A Twitter campaign has convinced Halifax bureaucrats that red swings popping up across the city are not lawsuits waiting to happen, but a fun way to get in touch with your inner child.

When the wooden red swings first began appearing in parks and other public spaces earlier this month, city lawyers expressed concern that someone might get hurt falling off a swing and sue the city.

Suggestions that the swings be removed sparked a Twitter backlash last week with the hashtag #redswingfx.

Leave it to lawyers to forget what its like to be a kid! one Twitter user, Lisa Ladouceur, wrote.

The ridicule worked. By Saturday, the city was tweeting pictures of municipal executives testing the swings for safety.

Adam Hayter of Fusion Halifax said the swings were placed around the city as part of the 100 in 1 Day global initiative to improve city living.

We wanted to encourage playfulness, Hayter told CTVs Canada AM Tuesday.

Hayter represents the group that assembled the swings and hung them from tree branches, park gazebos and other structures with rope.

The group doesnt have a name, he said. It was inspired by RedSwingProject.org, which lists similar installations around the world, all executed anonymously.

The locations of the Halifax swings are not listed anywhere, so its up to residents to discover them.

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Halifax residents convince city to have fun with red swing project

Kenny Francois, left, and Ron Cappy of Ocean Dynamics walk off the new docks at the Dania Beach Marina. The $7.5 million renovation project features 120 floating concrete docks. (Taimy Alvarez / Sun Sentinel file / March 21, 2014)

Ahoy, boaters.

There's a new marina in town.

Dania Beach is celebrating the $7.5 million renovation of its marina with a ribbon-cutting ceremony from 9:30 to 11 a.m. Tuesday at 151 N. Beach Road.

Come check out the marina's 120 floating concrete docks and boater's lounge with space for the dock master.

You'll also find a landscaped promenade with turtle-friendly lighting, a covered pavilion for picnics, gazebos with views of the ocean and pier and an environmentally friendly fish cleaning station and pump-out facilities.

sbryan@tribune.com or 954-356-4554

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Dania Beach throwing a ribbon-cutting party for new marina

Witney Market stalls get makeover

5:30pm Wednesday 18th June 2014 in News

MUSICIANS and street performers will join shoppers and market stallholders on Saturday to celebrate the launch of a new look for Witneys Buttercross Market.

Colourful new gazebos will adorn the Market Square on Saturday as part of a project by West Oxfordshire District Council, supported by the traders, to improve the markets appearance.

Keith Davies, from Burford, who has run a flower and plants stall at the market since the 1960s, has been trialling one of the gazebos and is delighted with them.

He said, They look good and have smartened up the market. I think it attracts more people to come here. The general situation has changed a lot over the years, with markets being affected by supermarkets and discount stores.

We were beginning to lose momentum, but Im really pleased that the council has given us a nudge and pulled it all together again. Id like to congratulate them, as we have more traders and a good turnout now.

As well as improving the visual appearance of the market, the gazebos are easy to put up and take down and have side panels which can be lowered during cold and wet weather to keep out wind and rain.

David Harvey, the councils cabinet member for environment, who is responsible for markets, said, The past few years have been difficult for many market traders, but were now welcoming a number of new stallholders and firmly believe that Witney Market is on the up.

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Witney Market stalls get makeover

Join the celebration of the longest day of the year, the first day of summer, and SIMBA's 25th anniversary at the SIMBA Silver Summer Solstice Dance Party Extravaganza on Saturday, June 21, 2014! The event will take place at 8 pm at the Evening Star Grange in Dummerston Center, Vermont.

In 1989 the band started by playing a benefit on the Brattleboro Common to shut down Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Plant; they called themselves the "No Nukes Band"; that group became SIMBA, and twenty-five years later, they have rocked dance floors, lawns, and small town gazebos all around southern Vermont and New Hampshire. They have played weddings, parties, summer concerts, benefits, and the greatest dance parties of all, the Summer and Winter Solstice celebrations (longer than anyone!). The energy and feeling of community at these annual gatherings makes this celebration one of the most special events of the year. The band will play music to make you move: funk, reggae, Latin, world-beat, soca-calypso, ska, jazz and blues; and features blazing horns and scorching percussion.

