What kind of irresponsible lout loses their passport? I mean, come on – it’s your PASSPORT. You should know where it is at all times.

Additionally, what kind of frightful procrastinator wouldn’t even notice their passport is missing until the week when they’re supposed to leave on a trip? It’s arguably the most important travel document, and they have the audacity to assume they know where it is until the last minute, when it turns out they actually have no idea?

I mean, who would do that?

WHO?!

*sheepishly raises my hand*

Yesterday was not my finest day. I spent four hours turning my house inside out looking for my passport. It should have been in our safe. I mean, where else would you keep a passport?! Rex’s was there, in our red box in the safe, exactly where it should have been. Very nice. Now Rex can leave the country while I stay home, take care of the dogs, and wallow in my sense of irresponsibility.

“Where else would I have put it?!” I exclaimed, feeling panicked. “We always keep our passports in the safe!”

“I know,” said Rex. “Which is why I remember it was so weird that you didn’t want to keep it in the safe last time you took it out.”

I wrung my hands. “Where did I put it instead?”

Rex looked around, like it would float by in the air or something. “I have no idea.”

“Why didn’t I want to keep it in the safe? That makes no sense!”

“I know! Women make no sense! I stopped questioning this years ago!” (Hahaha – he didn’t actually say that, but I think I saw it in a thought bubble over his head).

To Rex’s credit, he was very concerned about the missing passport even though this was totally my fault. He helped me look, and we both tried to brainstorm why on earth I had taken it out (we haven’t been out of the country since before COVID). WHY WOULD I TAKE MY PASSPORT OUT OF THE SAFE? AM I INSANE?

Well, yes, a little, but that doesn’t really apply here.

Here’s a list of important things I found, none of which were my passport:

• Marriage license
• Birth Certificate
• That one turquoise hat I’ve been missing

Like, why weren’t THOSE items in the safe? (okay, maybe not the hat). To be fair, the papers were in our desk in a section labeled “important papers.” Though now, the important papers are a little disorganized. I was pretty frantic looking for my passport. A cruise to the Bahamas was on the line – you’d be frantic too.

Looks like I’ve got some reorganizing to do. My usually clean office now looks like this:

AND – spoiler alert – the passport wasn’t even in there. I had this one moment of relief when I THOUGHT I found my passport, but actually I found my expired one (appropriately filed in “important papers”). That’s just mean. I was mad at myself for keeping the expired passport, since it tricked me into thinking I’d found the right one.

Rex and I did our best to stay calm and talk it out. When would I have needed my passport without him? I finally tried thinking of this another way – when was a time in my life when I would have made really dumb decisions like NOT PUTTING MY PASSPORT IN THE SAFE?

That turned out to be the key – the time in my life when I had zero brainpower was right after Charles died. I kept thinking about that time period and when I would have needed my passport. Then I remembered: I took the passport to Key West with me when I went there for spring break just over a month after his death. I thought I might need it because….okay actually I have no idea why I thought I would need it. But I thought maybe I’d taken it. I had already looked in the luggage I took to Key West, but I decided to check again JUST in case. There it was in a hidden pocket. It all came back to me, then: I’d put the passport in a secret pocket because no one would be able to find it.

Ha. Right. Joke’s on me.

When I came home from the trip, I guess I forgot to take it out of the secret pocket and put it back in the safe. I’ve used that bag multiple times since that trip with no idea that I was toting around my passport. *facepalm.*

Anyway, my house is a mess, but I found my treasure! Bahamas, here I come!

Well, not quite yet.

Before I go to the Bahamas, I’m going to SPACE CAMP! That’s what I’m calling it, anyway. It’s not really Space Camp, but saying I’m going to “an NEH seminar to study the Space Age on the Space Coast” doesn’t sound quite as catchy. So I say…SPACE CAMP!

Through the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH), I received a grant to go to Cape Canaveral in Florida to study space for the week. It should be pretty fun…we get to talk to some astronauts, learn about the space program, and maybe even watch a launch! The protagonist of my second novel would be drooling over this opportunity, and I think she may be part of the reason I got the grant. I put in my application that I wrote a young adult novel about space (coming soon from Peachtree Teen!!), and in my revisions I’d like to make sure that the book is as accurate as possible. No matter the reason why I got it, I’m really thankful for the opportunity. Plus, “Christine Goes to Space Camp” should have some interesting blog posts, right?? I miss blogging.

