I WON WHAT?????

A little background... I was the Employee Campaign Manager (ECM) at my work this year for the United Way Campaign. You know, when you pledge a dollar or two a week from your paycheck to be donated to the United Way. Well, this year our pledges increased by 700% so I got to enter my name into a drawing for ECM's twice (once for being an ECM and once for the increase in pledges.)

Wouldn't you know it, they drew my name for a prize. I got a call Monday that I won a prize and I was invited to the campaign finale event. (I have to tell you, I thought going to the event was supposed to be my prize, I almost didn't go because I work until 7pm and the event started at 6pm.)

So I went to the dinner, straight from work. Nice dinner in one of the hotels in Greater Portland. They did the presentations for the business and individuals that raised a lot of money. THEN... they start presenting the prizes. I won a trip to Bermuda!!!!!

I got home with all the brochures and goodies in the travel bag they gave me, and told Scott all about it. We plan on going in March, during the week before my birthday (also known as "Princess Week.") The prize was for 3 days, 2 nights, but Scott and I are planning on purchasing another night so we can stay longer.

I've already done a search for letter boxes!!! There are 32 on the island!!! Now we just have to get through the holiday season!!! Woohoo!!!

Catching up!

It's been a while, over 2 months in fact! Let's see if I can catch us all up!

Labor Day weekend we boxed every single day! I took half the day off on that Friday and went boxing on my own. I pretty much stayed in Portland/Westbrook. Found a couple of boxes near downtown Portland and then went for a series in Westbrook. The next day, Scott and I finished up a series we had started a week or so prior and then found a few more boxes, all in Portland. Sunday, we headed to Cape Elizabeth to find some of the boxes that were planted for Come Fly a Kite in 2007. We had a great time, but it was very busy because of the holiday weekend. Monday, we found a few more boxes, including our 200th, between Buxton and Biddeford. Plus, Scott planted his very first series. He carved all the stamps (motor sports themed of course) and chose the place to plant it. No finders for that one yet, but hopefully there will be many next year.

A few more weekends of boxing before we started winding down Scott's drag racing season. Scott raced pretty much every weekend for 3 weeks straight. No boxing for us since the races were held both days of the weekend.

I took a week off from work (my first week0long vacation since I started my job 2 years ago.) The plan was to relax and/or box all week. I boxed all but 2 days. Mostly in and around the Portland area, but Wednesday I made a special trip to Lincoln, NH to meet up with Ellen (skier4444) and Silva Foot Family (who's real names escape me at the moment.) We did a couple of boxes right in Lincoln, then started following the Kancamagus Hwy (which is actually how I get home from Lincoln.) I had a great time with everyone there! We found quite a few boxes before we called it a day. I found a few more boxes on my way home in NH and once I got back into Maine. That Saturday, we picked up our nephew, and headed to Saco for the Mini-Golf mini meet hosted by Happy Daze and more boxing! Scott and Zach played mini-golf while I stamped into the boxes. Scott ended up getting the best score of the day and is looking forward to holding on to that title next year.

Fast forward to the weekend before Halloween. Friday night we went to the Frightnight Pre-gather event, a 50's-themed cocktail party. I had way too much to drink (ok, like a bottle and a half of wine and several jello shots.) But I had a great time, and didn't even suffer a hangover. Scott stamped in to all the adult-themed personal travelers. (The following week he carved his own adult PT.)

The next day was frightnight, whcih I had been looking forward to for weeks. Scott and I planned to dress up as Danny and Sandy from Grease. We also took Zach with us, and he decided to be a greaser, just like Uncle Scott. We ended up winning for Coolest Costume, I think because my two handsome men dressed up like cool dudes, I just tagged along. We stamped into so many event stamps, exchanged with a ton of people, and just had a great time. It was especially nice to see Scott socializing more with our new friends. (For those who don't know, Scott can be very shy around people he doesn't know, but once he is comfy around people his real personality comes out.)

After the event ended and the clean-up was done, we grabbed a quick bite and headed to the night boxing portion of the event. The three of us paired up with Happy Daze, who were actually the first letterboxers I ever met at an event and really showed me the ropes (thanks guys.) The 5 of us headed out with flashlights, headlamps, umbrellas, paper and ink! We had quite a system for stamping in and actually ended up catching up with the group ahead of us. At one point we found a great hiding place and scared a certain teenage boy, who has the same name as a north midwest state. Hey, the event was called frightnight, was it not? We got all the boxes and called it a night. What a great day!!! Kudos to Mainekokopellian and all the organizers and helpers.