After a cold winter we welcome the warmer weather and the longer days of light. Don't miss this exciting night of music and dance!

Rupa Cousins will lead a movement meditation. The band dedicates this event to peace, love and unity in our community, and all across Mother Earth; with special thanks to all the dancers who have come out to move to the music over the years.

The members of the band will be Bob Stabach (sax, flute), Dan De Walt (keyboard, steel drum, trombone), Wim Auer (bass), Derrik Jordan (guitar, percussion, violin, vocals), Steve Sonntag (trumpet, percussion), and Johnny Yuma (drums, vocals). Special guest master drummer William Rodriguez, formerly of Cuba, will provide even more firepower throughout the evening on congas and timbales.

The Evening Star Grange is located at the intersections of East-West Rd/School St, Bunker Rd, and Middle Rd, in Dummerston Center, Vermont.

All ages are welcome for this night of drumming, dancing, music and fun for the whole community. Admission is $10, with a family maximum of $25.

Bring the whole family and join SIMBA as we celebrate the beginning of summer and the return of sunshine and flowers at "SIMBA's Silver Summer Solstice, 2014" dance party.

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SIMBA's silver summer solstice dance party!

Coastal Carolina University is gearing up for the official launch of its tobacco-free initiative Aug. 1, but the new policy began changing lives soon after it was announced in January.

Deborah Hardee, an administrative assistant in counseling services, took advantage of the pilot smoking-cessation program offered to faculty and staff in the spring and kicked the habit March 20. The program is one of the resources being made available to those on campus to help them comply with the new policy, which is part of the LiveWell @ CCU program to promote overall health at the university.

Im so proud of myself, said Hardee, a smoker for more than 30 years who had tried to quit several times before. It is probably one of my biggest accomplishments.

CCU is following a national trend among colleges and universities to take their campuses smoke-free or tobacco-free. Most of the feedback from students and staff has been positive, although some diehard smokers say they will continue to smoke, just not on university property.

At least 1,343 U.S. colleges and universities have 100 percent smoke-free campuses, and 925 of those 100 percent tobacco-free, according to the American Nonsmokers Rights Foundation. The foundation lists 22 smoke-free campuses in South Carolina, with the majority of those also tobacco-free. The University of South Carolina is on the smoke-free list but moved to tobacco-free status Jan. 1, while the College of Charleston, which is not on the list, will go tobacco-free July 1.

Tobacco-free means no cigarettes or smoke-related products, including cigars and chewing tobacco, and while a person may be in possession of those products, they are not allowed to use them, even in their vehicles. CCUs policy also will prohibit the use of e-cigarettes, which are not allowed anywhere on 167 campuses that made the foundations list. University officials say the U.S. Food and Drug Administration still consider e-cigarettes tobacco products because of the nicotine levels they produce.

CCU has taken steps to help students and employees adjust to the new policy. A website has been created, http://www.coastal.edu/livewell, that answers questions and lists available resources, while the I Quit program, which has instructors certified through the American Lung Association, will be available to faculty, staff and students in the fall.

Hardee was in the eight-week program, one of three who graduated out of six who signed up. Lamonica Yates, director of training and employee services, said 50 percent is considered a success in smoking-cessation programs, and the classes are small so participants can bond and support each other.

Im not going to lie it was very difficult, but this was a way [for the university] to support the staff, and I thought, This is it. This is my way to quit, said Hardee, who said she is now breathing and feeling better. I never thought Id be one of those people who say, If I can do it, you can do it, but I really believe if I can do it, you can do it.

Some smokers on staff say they werent surprised by the new policy, but that doesnt mean they have to like it. And there always is the possibility they too will try to quit.