I’m not sure how I made this connection, but somewhere along the line I realized that Cape Canaveral was right next to Port Canaveral, where lots of cruises leave and arrive. Since NEH was paying for me to fly to Port Canaveral, I thought why not stay a few days longer and hop on a cruise? I’ve never been on a cruise before. It’s *technically* crossed off on my bucket list (yes, I have a literal list) because I lived on that research ship in the summer of 2017, but that seems vastly different than a real cruise for a number of reasons. Here are some:

1. I don’t think I will dissect fish brains on this cruise.
2. There was no “Gala Night” on my research ship.
3. I won’t have to wake up at 4 AM to study zooplankton.
4. There will be more than 32 people on the ship this time.

Therefore I think I should uncross it off of my bucket list and re-cross it off after this trip. This seems much more cruise-y. Probably because it’s ACTUALLY a cruise. My mom is flying down to go with me, and Rex keeps calling it the “Bahama Mama” cruise because I’m going to the Bahamas with my mom.

I leave Sunday, so stay tuned for more posts next week. Space Camp is first, and then my first-ever (real) cruise. Now that I have my passport in hand, who knows what kind of adventures I’ll find?

To my fans (you small but loyal group!),

I wrote this post on my way back to Michigan from Miami, but I never posted it. Then I got multiple complaints that I never finished out my blog posts from Florida. I admit, I felt very touched. Like, hey! Someone actually READS this blog and NOTICES if the posts don’t go up! So I’m going to post it after all, just so you can see some more of Rex’s amazing pics and pretend you’re in Florida with us. Enjoy! Thanks for being loyal readers. Speaking of loyal readers…for those of you who don’t know, I have a book coming out in October! YAY! So there will be even more Christine fun to read (though the book’s not about me…mostly). Thanks for encouraging my writing. I appreciate you!

Now. On to the post!

I’m sitting at Gate 51 at the Miami airport, waiting for our flight to take us back to Michigan. Why can’t THIS flight get cancelled, hm? If they said they can’t get me home for a couple days, I wouldn’t even fight it this time. “Oh well, travel. You know how it is. Sorry boss, I can’t make it back.” Alas.

The last couple days have been so relaxing – absolutely worth the hassle it took to get here. We’ve done so much chilling and walking the beach (20k+ steps per day) that I don’t even feel like I have a ton to tell you. We didn’t go on a grand adventure. We didn’t get stranded somewhere and have to befriend the locals. We didn’t find ourselves in any pickles. We simply relaxed and enjoyed our time with family, and it was AWESOME.

One of our favorite parts was visiting the bird sanctuary. We did this usually multiple times a day, as it was only around a ten-minute walk from Nana’s. I would bring a book, and Rex would take pictures. At one point he was just sitting and staring for a while, so I asked what he was doing. He said he was watching a hawk and waiting for it to take off. I asked if he wanted me to go scare it into flight (because I’m a big, scary human), but he said the best shots are when the animals are “acting natural.” So he waited. And waited. He has more patience than I do, but it paid off because LOOK at these pictures he got:

My man, I tell you. He’s got skillzzz.

When not taking pictures or sitting and waiting for nature to “act natural,” we spent time with Nana. Remember those spindles from the beginning of the trip? We bought these super cool shadow boxes that fit the spindles perfectly, and Nana’s going to hang them on her wall. We’d have hung them for her while we were there, but we had to order more once we found out how perfect they are. Once she has the full set, we’ll put them up. GUESS I’LL HAVE TO GO BACK AND HELP HER. *shrug*

On Sunday night, we had a picnic with Rex’s sister and her family. Now, I can’t say that my niece is the cutest kid in the whole world, but that’s only because I have two nieces, and they’re tied for first. Look at this sweetie:

We had a great picnic dinner (thanks Michelle and Paul!) that ended with some “coo-coos” (cookies) and “bub bubs” (bubbles). We also played in the sand. I can’t remember the last time I made a sandcastle. Kids are good for making adults remember how to play, and I think playing is important for some psychological reason that I can’t remember now but is probably totally legit.

Monday dawned with another beautiful sunrise (they really must be beautiful for me to keep getting up so early). We wandered and took pictures some more. Then, on a whim, we went and bought cat food.

“CAT FOOD?” you ask. Because we missed Elsie so much? Um, no. We bought some cat food because Rex’s dad told us that the turtles would like to eat it. There’s a bridge over a pond by Nana’s condo, and some turtles live there. We threw some cat food into the water, feeling a little ridiculous, wondering if it would attract the turtles.