The next day, while taking the "boy" home, we grabbed one more box. We tried to get this box earlier inthe spring, but it is one that is taken in for the winter and it hadn't replaced yet. Happy to get the elusive box, we took Zach home and spent the rest of the day running errands and relaxing.

We've done a couple of boxes since then, but it is getting cold and hunting season has begun again! Darn hunters, breaking into our letterboxing days.

We do have an exciting letterboxing adventure coming up, I can't wait to tell the plans. But you will have to wait until next time!! Until then...

Anniversary Weekend!!!

Scott and I decided to take 4-day weekend (Aug. 14-17) for our anniversary this year. We booked a wonderful B&B in Cutler (www.cutlerinn.com) and made our preparations for the 5-hour drive. I had printed clues for all the boxes I could find along Route 1 from the Schoodic Penninsula to Eastport to Campobello Island.

We left Thursday morning and started out journey! We stopped at my parents after driving 2 hours for a bathroom break and lunch, then headed Northeast from there. We decided to make a short detour to Schoodic Point for our first box of the weekend. Scott hadn't felt well all day, so he stayed in the car while I walked the short hike to the box and stamped in.

We decided that would be the only box of the day, since Scott wasn't feeling up to it. We drove straight to the B&B and relaxed the rest of the night. We had each brought books to read, since the rooms didn't have tv's. It was so nice to go without tv all weekend, just read and explore.

Friday morning we got up and had a wonderful homemade breakfast cooked by our wonderful hosts. We decided to head to Lubec and Campobello Island for the day. We headed to Lubec and decided to go to Campobello Island for the first half of the day. We stopped at the Tourist Information Center first for a map. Then headed to Mulholland Light for our first box of the day, and our first ever international letterbox.

Then we decided to go to Roosevelt Campobello International Park for our next box. We knew we were going to be hiking a bit for this box, so we decided to just carry what we needed to and keep it light. We took the camera and out letterboxing clipboard, and headed out. Less than a quarter mile into the hike I stepped down off a wood walkway and into a hole. I twisted my foot and went straight down into the bushes, spilling the entire contents of the clipboard (it's one of those contractor clipboards that we can store our stamps, ink, paper, pens and our compass.) There was no way I was going to stop, so Scott helped me up and we kept going. As long as we didn't stop and sit for a long amount of time, I was fine. Otherwise, my foot tightened up and it took a few minutes to get going again. It took us almost 2 hours to get to our destination because we kept stopping to take in the view of Grand Manan Island and Lubec. We took lots of photos! The photo I posted with this blog is of Scott at the trail sign when we took a new path. We finally arrived at our destination "Ragged Point" and started our search for the letterbox. We looked for almost an hour, and I was ready to give up and go back, until Scott said "let me just do this my way." Less than a minute later he moved a rock and pulled out the box! MY hero!!!! I would've been soo upset if we hiked all the way in there, I twisted my foot, and didn't come up with the find, and it was definitely worth it. This was the oldest box we have ever found, planted back in 2001. It took us about 45 minutes to hike back to the car. So 4 hours later, it was really a great experience.

Our next stop was a quick lunch at the only takeout on the island, then off to East Quoddy Head Light and another box. East Quoddy Head light is not to be confused with West Quoddy light which is located in Lubec. East Quoddy is on on the eastern end of Campobello. We found our box and headed back towards the Roosevelt cottage and one more box before calling it a day. The fog had started to roll in and we made our way to the highest point within Roosevelt Campbello International Park for one more box. We ate dinner in Lubec and headed back to the B&B to relax and read, before falling asleep.

