~KiDDṏ
Truth in Advertising
making a difference
Date or Hangout?
Geocaching – fun hobby
Need an interesting hobby that will not only exercise your body but also your mind? Not everyone is familiar with Geocaching but it’s a real-world, outdoor treasure hunting game using GPS-enabled devices. Participants navigate to a specific set of GPS coordinates and then attempt to find the geocache (container) hidden at that location. Participants come up with a cool or clever profile name and register at https://www.geocaching.com then begin their hide and seek adventures. Our FLorida4ce started out Geocaching in October 2005 because my parents got us into it. I homeschooled our kids and felt like this was an excellent way to learn so many things about problem solving, navigation, teamwork, determination and disappointment as well as learning about nature and enjoying all that the outdoors gives us. Our team was my husband, myself and our two sons, hence the “4 ” in FLorida4ce. We really had a LOT of fun especially in 2009 when we all had a lot of time to find caches as a family.
After all of the construction stopped in our area my husband had to switch careers and out of necessity changed from running a land survey crew to being an over the road truck driver. With my husband out of town a lot we didn’t get to cache much because we wanted to stay a team. Eventually we stopped caching at all. In 2013 my husband left us without much of a warning and as you can imagine that was a huge disruption in our lives. I went from being a stay at home mom to working 3rd shift in an industrial laundry and teaching yoga and fitness classes mornings and evenings in a few local gyms and studios. I didn’t have much free time. Anytime we would think about Geocaching we just didn’t do it because I was either too tired or didn’t have time to sync the cache locations from the website to our GPS. We were also reminded of all the good times we had as a four person team. Even our caching handle reminded us that someone was missing.
Currently I am gone for work about 60 hours a week and do not have a lot of time for family or anything else. My sons are now 18 and 21 and I try to come up with activities to do together since we’re all busy a lot. For two years I’ve gotten us annual passes to Universal and that’s a blast but I also wanted to have a less expensive activity that we could do without having to drive for hours. We just recently got back into Geocaching and it is so much easier now because of smart phones and the app to follow instead of loading a few caches into a GPS from the desktop computer. Now there is no need to go back to the computer to log our finds either. Everything can be done on the go.
In the past several weeks we decided to take the leap from just finding to HIDING! We have gotten great responses from the people that are finding our caches. We try to make caches that we would’ve loved to come across when the kids were younger. We try to make sure the hides are in places with terrific views in areas that have parks or picnic areas so that other cachers can not only find a cache but also a new place to enjoy even when they’re not on the hunt! WE LOVE the logs that other participants post when they find our caches and really love the photos that they are sharing!
I am having a good time Geocaching even with all of the changes in my personal life. We don’t have our original team anymore and my older son hasn’t gone out with us yet since we got back into it but he is still part of the team as a consultant until he gets time to join in. My younger son often goes along with me and usually my girlfriend and her super sweet dog Lady comes along with us too. Even if I go it alone I have a feeling that this hobby is going to be part of what keeps me active as I deal with this aging broken body. I adore weather and the sky and scenery and geocaching takes me right out into it.
Check it out, you don’t have to become a part of the geocaching community but if you choose to you can communicate with other cachers on the site and nowadays they even have geocaching events and gatherings. We haven’t gone to any of the events but we’re thinking about it – HAPPY GEOCACHING!!
Boardwalk where one of our caches is hidden
Jetty nearby one of our caches
View from one of our caches
The treasure map I created for participants to follow
Philosophical Rant
All I can say about today is “UGH” and “I’M UP TO THE CHALLENGE!!” Sometimes ppl will accuse me of being a pessimist (usually when I point out something to do with my looks or position in life) and sometimes people’ll accuse me of being an optimist but in both cases I respond the same way: I’m a realist…I see the truth and I’m not afraid of it. Life is beautiful. Life is discouraging and ugly but NOTHING can take away from the fact that despite the beauty and the ugliness we can CHOOSE to enjoy it and wring every bit of pleasure from it….and in that way even the ugliest circumstance becomes immeasurably gorgeous. …so beautiful that it brings tears to the eyes….I have THOUSANDS of photos of beautiful sunrises,sunsets, storms and rainbows. ..they’re all spectacular and worth living to see the next one. The greatest wonders in life are free and just accessible to the pauper as the prince…priceless in their originality just as much as in their promise to come again in a slightly different incarnation. Life is a series of cycles. Tiny little cycles too small to notice and enormous cycles so big we could NEVER comprehend them and no matter if time is linear or deviant we can experience it only one moment at a time….each moment to be appreciated or ignored. If we fully experienced each moment we would be useless….so we are open to distraction and interpretation which actually preserves us but the truth remains and our lives are the results of our random as well as meaningful choices. We are all but pixels in the bigger picture. The smaller we make our universe the more significance we play in it and the grander we make existence the less influence we have on it. Some people say look at the bigger picture without realizing that the enormity of the actual BIGGER picture is that we have absolutely no influence on the cosmos as individuals….so I choose to live the not so big picture and actually make a postive difference in the lives of my loved ones and my community. If everyone chose to do so the world would be infinitely better and the universe and the multiverse as well…but science decrees that a positive can’t exist without a negative which is great because I love lightning and magnets and equal and opposite reactions and sometimes the best thing to accept is that I only have so much power and therefore a limited responsibility even though the potential is available if we ALLL worked together. The chance that all creatures will work together for the greater good is slim to none which basically means that the pressure is off. Enjoy your little slice of life. That’s the way the cookie crumbles, the ball bounces and let the chips fall as they may. It’s all good. Inhale love exhale love…not one breathe wasted 🙂
Love my kids
Ride for Renovation
I have donated to this cause and thought maybe you’d like to as well…the link is at the bottom
My name is Amanda Endres, I have been a certified Spinning® Instructor for 7 years. I am trying to raise money to help fund the renovation of my very own Official Spinning® Facility. After the birth of my one and only child 8yrs ago I was extremely overweight. I had been quite chunky all of my life even though I was very athletic. After the birth of my child I was bigger then ever and tried several things to get the weight off. It wasn’t until I tried The Spinning® Program that not only my body changed but my entire LIFE had changed! 6 months after my very 1st Spin® class I received my Spinning® Instructor Certification and I started teaching the program to others along with working a fulltime job. I wanted to inspire others to change their lives as I had through the Spinning® program so I taught at as many gyms as I could that offered indoor cycling rather they where an Official Spinning® Facility or not! After 5 years of teaching at various gyms, while working a fulltime job and changing other peoples lives, I got an opportunity to start my own Official Spinning® Program and “A” Vicious Cycle Inc. was born. I was renting space in local gyms where I had to share my area with other fitness professionals. Every class I would need to completely set up all bikes and equipment and then take everything back out of class. Quickly all of my classes where filled and I was changing many lives as mine was. I am currently growing out of the room I’m in and have several more lives to change. I was offered a great space with plenty of room for my current riders and more room for additional riders. The new space needs some renovations that I can not afford before I can officially make the move. Having my very own facility has been my passion and dream since day 1 and I’m asking for your help to make this final transition happen! I will also be doing a 4hr Spin®-A-Thon soon called Ride-4-Renovation to raise money as well. So this site is perfect for all who can’t ride but would love to help. THANK YOU!!
Go Fund Me – Ride for Renovation
Not That Anyone Asked Me... 