WELL. It attracted turtles like free pizza attracts college students. There was suddenly a complete mob of turtles – probably more than I’ve seen in one place in my entire life. It’s like one turtle found the cat food, sounded some secret alarm, and all the local turtles dropped their turtle activities to rush to the source of the bounty. (Now I’m picturing turtles playing cards at the bottom of the pond and then quickly abandoning their game when they heard there was cat food being flung around).

We ended the trip with a good dose of front-porch sitting. We walked to the lighthouse and sat in the rocking chairs in front of the lighthouse keeper’s house. The keeper hasn’t been there for something like sixty years, so we figured it was okay to use the chairs. I tried my best to soak up the sun and remember the warmth before I had to go back to Michigan.

Now, too soon, it’s back to the real world again. I’m not quite ready to go back, but I’m thankful for the time we had. Thanks for reading, and see you next time!

After the longest travel nightmare ever (see yesterday’s post), we are finally in Florida! YESSS! We got in this morning around 1:15 AM, and not only did Nana stay up to greet us, but also she had a dinner prepared with homemade turkey soup and chicken salad sandwiches.

My Nana, y’all. I’m telling you. She’s the best.

FitBit tells me that I got three hours and fifty four minutes of sleep last night, because after we ate dinner and went to bed, Rex and I also decided to get up and watch the sunrise (the sunrise on Nana’s beach is beautiful). While watching the sunrise, we watched two dolphins swim and hunt fish close to shore. It was amazing, and all the stress of the last two days started to slowly melt away.

After watching the sunrise and the dolphins, we walked the beach down to the bird sanctuary. Rex got some more pictures, including a couple of a crocodile where he was way too close for comfort, even though he has a long lens.

When we went back to Nana’s, she was awake. We all ate breakfast, and then we helped Nana clear out a chest of stuff that she keeps in her guest room. We found all kinds of treasures, including old marionette puppets, a giant bride Victorian doll, and Nana’s collection of 40+ spindles. (“Why do you have all these spindles, Nana?” “Dunno – the colors were pretty.”) In case you haven’t seen Sleeping Beauty lately and forgot what a spindle is, it’s this:

We also found a long white leather skirt that fits me, and Nana insists it’s very “in.” I wasn’t even going to try it on, but now I’m kind of attached to it. We also found a terra cotta colored crop top that has gotta be from the early nineties, and that sort of fit me.

Nana: That looks terrific on you!

Me: Um…my boobs are trying to make a break for freedom.

Nana: For crying out loud, girl. If you’ve got it, flaunt it! Enjoy your boobs now before you’re old and they fall to your knees!

So that’s how, even though I’m thirty three years old, I ended up wearing a crop top today. I’ll post a picture of the crop top, but without me in it. In the event that my middle schoolers ever find this blog, I don’t want pictures with the caption “Mrs. Webb thinks she can wear crop tops HAHAHA” circulating around my school.

After the great Crop Top Debate, we decided to dress up in Nana’s fur coats. Fur coats were made for playing dress up. Nana suggested we try to copy Cara and Drew’s iconic “perfume ad” engagement picture, so we did. Not to brag or anything, but we kinda nailed it.

After a few hours of chilling with Nana, it was back out to the sun! We walked down to the lighthouse (me in my shiny new CROP TOP) and had fresh squeezed mango juice. Then we walked back through town and bought way overpriced gelato in the shape of a cat, but I didn’t even care about the price because I was so happy to finally be in Florida with my man.

Also, now that I’m typing this – why was the gelato in the shape of a cat? I mean, what about a cat seems appetizing? They could have made it in any shape. This is odd. I could write a whole separate post questioning this, but I won’t.

When we got back to Nana’s, it was time to get ready for church/the Yacht Club. We got all dressed up (Rex wearing his suit for the third day in a row now), and we headed to church. We got to church way early, so we sat in the parking lot for a while. To kill time, I asked Nana questions about her life. Here’s a sample for you:

Me: Where were you when you found out JFK was assassinated?

Nana: On my head.

Me: Excuse me?

Nana: I was going through a yoga phase. I liked to stand on my head for twenty minutes per day. On that day, I was standing on my head when I heard on the radio that JFK died. Then the mailman showed up, and we cried on each other’s shoulders. It was very sad.

She’s got all kinds of stories.

We listened to a nice church service, then it was off to the Yacht Club! This is a very fancy restaurant, and we were there with the Fab Four (Nana and her three sisters-in-law) as well as this famous artist guy and his wife from Paris. It was very important to have good manners. Rex, as usual, dazzled everyone and made me very proud. I, on the other hand, made a crucial mistake: I ordered pizza.