Saturday morning we, once again, had a wonderful breakfast. Then we headed out to Eastport to search for a couple of boxes and also plant one of our own. We decided to do a series for our Anniversary. We will be planting a new box every year on our anniversary weekend, wherever we are staying. Since we weren't yet letterboxing last year on our anniversary, so we decided to head back to Eastport, where we spent our first anniversary, to plant the 1st year box. We headed to Shackford Head State Park to find a 3 box series already planted and figured we'd plant this box somewhere in the park. We headed up to the Overlook for the first box and found the perfect spot for our's while we were up there. After finding the first box, we headed off to the second. The trail was pretty treacherous and since I had hurt my foot the day before, Scott decided that he would go down the trail by himself and look for the second box. He walked it twice and didn't find it. So we headed off to the last box and found that we were not alone. We headed down a path to Cony Beach and noticed that there were tons of red ants on the trail. When we got to the beach our feet and lower legs were covered with them, and we both were bitten. We knocked them off, thinking that we shouldn't have a problem since we were on the beach, but we were VERY wrong. They were crawling all over the beach, so we found the box, stamped in very quickly and ran back up the path to the parking lot (which BTW, was also crawling with red ants.) My pants were soaked from walking through the tall grass, so I ended up changing into my shorts right there in the parking lot and jumping in the car to keep the ants away.

We headed back to Lubec and went to West Quoddy Head state park for our final box of the day. We headed along the coastal trail and found the box and stamped in where the planter told, which had to be the best spot in the entire state park. It was like we were sitting on a royal throne and had the view to die for. After a long day boxing, and hiking and running from ants, we headed to Cohill's Inn for a wonderful dinner and drink. After dinner we walked along the town's public landing and took in our last view of Campobello, Eastport and Lubec and headed back to Cutler. Since we had dinner a little early, we figurd we would have plenty of time to hike to Western Head to plant our 2nd anniversary box. We got 3/4 of the way there and ended up turning around because it was getting too dark. We couldn't find a place to plant the box, since we were having a hard time seeing in the woods, so we decided to plant it the next morning before we left for home. Back to the room for our final relaxing night.

Sunday morning we were up early for breakfast, and then headed to the Bold Coast Trails in Cutler to plant our 2nd anniversary box. We planted it near the trailhead (it could actually be classified as a drive-by, since you can see the parking lot from the box.) Back on route 1, we stopped for 2 more boxes. We made our way back to my parents, once again for a bathroom break and to check out the town's art show (which I was showing a couple of photographs in) and then home to our own bed.

We had a great weekend, one I will always remember. I can't wait to see where we go next year!!

10 Hours Straight

Photo of Scott and I at Land's End on Bailey Island, Maine, taken by Alice of the Wildcats.

The "Letterboxing in Historic Mid-Coast Maine" event took place the weekend of August 1-3. We planned to attend for just Saturday the 2nd, since Sunday's are usually our grocery shopping and NASCAR day (Scott loves to watch the races.)

We headed out for Brunswick at 7am Saturday morning. After stopping for coffee and fuel, we reached Thomas Point Beach at 8am, just as we had planned. Our wonderful hostesses, mudflinginfools and Teacup, were serving breakfast when we got there. We spent about 3 hours stamping in to all the event stamps and exchanging with folks we hadn't met yet. We had planned on boxing in and around Brunswick for the rest of the day, since so many boxes had been planted for the event and there were plenty of boxes planted prior to the event. So we headed to lunch at the Sea Dog in Topsham, where we also picked up our first box of the day.

We decided to head to Bailey Island and work our way back from there. We started at Land's End and found 7 boxes before we reached Brunswick again. It was earlier than we thought it would be so we headed back to Thomas Point Beach and did a series that had been planted for the event, and a couple more event stamps that we had missed. We left Brunswick at about 6pm, stopped to take out dinner and got home at about 7pm. Twelve hours from start to finish, and 10 hours on straight boxing... a record for us.

Thanks so much to our hostesses for such a wonderful and memorable event!!!

All About Kites

This past Saturday was the 2nd Annual Come Fly a Kite event at Fort Williams Park in Cape Elizabeth, Maine. Scott and I arrived late, because Scott had to work until noon. Thank goodness we brought our canopy, it was hot!!! We met a lot of new people, folks whose trailnames are familiar from all the posts on AQ, but now we can put a face to the name. The photo was taken by Happy Daze. Scott is sitting in the chair back to, and I am in the ground looking up at him. We didn't search for any of the boxes that had been planted for the day, but planned on coming back the next day to do some boxing. Thanks to Happy Daze for such a great event.

Sunday, Scott and I headed out at 11am to look some of the boxes planted for the Kites event. We headed to South Portland to look for the Bug's Life series. The series was actually planted on the same trail that we walked on our wedding day. Just as we found the last box, it started raining. It didn't really surprise us, since it seems to rain everyday here. We found several more boxes in the rain. Then called it a day.