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Staff and students at CCU prepare for launch of tobacco-free policy

The Master Wishmakers create luxury, bespoke playhouses and even private islands for clients Range in price from 25,000 to over 50,000 Some have slides, pubs, garages and fake helicopters

By Bianca London

Published: 02:59 EST, 11 June 2014 | Updated: 05:29 EST, 11 June 2014

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Ever dreamed of creating a princess palace or a mini fantasy island for your child, but don't have the time or imagination to build it from scratch?

Now one company is available to come to your rescue, ready to create luxury turreted tree houses, fairy tale woodland castles, magical playhouses, English country garden gazebos and even private islands.

The British company, called The Master Wishmakers, promise that they can custom-design bespoke interpretations of clients aspirations for their loved ones, however farfetched or fantastical.

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The 50,000 luxury playhouse that come with drive-thru restaurants, working car washes, sweet shops and even a pub for ...

Looking for a dog?

The Grand Strand Humane Society, one of many area shelters experiencing overcrowding, is holding two dog adoption events Wednesday and Thursday at the Market Common.

The adoption events will take place alongside Music On The Streets concerts in the retail area of the former Myrtle Beach Air Force base.

Wednesday nights concert is in the gazebos off Howard Avenue and Reed Street. Thursdays concert and adoption will be at Valor Park. Dogs will be available for adoption from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m. both days.

We must get 70 to 75 animals adopted into loving homes very quickly, said Sandy Brown, executive director of the Grand Strand Humane Society. Our mission is always to save and find permanent homes for animals in need, but now it is a dire emergency. We will be downsizing our shelter population based on our budget.

We must find permanent homes for the animals already in our care to create space for other animals in the near future. We do not want future unwanted, abandoned and abused animals to go to a kill shelter.

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Grand Strand Humane Society holding dog adoption events at the Market Common in Myrtle Beach

Premium television's answer to wedding season Games of Thrones is no doubt only popular because of its breathtaking cavalcade of aspirational lifestyle inspiration. Each wedding ceremony in the show seems to be more special and loving than the last, causing its audience to wonder: But how do I get myself one of those? Well! A wedding planner has evaluated each ceremony with ahelpfulline-item analysis.

Sarah Haywood, noted authority on multimillion-dollar weddings," worked with the Daily Dot to thoroughly analyze each ceremony.

Would you like some dancing bears? Only $11,300 each, including insurance and handling! Insurance to back aDothraki wedding, where at least three people are expected to die from having too much fun? $323,559. Flowers to decorate your never-ending gazebos? Half a million. A meal including a stuffed peacock? That's $1,800 per person. A necklace with rare poison? Unsettlingly cheap, at $20. Funds to murder 30,000 of your favorite enemies?$5.6 million.

The whole graph and analysis--from Max Fleishman andRob Price,with references including the British Royal Wedding of 2011 and the Kardashian-West ceremony--is worthpursuinghere. Just print out your favorite one, and you've got your budget all ready to go.

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A Wedding Planner Calculates the Cost of Game of Thrones Ceremonies

Next it was back to Tylney, for an idyllic picnic lunch in the pair of restored Italianate gazebos, with Pimms in hand and views over the park and boating lakes. This was a leap backwards in time, from Edwardian garden glory days to the 18th century and a small country mansion, West Green House. Its garden has an equally fractured history, having been saved from ruin by garden magician Marylyn Abbott after an IRA bomb blast. I visited this garden three years ago to report on the garden opera season, and on returning I was amazed to see further development Abbott clearly isnt one to let the grass grow beneath her feet.

The Quinlan Terry follies, the light installations and the potager are now all surrounded with a new streamlined bosky walk, taking you off to pastures new with ribbons of blue Iris sibirica and ferny glades. It was Schultz who connected the various gardens within the grounds he was commissioned to make alterations to the faade of the house, and to redesign the grounds in the early 1900s and each of these gardens has its own story to tell, its own journey from glory to dereliction and back.