Now, on the surface, this doesn’t seem like a terrible mistake. Pizza is delicious, and pizza at a fancy restaurant is probably good. The mistake was this: have you ever tried eating pizza with a knife and fork? Especially with a dull butter knife? It’s not easy, let me tell you. At one point, I was sawing so hard that a piece of pizza shot off my plate like a tiny tomato-sauce covered bullet.

Oops.

I eventually gave up and ate the pizza with my hands, the way you’d eat pizza if you were anywhere besides a fancy restaurant. I felt a little barbaric, like, “Forget you and your oodles of silverware! All I need are my HANDS!!” I’m pretty sure I wasn’t supposed to do that, and I felt so guilty that I eventually gave up and stopped eating the pizza. I just stared at it longingly until the waiter asked me if I wanted a box (Yes, I want a box so I can go home and finish eating this pizza. I’m still hungry, you see, but can’t figure out how to properly transfer this food from my plate to my stomach).

I felt so bad that I apologized to Nana afterwards for eating with my hands, and she said, “Aw, Christine, people aren’t going to judge you. Eat with your toes for all I care.”

(If I ate with my toes, I’m pretty sure she’d care).

Now I’m tucked into bed, wearing some of Nana’s old silky pajamas (we found them in the trunk), and I’m awfully tired but so thankful to be here. Thanks for all the prayers and check ins to see if we made it to Florida. I’m so happy to be here!

When the fire alarms at Boston’s airport started squealing and flashing their bright lights, my first thought was, “Ahh! How do I evacuate out of an airport? Where do I go??” My second thought, closely on its heels, was, “That’s it, I’m writing a blog about this.”

You see, this is my Midwinter Break from school. I’m supposed to be on a beach in sunny Florida, hanging out with my grandma watching documentaries about the British royal family, and generally relaxing. Instead, I’m sitting on the sticky vinyl of an airport chair, I’m watching our flight get delayed for the millionth time, and I’m generally stressed.

Come with me on a journey of travel nightmare. *cue Twilight Zone music*

This nightmare started back on Tuesday (TUESDAY. Today is FRIDAY). That’s when I first heard about the snowstorm that was scheduled to hit Kalamazoo on Thursday. Thursday was the day our flight to Florida was scheduled to leave. I got an e-mail from American Airlines saying that I could reschedule my flight if I wanted to try to avoid the storm. Um, yes please! Rex and I were at fellowship group from church when I got the requested call from the airline, so I excused myself for the “quick” call.

A half an hour later…when everyone in my fellowship group probably worried I had expired down in the basement…I was faced with a choice: take an earlier flight for $600+ dollars, or keep my original flight and hope for the best.

Y’all, $600 is a lot of money. I kept the original flight and hoped for the best.

I did not get the best.

When we got to the airport in Kalamazoo on Thursday, it was baaaarely snowing. I admit that I really thought we were going to make it to our connecting flight in Chicago. Our flight wasn’t even delayed! Cheer! Then, while waiting, I saw on the weather channel that “350+ flights” had been cancelled out of the Chicago airport. The news anchor was standing on Navy Pier dressed in more layers than a 7-layer taco dip, and she was being pummeled with whiteout snow. It didn’t look good. But our flight hadn’t even been delayed! Maybe there was some flight science I didn’t know about that allows pilots to fly in whiteout conditions!

Oh, you poor, naiive little Christine. *shakes head*

Sure enough, our flight got delayed…then got delayed again…and it was delayed enough that we would officially miss our connecting flight in Chicago.

Let’s remember – this part of the story takes place on a Thursday (that gets important in a minute).

I walked up to the desk. The gate agent was busy dealing with a very flustery and rude lady. I mean, delays are never good, but don’t be rude to the gate agent. I assure you that she doesn’t want to deal with delays either. Anyway. Mrs. Flustered finally left, and it was my turn. I explained my situation, and the gate agent plastered on a fake smile and said she’d try to help. While she was clicking away on her computer, a guy came and whispered something in her ear. Her already fake smile faltered, and she looked at me with pity.

“Everything okay?” I asked.

“The flight just got cancelled,” she answered.

Okay. I could handle this. No need to be dramatic just because I was stuck in a snowstorm instead of at the beach. (I mean, at least the airport wasn’t burning down in Kalamazoo!). I plastered on my own fake smile and said, “Okay, what are my options?”