I have a new series in the works. We'll be planting 2 boxes for it next month and after that we plant one box every year, in August. Keep an eye out for the clues. Soon you'll understand why we only plant one box per year in this series.

I'm also working on our CBB box. I know where I want to plant it, just need to figure out what I want to carve for it. We want it to be challenging and fun!

Happy Boxing,

Jiffy

Dirt Bike

So what exactly does "dirt bike" have to do with letterboxing? Well, that's the trailname our 10-year-old nephew chose to be called. He originally said dirt bike racer, but decided that that was to similar to Uncle Scott's moniker "atvracer." So he shortened it to Dirt Bike.

This past weekend, we took our nephew, Zach, with us to my parents for the weekend. Scott had a drag race scheduled for Saturday and Zach is a great pit crew for the day!

Since we were going up Thursday night, so Scott could work on his bike Friday before the race. Zach and I spent the day in Ellsworth letterboxing! He had a great time and did a great job re-hiding the boxes. He checked the boxes from any abngle it might be seen to make sure it was totally hidden from view. He counted the stamps in his logbook and he found a dozen boxes. (three of them were boxes that Scott and I had already found, but we thought he would have fun finding them for himself.)

We had a great weekend. Scott had a great day at the race track. We were definitely happily exhausted when we got home Sunday.

Happy Boxing!

July 4th Weekend

Scott and I had planned to make our 4th of July weekend a 4-day weekend this year, so we took Thursday the 3rd off as well.

We headed to my parent's house, about 2 hours northeast of us, on Wednesday night after I got out of work. That way we could spend the whole four days doing what we want and only had to drive home after.

Thursday, Scott decided to put the bottom half of his engine back in his ATV (he was still waiting for the top half to come back from the builder.) So I decided to spend the day with one of my good friends, who I hadn't seen for quite a while. We headed to Fort Knox to check on the series that we had planted there. I ended up replacing one of the boxes and discontinuing two that were missing. It was my friend, Lesley's, first experience with letterboxing. Then we headed out for some lunch and shopping (of course, we are girls after all!!!)

Friday was the 4th!!! My favorite holiday! We spent the morning downtown at the annual field day, which has been going on since before I was even born. We watched the parade, then headed out for the afternoon to plant the 15 box series I had carved. Scott wasn't feeling all that well (probably the fried dough at the field day) so he stayed in the car and I did all the planting. We planted 15 boxes in 5 cemetaries in less than 3 hours. WOW!! Must be a record!! We headed to my grandmother's house for lobster, salmon and steak. Then to the town's park for fireworks.

Saturday was letterboxing day (who's kidding, everyday is letterboxing day!) We headed to Ellsworth, my dad's hometown and a place where I know my way around pretty well. We found quite a few boxes, but had problems with two. On the way home we stopped in the cemetary where my grandfather is buried and planted a series of two boxes. After a long couple of days, we were in bed early. Plus, we had to get up early Sunday to pack up and head home.

Sunday morning, we left between 9-10am to make the 2-hour trip south for home. But we made one last stop in town to plant a final letterbox for the weekend. We planted 18 boxes in 3 days! My feet still hurt (I should have worn sneakers instead of flip-flops when we planted the big series!!!)

Happy boxing!! Oh yeah! The picture is of my cousin, in the lobster cap, and her friend at the July 4th rowboat races last year!!

100th Find!

We did it!!! We found our 100th box! I am so excited!

Yesterday, we decided to go out and finish the series we had started (twice), since it was cool and we could wear long sleeves to keep the mosquitos away. We found eleven out of the thirteen boxes. We figure we will go back and find the other 2 boxes sometime in August when we look for two other series in the same park. But for now, we are kind of sick of going to that park and want to head in some different directions. Luckily, the park is in the next town over, so if we do want to go back sooner, it's not that far to drive. So after the series we had 99 finds. We had to find one more to make 100, and we weren't going to stop for the day until we found it. We went back to a box that we had tried once before and actually found it this time. Our 100th find was a Buxton Boxers plant, the first of theirs that we had found.

