  I  looked all over but couldn't find it and I planted my letterboxes on the path.  I will probably look for the old box again before my event.  It was last found in February of this year.

Then I planted my Life is Good in Indiana series that has 20 boxes.   (Don't let me forget that I have to return one of them when the event is over.)  I have never planted a series this big before and it is tough.  You don't want the boxes to close together and you don't want them to far apart.  I was worried about but I think it worked out pretty well.  Part of this trail is around a small lake and there was a nice breeze.

After that I planted my 6 pennies.  They are on a loop trail around a church/ cemetery/historical area in the park.  I am still temped to carve those last two pennies.  The park has an amphitheater and there was a live show that evening.  They were practicing that afternoon and as I was planting the pennies, I could hear the music floating through the forest.  It was beautiful :)

I am waiting on 3 more stamps.  I had some stamps sent to me that I wasn't expecting and had to order more Lock n Locks.  They should arrive today and I will be back out planting soon.

Rainbow!!! LTC

Rainbow!!!: Rainbow Milkshake

Daddy's Favorite Princess loves to carve stamps and make LTCs.  She is participating in the "Rainbow!!!" swap, hosted by GreaseLightning.

Not sure why but she picked a rainbow milkshake.  She picked the image and carved the stamp herself.

She really enjoyed making the background.  I have used this technique a few times myself and it is fun to play around with.  You take a cookie sheet and cover it with shaving cream.  Put a few drops of food coloring on and swirl it around.  Lay a piece of card stock on top and push down all over the paper.  Any place where the paper doesn't touch the shaving cream will be white.  Then you scrape the shaving cream off with an old gift card.

I cut the cards to size and helped her stamp them.  I stamped and she glued them to the red background.  Some of the cards turned out better that others but she is pretty proud of them :)

New Trail Names & Sig Stamps

A few months ago Daddy's Favorite Princess asked me to carve her a new trail stamp.  Her original stamp was a Hello Kitty face.  It was about the size of a quarter and she lost it.  Then I carved a Jewel Sparkles Lalaloopsy and she has been using it for a while.  But the stamp warped and it is hard for her to get a good image with it.

While we were at the Homerdoodle event she said that her trail name was too long, after a while she was just stamping table top box boxes, and not writing her name.  So we discussed the new stamp and she wanted a Shopkins image.  I added her trail name to make it easier for her when stamping a lot boxes.

While we were out hiking the trails at Homerdoodle, R2-D2 said that he would like to change his trail name.  He said if he could change it he would be more willing to go letterboxing.  Now, I don't believe that for a second but agreed to change his name and carve him a new stamp.

He said that he wanted to be Boxing Turtle.  He loves turtles right now.  But we really went back and forth on the stamp image.  He drew something up with his finger on his iPad and said do this.  I got on my laptop and designed a stamp using clipart.  He didn't like it and said "just wing it."  I said, "Have we met?  I don't wing it!"  We have been boxing for 5 years, I have 150+ traditional plants, and I never hand draw them.  We finally found something we both could agree on and I added his name to it too.

Lego Clone Trooper didn't ask for a new stamp or trail name but he got one.  When he graduated from 8th grade a few months ago, he got a phone and started using social media.  His Facebook name is Bantha Rider and is a big Star Wars fan.  So I changed his trail name to Bantha Rider and carved him a new stamp.  I really like his and he does too.

Lil Ewok is only 4 and he is staying the same.  If I gave him the chance to change it now he would probably pick a ninja turtle.  We will stick with his current name & stamp for now.


PENNY UPDATE:  I have decided not to carve more pennies.  I am in the process of painting a labeling the boxes for the event.  I don't have anymore round Lock n Locks; if I carve more pennies, I have to order more boxes.  As of right now, I have just enough boxes for the stamps that are supposed to come.  I had one person drop and I have a feeling that 1-2 more people will be removed.  That adds a few more stamps to my list but the boxes will be ready when I finish the carves.  

Event Stamps & OCD

Event boxes ready for paint

My event is one month away!  I am excited and terrified at the same time.  Back in March I set up two trackers to collect stamps.  I am shocked at the response and the number of stamps coming in!  Big "THANKS!" to everyone who have sent stamps.  If everything comes in I should have 92 stamps :)

If things go as planned, there will be 4 tails of stamps.  All About Indiana will have 28, Famous Hoosiers will have 39, Life is Good in Indiana will have 18, I have 6 Pennies, and the event stamp.