Click click click click

Click click click click

Click click click click

After a ridiculous amount of clicking, she said the soonest she could get me out would be Sunday.

SUNDAY.

“All of the other flights that cancelled today have rebooked onto Friday and Saturday,” she said. “Everything’s sold out.”

“Can I fly out of Grand Rapids?” I asked. “Detroit? Chicago?”

As a restless line of people waited behind me, the gate agent checked Detroit, Chicago, Flint, South Bend, Grand Rapids, and a couple others I don’t even remember now. Out of seven surrounding cities, the soonest she could get us to Florida would be Sunday. Rex and I agreed that flying to Florida for one day wasn’t worth it, and I started feeling very, very dejected.

Then I called American Airlines, hoping maybe they’d find something that my gate agent didn’t. To make a very long story short, forty-five minutes later we still had nothing. The guy on the phone was really amazed. “This is so crazy,” he said. “Literally everything is sold out. All around you. For days.”

Greeeeaaat.

Rex, as always, had a good attitude. After a BRIEF (like, less than ten second) pity party about losing four days of perfectly good grouse hunting PTO, he said, “Well, we have the time off, the dogs are taken care of…let’s go somewhere. Where do you want to go? Just get in the car, drive south, and see where we end up?”

If you’ve been following along, you know Kalamazoo was in the middle of a snowstorm, so it’s not like we could leave Thursday night. Rex’s mom VERY KINDLY offered to pick us up from the airport and take us home. The roads were awful by that point, so that was really, really nice of her. Once at home, I literally googled “Map of the United States” and drew a mental circle within a twelve hour radius of Kalamazoo. I started looking at AirBnBs in Tennessee. I started looking at weather reports in a few cities, seeing if we could at least crack sixty degrees somewhere. Then I decided to call American Airlines again, more out of desperation than anything else. I knew there had to be a flight to Florida sooner than Sunday. There just HAD to be.

This lady on the phone did the requisite amount of clicking on her computer before talking about how amazing it was that there were literally no options. I’d heard this before. I asked again if she could check surrounding cities in Florida. Could we even get close?

Finally, she said, “Sorry, I only have one option out on Friday…it goes from Detroit to Boston, then to Fort Lauderdale. But you’d have to hold for at least twenty-five minutes while I try to get authorization.”

DONE. Let’s AUTHORIZE!

Not daring to get my hopes up, I continued to scroll AirBnB for a Plan B while I waited for this mysterious authorization. Did you know that through AirBnB, you can stay in a giant fake cow in the middle of a cow pasture? You can.

Anyway, three hours after our flight cancelled, my hero from American Airlines got the mysterious authorization to send us to Boston and then to Fort Lauderdale on Friday – only one day late! Still totally worth going. We don’t have to stay in the cow after all!

I was ready to cheer, but smart enough not to. I had the sinking feeling our travel woes weren’t over.

I was right.

We spent the night at home, dejected but with a tiny sparkle of hope. Maybe by that time on Friday, we’d be in Florida.

Friday morning, we woke up super early so that we could get to Detroit in plenty of time. We didn’t want our own mistake to be what kept us from our precious flight. After a quick breakfast at Ted and Marie’s cafe (yum), we set off on our Friday adventure.

Once we got to Detroit, our flight was delayed. Not long enough to miss our connection in Boston, but delayed nonetheless. Then I got an e-mail that our flight from Boston was delayed by a few hours. So many delays!! Would more planes get cancelled? WOULD I EVER LEAVE THE STATE OF MICHIGAN EVER AGAIN?!?!

Well. When we F-I-N-A-L-L-Y got on the plane to leave Detroit, and my hopes were high that I would at least get a vacation in Boston, the pilot came over the intercom.

“Erm, this is your captain speaking…we’re going to have to wait a bit because we’re trying to get fuel, but the underground fuel pumps are frozen. We’re doing what we can to get them defrosted.”

What do you do to defrost underground fuel pumps?! I have no idea. It must have worked, though, because after a small delay (most delays seem small at this point), we were finally up in the air. CHEEEEEER!

Our Boston to Florida flight was supposed to leave at 4:50 PM. It’s currently been delayed twice, and it’s supposed to leave at 7:30. That puts us in around 11:30. I’ve already decided that if we get in tonight at all, I’m calling the whole thing a win. I’m waiting for them to cancel this flight too but hoping against hope that it’s just delayed for some weird, insignificant reason. The weather here looks fine…though Boston was under a “Gale Warning” earlier today. I didn’t even know a “Gale Warning” was a thing.