So today, we planned on looking for 4 boxes in neighboring town west of us. There were two new plants there and 2 boxes we had looked for before. We ended up going for 6 boxes and found 3 of them, plus a really great hitchhiker. There is this one box that just keeps eluding us! Not so much eluding, but it was taken in for the winter and was supposed to be re-planted this past week. But we didn't see it, or at least Scott didn't. I stayed in the car, since we were having a downpour. He actually searched for that box and another during a pretty strong thunderstorm this morning. The storm only lasted for about 30 minutes, but Scott was determined to get the boxes, since we didn't know how long the rain would last.

We had a great weekend in all. Next weekend we are planting my 15-box series in my hometown, plus re-planting one, maybe two, boxes in the Tour the Fort series. We are taking Thursday off from work and will make a 4-day weekend of it. I'll be planting on Thursday, spend the fourth with the family, and we'll be boxing on Saturday and maybe some on the way home Sunday. Ok, I am way addicted. I hope there aren't any 12-step programs for this addiction though. That would mean that I need help with it, and I'm having way too much fun!

"Naughty Scotty"

I just had to laugh when I heard this. Scott and I have been together for about 5 years now and today was the first time he ever told me about the name that he gave himself!

My husband, Scott, works as a diesel mechanic at the Mack/Volvo Truck dealership in Portland (Maine.) He was telling me about a truck that he was working on today and how it started to look familiar to him. He said he could see some of the markings he had made on the truck a few years before. But, the final clue that he had worked on the same truck was when he removed the clutch and saw his moniker written on the housing. I didn't know this, but every truck that he works on he signs "Naughty Scotty" and the date he worked on it. This particular truck was dated May 19, 2006. I busted a gut I laughed so hard at the nickname he gave himself. I just can't get over the fact that I never knew about it.

Now, I (being the letterbox addict I am) suggested that he change his trail name from atvracer to Naughty Scotty. He just gave me a big grin and said nothing. Which means I probably shouldn't have just blogged about it, but I just couldn't keep it to myself!!! I'm still smiling!

Day off, a Cruise and 7 to go!

I've had a wonderful weekend full of letterboxing activities!!!

First of all, I took Friday off! So, what did I do? I met my husband for lunch, then headed out for some boxes. I found three letterboxes, the first time I have ever gone by myself. Scott and I always go together, except the one time I spent the day boxing with my sister, who was visiting from Seattle. I was even first finder for one of the boxes! It's cool to be first finder, but honestly I like to find them after others have, so I can see who else has found it. The fourth box I went looking for I didn't find, and why was that? Because I didn't know that there were two neighboring towns, each with roads the same name, and it was not the same road. Duh, Gray and New Gloucester each have a Town Farm Road and they aren't any where near each other. So since I drive by the one in Gray every now and then, I figure that's the road. WRONG! I ended up going home and checking on mapquest and see there are two different roads. I'll go looking for that one again sometime soon. But, I got find #'s 83, 84 & 85.

Saturday, the plan was to do a couple of errands in the morning, then head to the 5-hour Cruise Tour event in Saco. Scott had to work in the morning and has been having rebound headaches (he takes meds for tension migraines, but after a while he has rebound headaches from the medication, which are sometimes worse than the ones he's taking the meds for.) He ended up working, then coming home to sleep and hopefully diffuse the headache. I headed out at about 9:30am to pick a couple things up in town, then headed for the turnpike. It happened to be that day that Windham holds Summerfest, so getting around was a mess. I was going to head straight into Portland and jump on the turnpike, but changed my mind and went to Gray to get on the Turnpike there. I was going to be able to kill two birds with one stone, get onthe turnpike and stop at the new Starbuck's at the re-furbished rest area. I ended up being about an hour late to the "Cruise." But it was going until 4, so I figured I could get plenty of time in. Unfortunately for my hosts, there was a very small turnout. They had done a lot of preparations for the event, and six people came. I do have to say, I had a wonderful time!! It was nice to sit and relax and take my time stamping all the event stamps. I got to know my hosts better, and found that we have a few things in common and we know some non-lb people in common. I also got to meet a couple of other letterboxers I hadn't met yet and do some exchanges. I headed home and stopped at a Dollar Tree on the way and picked up twenty of the Lock-n-Lock knock-offs. WoooHooo!

