Spring is just around the corner.

And if you're looking for ideas on how to spruce up your home, check out the 13th Annual Eastern Pennsylvania Spring Home Show, Friday to Sunday, at the Agri-Plex at the Allentown Fairgrounds, 302 N. 17th St.

No matter what you're looking to redo, makeover or rehab, the show will have nearly 200 companies on hand with a diverse array of home products and services. It's a show that blends the latest trends with a hometown flair.

Whether you're looking to redo your bathroom, gut your kitchen or add a sunroom, pool or spa to your home, you can talk with experts and find the right designs or products to fit your budget. Banks and mortgage companies will have representatives on hand, as well as financial planners, to help your wallet and maximize savings.

Get some ideas for outside your home and check out a display by Center Valley's RidgeCrest Landscaping. RidgeCrest's Chris Baumer will be available to answer all your design questions while providing new and innovative landscape tips.

And bring the kids because they'll have the chance to do their own project for free at the Home Depot Kids Workshop.

Hours are 5-9 p.m. Friday, 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday.

Admission is $8; $7, seniors; free, under 12. The show's producer, Jenks Productions, is also offering $1 off admission with a non-perishable food item. Donations will benefit the Allentown Ecumenical Food Bank.

Info: http://www.jenksproductions.com/paspringpress2014.html

Jennifer Sheehan

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Get inspired at the Eastern PA Spring Home Show

Jane Ussher Jane Ussher Jane Ussher Jane Ussher

POOLSIDE LIVING: Linda Hodgson and Ginger in the redesigned pool deck area.

POM POM TREE: Cloud pruned Juniperus 'Kaizuka' provides a sense of fun in the garden

FRAMED OUTLOOK: The arch of the front entrance is reflected in the curved gate and the cloud pruned Juniperus 'Kaizuka'.

SWEETLY SCENTED: Hedges of gardenia, star jasmine and mandarins offer a beautiful fragrance in the front garden.

Just as houses grow and change to suit their owners, so Linda Hodgson's Remuera garden has evolved over the past 11 years.

When Netherlands-born Linda, husband Steve and their family moved into their first New Zealand home, she worried about keeping her preschoolers safe from the pool and where to site the sandpit.

Fast-forward a decade and daughters Lara, 15, and Jemima, 13, and their friends are sunning themselves on the new pool deck and trying not to get their hair wet.

Belinda Merrie

For more great gardens, see the latest issue of NZ House & Garden.

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Formal and fun Remuera garden evolves to meet family needs

Financing at heart of matter

Moorparks first public swimming pool might become a reality if the City Council and the Moorpark Unified School District can agree on how to share the $4 million cost.

Currently the school district pays about $100,000 a year for Moorpark Highs use of the pool at Body Xchange Sports Club on Los Angeles Avenue.

The council voted 4-0 on Wednesday to appoint Mayor Janice Parvin and Councilmember Keith Millhouse to an ad hoc committee to review the pool project with the school district.

Steve Kueny, Moorpark city manager, said 13 years ago the school district and the city could not agree on ways to pay for the project, much less the cost of maintenance.

A 2002 feasibility study estimated it would cost about $250,000 to maintain a pool at Arroyo Vista Park.

The plan was scrapped when the school district and the city decided the maintenance costs were too high, Kueny said.

Kueny said the two entities will discuss sharing those expenses with the money available now.

Funds needed to finish the project would have to come from a tax assessment fee or something similar to a parks assessment fee requiring a two-thirds vote by residents, Kueny said.

He said the city wants a recreational pool that can accommodate high school aquatic sports.

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City, school district renew pool talks

Published: February 10, 2015 - Updated: February 11, 2015 10:32 pm

by Suzanne Elliott

Almanac Staff Writer

Suzanne Elliott / The Almanac

Bob Good of Pashek Associates talks to Peters Township residents about how to transform their parks and recreational space.

McMURRAY If the more than 40 Peters Township residents who attended the latest round of public meetings on the townships new 10-year plan for its parks, recreation and green space had their way, there would be an indoor and outdoor swimming pool, a disc golf course and ample room for young entrepreneurs to open lemonade stands.