Such journeys, and how garden owners decide to travel along them, were examined by Dominic Cole, chairman of the National Trusts Advisory Panel and the Garden History Society, in the talk he gave us over a glass of champagne back at Tylney Hall. As a landscape architect he has developed the Eden Project and Heligan with Tim Smit; designed the grounds at Lowther Castle, the Horniman Museum and Magdalen College; worked on Trentham with Piet Oudolf and Tom Stuart-Smith, and had a hand in one of my favourite spots in London the Roof Garden on Queen Elizabeth Hall.

He has also created gardens from almost everything, including china clay craters, chicken sheds, Christmas tree plantations and local authority tenure.

Dominic believes that although these days we have labour-saving machinery, this cannot compensate entirely for the dramatic decrease in manpower (the Tylney workforce, for instance, has gone from 50 to five). So we need to be pragmatic in our restorations, aiming to capture the spirit of the past rather than recreate its every detail. The discussion carried on over dinner gardeners always make interesting table companions.

When I awoke the next morning, I looked out from my four-poster on the gallery of the Jekyll suite in a converted orangery over her Water Gardens, and wondered whether Jekyll would have agreed with Coles notion that modern gardeners should try to capture the spirit of former times.

Either way, in transforming gardens from the tortuous bedding patterns of the Victorian era to her own light, subtle and billowy style, she has influenced many of todays gardeners.

*Tylney Hall Hotel, near Hook in Hampshire, is planning further Garden Appreciation Weekends; for more information visit tylneyhall.com or call 01256 764881. The Manor House at Upton Grey is open on weekdays; see gertrudejekyllgarden.co.uk. For information about West Green Houses opera season and garden, see westgreenhouse.co.uk.

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Glorious restored gardens show history in living colour

(PRWEB UK) 11 June 2014

Oxleys Furniture has teamed up with Unosider, the luxury Italian gazebo makers, to offer their range to the UK market. Oxleys is now the UK distributor for the Italian outdoor shading manufacturers range of high quality products.

Oxleys MD, Simon Hudson, felt the collaboration between the two companies would lead to a new era in the UK outdoor furniture industry. Oxleys designs and manufactures luxury outdoor furniture for our discerning clientele. We have found the perfect partner in Unosider to provide our customers with gazebos that are of the highest quality and design.

The partnership between Oxley's and Unosider was unveiled at the Chelsea Flower Show this year, where the Novocento Prestige gazebo was at the centre of the stand, giving a sense of elegant calm, and complementing Oxley's all weather outdoor furniture perfectly.

We are very proud to be working with Oxleys Furniture as our UK distributors. We feel there is a lot of synergy between our brands with the high quality of Oxleys products matching the specifications of our gazebos and outdoor coverings, said Moreno Semprini, Export Sales Manager of Unosider.

Unosider and Oxleys work with the same ambition, to bring beauty and functionality to the outside environment. Oxleys with their timelessly elegant outdoor furniture and Unosider with their structures that create a convivial hub for outside entertaining.

Unosider have been making their Gazebos near Rimini in North East Italy for many years. They have been exported to all over the World and Oxleys are very pleased to partner with them in the UK.

About Oxleys Furniture Oxley's is an English Company making luxury elegant outdoor furniture for discerning customers. By combining their classic designs and rich palette of colours with a large range of available outdoor fabrics, they create a unique look for each and every one of their customers.

The company delivers worldwide and their furniture graces some of the most beautiful properties imaginable. The furniture they produce is all weather proof and maintenance free. It is made to be left outside year round and bring a sense of elegance and beauty to gardens and outside spaces.

Oxleys has been producing beautiful outdoor furniture for over 20 years from their factory in the Cotswolds.

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Oxley's Furniture now UK distributors for UNOSIDER, makers of luxury gazebos.