Today, we got up about 8am, with the plan to leave between 9 and 10 to get some more boxes. We are so close to that 100th find. we thought we would pick up the series we had started a couple of weeks ago when it was really hot and the bugs drove us out of the woods. We got two more in the series, but once again we got tired of fighting the mosquitos in the woods. We even doused ourselves in bug spray, but they came after us anyway. So we decided to come back on a cooler day, when we could wear longer sleeves and not sweat to death from the heat. We ended up doing six drive-bys instead. So a total of eight boxes for today!! That's find #'s 86-93!! Woohoo!! Only 7 more to go! We will get them next weekend!!!! The goal is to get them before the end of June!!

On another note, we learned that one of the boxes in a series we planted near my hometown had been muggled. They left everything in the box, except the stamp! What the heck? Why would they just take the stamp. I mean, I've heard that it has happened to others, but it is just so heartbreaking to hear it happened to this series. And to boot, it was the box that everyone loved looking for, because it was in total darkness and you need a flashlight for it in the middle of the day! Oh well, I will re-carve it and re-hide it again over the weekend of the 4th.

Well, off to dream about planting and finding more letterboxes.

The Countdown has Begun!

We hit 75 boxes found today! We are so excited, we are starting the countdown to 100! 25 to go!!! 100 finds seems to be a huge milestone for most letterboxers and we are loving the fact that we are almost there. We found 7 today and will be heading out tomorrow to finish the series we started last weekend (we are bringing lots of bug spray with us!!!!) Plus, we are finally planting the box in memory of our little guinea pig tomorrow. Scott has picked an area that is all about animals.

OMG, I laughed so hard today! We stopped by my favorite HH hostel today to drop of a new HH and had quite a mini-adventure. I opened the lid of the box and was greeted by two wasps. I looked at the underneath of the lid and there was a small wasp nest, not more than 8-10 openings for baby wasps. I grabbed the container in the box without even thinking there might be more. Scott kept saying that there was one on the front, but I didn't see it. He was at an angle where he could see inside the box and there was one sitting right on the front wall, waiting for me to put my hand back in there. I couldn't grab the second container with the boxes stamp in it, so I ended up just stamping the HH into the box's logbook and putting it in the container with the other hitchhikers. Scott had a plan to get the container back in the box, he wanted me to get in the car and start the engine running. He was going to put the container back in the box and close the lid, then run to the car and jump in car so the wasps couldn't get him. I laughed so hard, I felt like we were robbing the box and making a getaway. We didn't even take a HH out of the box cause it was supposed to have three remain in it and there were only two besides the one we put in. UNLESS, there was one in the container with the boxes stamp, which we never took out. Oh well, it's a bonus for someone if that's the case!!!

I carved a new signature stamp tonight. It's the same image really, just a little different view. My signature stamp is of Spring Point Lighthouse, where Scott and I got married in 2006. You can see a picture at the top of this entry and a picture of my old one is on my profile page at Atlas Quest (http://www.atlasquest.com/people/profile.html?gMemberId=15556) The new one is a little bit bigger, and a little more detailed, and the rocks are gone. It should be easier to figure out what it is. I'm really happy with it. My original signature stamp is starting to show wear, and is actually splitting from the back.

Scott is working on a series right now. Every time we go out boxing, he starts talking about it and actually has one stamp ready for it. He wants to get the stamps carved first then he'll figure out where to plant it.

I'm following the same idea. I'm planning a 15 box series, hopefully to be planted near home or near my hometown. I haven't quite decided yet. But, I carved the first stamp for it tonight. They are pretty easy carves, and I haven't seen any other boxes with the same theme yet. So, hopefully it will be worth finding.

Can you say HOT?

Scott and I have been talking about doing the Ghost Train series at Shaw Park since this winter, and we finally decided to do it. Unfortunately, we didn't get very far! We got 3 out of 13 boxes. It was just so hot and muggy (and BUGGY!) Scott actually pulled a deer tick off my pants (yes, today Scott decided to wear shorts and I wore pants, so guess who got to go in tall, grassy areas!) The mosquitos were having a field day with us! Next time we have a cool and breezy day we will definitely go back to finish!!

We decided to do a few drive-by's as well, but honestly once we got into the air conditioned car, it was hard to get out. So we attempted one, but had the wrong place and when we found the right place, we decided to do that one another day as well.

