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Like most Michiganders we try to go up north every year and this past summer we rented a little farmhouse in one of the nicest corners of the state and we liked it so much we rented it again for the Thanksgiving weekend and headed up into the snow for an early and cozy little glimpse of the winter to come. It was a treat to see all the heavily-touristed areas more subdued. We walked (and sledded) along empty, ice-encrusted beaches and hiked in the woods while the old snowmobile tracks we followed filled with fresh powder. And we ate a lot of good food.

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When we got back I remembered I took a bunch of pictures last summer that I never shared. . . and after looking at all the pictures I took over the holiday weekend I thought maybe I should share just a few to show how beautiful it is up there in Leelanau County all year round. 

Click here to see the full set of pictures. 

Just a few pictures from our trip down south (Lexington-Knoxville-Asheville-Columbia-Charleston).

Previously:


Up North: Seen (2011)
Up North: Seen (2010)

When I was three-years old we took a family vacation to Colorado Springs. After a big pancake breakfast one day we drove to the top of Pikes Peak. My memories of that trip do not include any remarkable vistas: I only remember my father with a hose somewhere on the side of the Pikes Peak Highway, washing pancake vomit out of the rental car.

I was just out there for a few days last week. I didn't spend much time in the mountains (I wanted to see some of the flat part of the state where my great-grandmother homesteaded in the early 1900s). I did drive up Pikes Peak. I didn't puke this time. It made me miss my kids.

I took a lot of pictures, and here are just a few:

 

 

 

I'm pretty excited to share this year's Halloween costumes. First post: Thursday.

 

While viewing these photos, you should imagine the musky odor of Grandpa's Pine Tar Soap in the air.  Grandpa's Pine Tar Soap is the official soap of Northern Michigan. After several months of exclusively using Grandpa's Pine Tar Soap myself, I am happy to say that on this vacation my wife also started using it. Being married to a woman who smells like a burning tire factory almost makes up for not catching any bass on Wycamp Lake (hearing the loons call to each other while paddling through the dusklit water was also nice). There's always next summer, fish. 

Last year: Up North: Seen (2010); also, Taking Care