Or as Chris Posti, a Venetia resident, suggested at the meeting, just keep the townships green spaces as they are unspoiled.

Welcome to Comprehensive Planning 101, Peters Township style.

Peters is in the midst of gathering a wish list from its citizens on a new plan for its six parks and recreation space. The township is spending $60,000 in this endeavor and has hired Pashek Associates, a landscape architectural firm based on Pittsburghs North Side, to bring the myriad ideas to life.

As we put together the comprehensive plan, we need to determine where we are now, where we want to be and how we get there, Pasheks Bob Good told the residents at a community meeting last week at Peters Township Public Library.

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Swimming pool at top of Peters Township wish list

10 hours ago A traveler arriving from overseas is fingerprinted while his paperwork is checked by a border patrol official at the passport control line in Newark International Airport in Newark, New Jersey

The United States wants the European Union to pool data on airline passengers to bolster security and prevent Islamist extremists from staging attacks on the West, US officials told lawmakers Wednesday.

The mounting numbers of foreign fighters flocking to Syria to join forces with militants has raised concerns on both sides of the Atlantic that jihadists with Western passports could slip through borders without being detected.

US counter-terrorism officials said a key tool to track militants and disrupt plots was sharing information on airline passengers, known as passenger name records (PNR).

Francis Taylor, undersecretary for intelligence and analysis at the Department of Homeland Security, said Washington was "encouraged" by discussions in the European Parliament to permit the pooling of passenger data throughout the European Union.

There was a "hope that the European Parliament will move forward to pass a European-wide PNR requirement that allows for that data to be collected across Europe and shared across the EU," Taylor told the House Committee on Homeland Security.

"We think that will be a big step."

He added that "if that doesn't work, then we can work bilaterally with individual countries to share data."

In the wake of extremist attacks in Paris that left 17 dead, European, US and Canadian interior ministers said there was a "crucial and urgent need" to establish an EU-wide database of passenger information for travel inside Europeand for flights leaving or entering the 28-nation bloc.

At the House hearing, the head of the National Counter-terrorism Center, Nicholas Rasmussen, said there has been "a fairly dramatic improvement" in sharing intelligence on potential suspects among US and European spy services.

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US hopes EU will pool airline passenger data

NPT Water Color
When deciding on your swimming pool water color, you must understand what variables effect the final color such as landscape, pool finish, water depth, and b...

By: The Pool Source

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NPT Water Color - Video

Story highlights New Zealand's South Island has fewer people and more scenic views than North Island NZ travel photographer Mike Hollman lists his favorite places to photograph List includes best road trip, glaciers, icebergs and alien boulders

Why should so few people get to hog such spectacular landscape? (Compared to, say, similarly sized England's population of 52 million.)

The larger of the country's two main islands is more visually stunning than the North Island.

With its smaller population, it's also more lonely and wild.

To get a handle of the island's most sublime landscapes, we asked Auckland-based award-winning photographer Mike Hollman to share his favorite spots to photograph.

Named New Zealand Travel Photographer of the Year in 2013 by the New Zealand Institute of Professional Photography, Hollman grew up on the South Island and says the landscape has had a tremendous impact on his work.

"The light is always changing and offering different views," says Hollman.

"My favorite time to shoot is in autumn, especially April (New Zealand's fall is from March to May) when the trees turn golden and the light on the landscape is magical."

1. Milford Sound

With an annual rainfall of 6.8 meters, Milford Sound is one of the wettest places in New Zealand.

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For beauty like this, head to South Island

Numbers are up for pool users in fall 2014

More people swam at the Kinsmen Sportsplex from October to December 2014 than they did in that period in 2013.

Times-Herald photo by Lisa Goudy

Jody Hauta, director of parks and recreation, is seen at the Feb. 9, 2015 council meeting.

The parks and recreation department's fourth quarter report, presented to council at Mondays meeting, stated there were 28,273 people who used the pool from Oct. 1 to Dec. 31 compared to 26,365 users in the same period in 2013. In 2012, a total of 28,131 people used the facility in that quarter.

Obviously the fourth quarter is a busy month for our programming for dry programs and also for aquatic programs, said Jody Hauta, director of parks and recreation. Our community association programs were started up in the fall in the schools. We also initiated a few new programs at the Kinsmen Sportsplex.