So home we drove, to do a thorough tick check on each other and watch the NASCAR race. (I will probably do some scrapbooking, that way I knock out some pages in our letterboxing logbook.)

Signing off!

Where to Plant?

Last weekend I carved a stamp in memory of our guinea pig, Tiki. It's just a cute stamp, nothing with a lot of detail. Scott decided that he wanted to choose the spot to plant it, making this letterbox the first box that he plants on his own. (We usually decide together, where to plant boxes.) He wants the spot to be animal-related and somewhat local. We've thought of a few locations and one of them he really liked, but get this, he can't remember which place that was. So I don't think the box is going to get planted this weekend like we had hoped.

He has also been carving a stamp here and there for a series he is interested in doing about his other interest (ok, his addiction) ATV racing! He's actually carved the same stamp twice because he's kind of a perfectionist about it. I personally thought the first one was really good, but he didn't like how the detail came out. Honestly, I think they both look exactly alike.

Speaking of racing, we've name our little letterboxing team "The Pit Crew." There are only three of us, myself, Scott and out 11yo nephew Zach, who's trailname is Dirt Bike or Dirt Bike Racer, whichever he feels like at the moment. So with the males in the team there is definitely a theme, ya think? We try to take Zach with us to Scott's races at least once a month, he's a great crew member at the races so the team name just fit. Hopefully he can do more boxing with us this month, since Scott isn't able to race right now (he blew his engine at the last race and is in the middle of fixing it now, hopefully it will be ready in time for the July race!) We'll see!!

Now, I need to get everything together for our day. We're heading out to do a couple of errands and there are a couple of letterboxes in the vicinities of our stops.

Enjoy!

New blog and this weekend's events

I started a new blog. Now I have one for scrapbooking and for letterboxing! Both are my favorite pasttimes.

This blog is specifically for letterboxing, with a few off-subject posts along the way, I'm sure. We'll see. So let me get to this weekend.

It didn't start out well, at all. Our guinea pig, Tiki, had been sick for a couple of weeks with bronchitis, that just turned to pneumonia. Friday night we came home and gave him another dose of the anti-biotic the vet gave us. A couple of hours later, he could barely hold himself up and was shaking and trembling. I picked him up to cuddle with him and he started shaking and wiggling more and within 60 seconds he was gone. Scott and I are both heartbroken. No more squeals when we open the fridge and take out veggies for the little buddy. We would wait until the next day to take him to Scott's parent's house and bury him next to the other giunea pig we had. They were buddies in life, so they should be together now.

Friday night, I had a hard time sleeping so I got up and decided to carve a stamp for a letterbox dedicated to Tiki. I searched through clip art and found a cute cartoon drawing of a guineaa pig that I decided to use. Since I carved the stamp and prepared the box, Scott is going to decide where it will be planted. He's trying to decide where it will be planted, but is having a hard time. He wants it animal-related and close by, at least within our town. I know something will come to him and he will finally have a P-count.

Scott had to work Saturday morning, so we headed to his parent's house in the early afternoon. The weather report said chance of scattered showers, and for a change they were right. We buried and decided to do a few drive-by boxes on the way home. This has never happened to us before, but we actually had a zero day. We looked for two boxes and didn't find either of them. We decided that we would start again around 9, Sunday morning.

This morning we headed out, 9am on the nose!!!! We stopped for coffee and headed to Southern Maine Community College/Spring Point Lighthouse in South Portland. Scott and I actually got married at Spring Point Mighthouse, and we realized we hadn't been there since. That was almost 2 years ago.

We found 5 out of 7 boxes! Not bad!

The funny thing about the day is that we just missed another couple (Beswick) who we have been chatting with about letterboxing and have yet to meet. We have family in the same area, where I grew up. After contacting them, it seems we missed each other by a mere few minutes. DARN!!! They picked up the hitchhiker we launched in our first box of the day and will be taking it with them out of state. Can't wait to see the finds logged on that one. Maybe next time we can meet up on the trail!

Speaking of hitchhikers, I wonder if my sister has planted the "Traveling Sisters" hitchhiker in Seattle yet. I carved it and she took it back to Seattle with her to plant. The directions are that the hitchiker travel from Seattle, WA to Windham, ME - from her to me. I should call her to see if she actually launched it this weekend, as she said she had planned on it.

OK, well time for bed!

Signing off!!