Pennies

My event is at Lincoln State Park across the highway from the Lincoln Boyhood National Memorial.  There are currently 4 letterboxes in the park.  Only one of those has a Lincoln theme and it is a store bought stamp in a geocache/letterbox hybrid.  I wanted to do have a series of Lincoln stamps.  I was looking at images and found these pennies.  I thought I could do the top 2 (Kentucky & Indiana) but the bottom 2 (Illinois & DC) were to hard for me.  I posted on the Stamp Exchange and aMAZEing adventure frog volunteered to help!!  Her carves are awesome.

I got to thinking, if I am going to have the back of 4 pennies I should have a front.  So I carved that too.  Then I carved what I thought was the back of the penny- the Lincoln Memorial.  But as I was looking online I discovered, the Lincoln Memorial is not the back of present day pennies.  They have a shield!   Now my OCD kicks in.  I need to carve the back of current pennies.  And if I am going to do that why not carve the Wheat penny too!?  I don't want to carve any more pennies but I think I have to.  I'll probably loose sleep over it if I don't :'(

Anyone out there what to take pity on a crazy woman and carve a penny?  I need it by 9/16 because I am going to plant on 9/17.

Back to School

I started this blog 4 years ago when my kids went back to school from summer vacation.  Now all the kids are in school in some way.  

Lego Clone Trooper is 14 and a freshman in high school.  This was his first year riding a school bus and using a combination lock.  He gets a little confused about where his classes are but I know he will get his schedule down soon.

R2-D2 (who will be changing his trail name soon) is 11 and in 6th grade.  He goes to a private school and has moved up to the middle school hall way.

Daddy's Favorite Princess will be 8 at the end of the month and she is in 2nd grade.  She was very excited to go back to school and see all of her girl friends.

Lil Ewok is 4 1/2 and he started prek today.   He will only be gone a few hours 3 days a week but we are both excited about it.

I've got a confession to make, I'm a little burned out on letterboxing :(  I think every year I'm a little disappointed about how few finders my boxes get.  I'm hosting my event next month and I am signed up for a few LTC swaps but once those are all done, I'm going to take a little break.  My noxer husband asked if I could walk away from it for a year.  I think that is unrealistic!  But some sort of time off will be coming.

Homerdoodle Event

Stamping on the trail

On Saturday, the kids and I went to the Homerdoodle Event in Homer, Ill.  We left at 6 am and arrived just after 9:30.  We only made one stop on the way up to go potty and grab breakfast.  I had my phone take us the "fastest route".  I think she was having problems because the roads kept getting smaller and at one point she told us to go east and then turn into a corn field.  I deiced that we would not be coming that way home.

We checked in, exchanged with the hostesses, and got our clue packet.  I think I grabbed two table top boxes and then we hit the trail.  We found a series of 19 stamps called, "Frogs are lucky! They eat what bugs them!"  All of the stamps (except for the last one) were bugs.  They were great carves and we found the stamp that I sent to the event too.

Kid Table

When we finished that trail it was time for the group photo and lunch.  After lunch Daddy's Favorite Princess wanted to stay in the a/c and stamp event/table top boxes.  We asked the hostesses if she could stay and they said yes.  They had a kid table set up with papers, markers, stamps, etc.  They also had bubbles, side walk chalk, and popsicles.

Trail Selfie 

After lunch the boys and I hit the trails again.  We did a nature series and found 22 boxes.  This was a nice shady trail and I found my 800th box during that series.  But the boys were getting grouchy and fighting over who would get the box, who would stamp first, who would put it back, etc.

Event/table top boxes

When we finished those I promised them we would stay at the shelter for a bit.  We got back and we only had 40 minutes to exchange, stamp table tops, event boxes, etc.  We stamped as many as we could and ended up staying a little late.  You know they want you to leave when they start taking your chairs away.  So we threw in the towel.

One of the hostesses had talked about a fancy playground area and I let the kids play there a while.  Lil Ewok ended up slipping on the rocks and getting a little wet.  After a while I talked the kids into getting 5 more boxes.  The stamps were wildlife in the park.

Playscape 

I would have liked to have gotten more boxes but the kids were hungry and tired so we left.  We went up the interstate and found a restaurant.  While we were there I studied the map and picked a different way home.  We got back just after 10:30 that night.  Homer is about 3.5 hours from home and my husband said that he didn't realize how far we were going.

We found 55 traditional boxes, 3 hitchhikers, 1 cootie, 64 event boxes, and a few exchanges.  I was hoping to get more traditional boxes and exchange with more people but I guess there is only so much you can do in a day.