One of those new programs was a Kettlebells fitness class scheduled during one noon hour per week in the Kinsmen Sportsplex lobby. Summer pickleball was also extended into the fall at a school gym in the evenings three times a week.

The free Friday family, public and teen swims are ongoing and they still continue to be popular and those were extended during the school Christmas break.

In the fourth quarter of 2014, a total of 14,059 people used the free Friday public swim for a total attendance of 58,116 people to date.

Thats incredible for a city where sometimes we hear, Well, theres nothing for us to do on a weekend or whatever. I would say that thats filling a huge need, said Coun. Candis Kirkpatrick. Its awesome the city has continued to do this.

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Just keep swimming

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Belle Vue Landscaping Pools And Spas, 78206 Varner Road Suite D-134, Palm Desert, CA 92211 E-Mail: info@bellevuelandscapingpoolsandspas.com California contractor license #499370

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Landscape Contractor Swimming Pool Builder 3D Design Palm ...

THERE was nothing new and surprising in the recent official statements, including those made by the foreign affairs and national security adviser Sartaj Aziz, that the Islamic State (IS) poses no serious threat to Pakistan. The statements nevertheless reflect the traditional, simplistic view of internal security taken by government officials.

Such viewpoints originate from a weak and superficial understanding of the threats facing Pakistans security and stability. The conventional security approach in Pakistan to comprehend and encounter insecurity and violence is confined to two strands of threats: sectarian violence and tribal militancy. Surprisingly, both Pakistani state and society, which have long remained in a state of denial and confusion about the Pakistani Taliban, took more than a decade to realise the threat posed by tribal militancy.

The threat perception about foreign terrorist groups has been the worst. Although the footprints of Al Qaeda had been identified in major attacks in Pakistan, the terrorist group was not considered important by the security apparatus and was always thought of as part of a global problem and as Americas responsibility.

The persisting state of denial about the presence of IS in Pakistan and the failure to foresee and encounter its impact on the countrys militant landscape will compound the problem. The announcement by IS of its organisational structure for Pakistan and Afghanistan, which it describes as Khorasan province, is a significant development in many ways.

Many groups and individuals from the region had announced their allegiance to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, but IS has formally accepted the allegiance of Hafez Saeed Khan, a former leader of the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan from Orakzai Agency, and appointed a former Afghan Taliban leader Mullah Abdul Rauf Khadim as his deputy. All those who had announced their allegiance to Baghdadi now have an obligation to accept Hafiz Saeed as their leader and to pool their resources to strengthen the so-called province of Khorasan.

Of course, this is a different organisational model from the ones militant groups in Pakistan and Afghanistan have been following. Despite their ideological and political bonds and operational alliances, militant groups in this region tend to keep their independence intact. A strict hierarchical control and command system will have certain security implications.

ISs regional chapter could appoint local commanders across Pakistan and Afghanistan. They would try to absorb smaller militant groups thus raising the threat of large-scale coordinated attacks in both countries. However it remains to be seen how the local groups and commanders will follow and adapt to the strict IS organisational framework.

Additionally, violent confrontation between IS affiliates and other major militant groups operating in the region such as Al Qaeda, the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan, Jamaatul Ahrar and the Afghan Taliban cannot be ruled out. If IS achieves some visible success in the region, it will certainly earn the wrath of major groups, which have a history of not tolerating emerging groups.

The IS factor has provided a lifeline to militant groups in the region. Groups that were not happy with Al Qaedas operational strategies are now more attracted to IS. Their frustration with Al Qaeda was mainly due to the conviction that their ultimate objective of establishing an Islamic state and system could not be achieved only through terrorist attacks. The IS model showed them the importance of controlling territory in order to project and establish power on the ground.

It is probably due to the increasing influence of IS over Pakistani and Afghan terrorist groups that Al Qaeda for the first time has opened its doors to local groups and individuals. Before the significant strategic change, at Al Qaedas core was an exclusive club of Egypt-, Saudi-, Yemeni- and Libya-origin militants. This environment of competition among major terrorist groups can intensify threats in the country and the region.

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The Islamic State factor has provided a lifeline to militant groups in the region.