So my poor, handsome Rex has been hopscotching the country for two days in his suit. We hope to go to the Yacht Club with Nana, and he doesn’t want to get his suit wrinkly. He doesn’t look too happy about so much time looking dapper.

I decided to go do some airport exploring while we were stuck here, more to stretch my legs than anything else. As I started to walk away from Rex, the fire alarms started blaring. Like, loud screeching, flashing lights all over the place, the whole thing. It was like in an action movie about an airport disaster. You’d think everyone would be running around in pandemonium, right?

No. Most people barely looked up from their iphones. Did NOTHING in their elementary school experiences prepare them for this? The teacher in me was ready to put us all in an orderly line and jump off a jet bridge and down to safety. Instead, someone came over the loudspeaker and said, “The alarms have alerted us to an emergency situation in the airport. The fire department has been contacted. Please await further instructions.”

I “awaited,” but the further instructions never came. After about ten minutes, the alarms went off, and I sat down to type up this blog post.

As I’ve typed this, I’ve watched the sun set in Boston over the planes taking off and landing. I can’t help hoping that I’ll be on one of those planes soon, and that when the sun comes up again I’ll be watching it from a beach in Florida.

Wish us luck, please! We certainly need it!

Let’s begin today’s post with a photo of Penny from this morning. She’s looking very proud of herself after she climbed some stairs, made it to a landing, and then realized she was finally taller than everyone. It was like a little puggy dream come true.

That’s really all I have to say about that picture. The way I see it, a picture of a pug is a good way to start any blog post. Regarding the rest of this post, I’ve got good news and bad news for you:

Bad news: There are no other pug pictures in this post.

Good news: The scenery pictures are beautiful like whoa.

We spent most of our day today at Rock Island State Park. In my opinion, we unintentionally saved the best for last.

We started out by going to the Rock Island Emporium. To explain why we stopped there, I need to take you back to church last Sunday. We met a couple there, I’ll call them Greg and Shirley, and the following conversation happened:

Greg: Have y’all been to the Rock Island Emporium yet?

Me: No, should we go?

Greg: Oh yeah! It’s a great little store. Lots of cool stuff.

Shirley: We own it.

Greg: SHIRLEY!!! You can’t tell them we own it! Now we sound all biased.

Shirley: *eyeroll* Well we do own it…

So we had to stop into Greg and Shirley’s store. After all, we bonded at the potluck. The Rock Island Emporium is a down-home awesome store with this handmade sign out front:

Shirley was the one behind the counter when we walked in. It was fun to see her again. In the main display case at the front of the store, the bottom shelf was reserved for her little dog Lola. Lola was such a sweetie! When Shirley found out we are dog people, she opened the display case and said, “Get to work, Lola. Do your job.” Then Lola came out and greeted us.

We shopped around for a while and found lots of cool things. When I held up a jar of strawberry jam, Shirley said, “Remember Beth from church? Those are all Beth’s jams!”

So obviously we had to buy Church Beth’s jams. She’s one of our Tennessee besties. I held up Church Beth’s pepper jelly and said, “Pepper jelly? What do you eat with pepper jelly?”

Shirley was shocked. “You’ve never had pepper jelly?? Is this a South thing? Here y’all, let me get you some.” She pulled some pepper jelly out of her fridge and gave us some samples on crackers. Then we had to buy that too.

After the Emporium, it was off to the state park! We spent the next several hours chasing waterfalls. I can’t even tell you how many we found. We stopped at quite a few to let Rex take pictures. He’d set up his camera, click away, and I’d go scout out our next location. It was a good system when so many falls were close together. Check these out!

At the bottom of one set of falls, we had a real picnic (in contrast to a snack picnic. A real picnic includes sandwiches or some other main course). It was one of the most beautiful picnics I’ve ever had. Then, while Rex took more pictures, I took a short snooze on a fallen log that crossed a stream. When I woke up, I almost fell off into the water. Oops.

Here are some ruins of…something. It was across from an abandoned cotton mill.

Toward the end of our hiking adventure, we found an olllllllld cemetery. All of the graves for which we could read the writing were from the mid-1800’s. There was one grave for an infant son where the birth and death dates were the same, and I felt so bad for the mom of that little boy. I wanted to give her a hug and then cross-stitch together or something. Anyway, that’s sad. Let’s not talk about that. Instead, can we talk about this grave that had a HAT on top of it?! And the hat was covered with spiderwebs and dust as if it had been there for a long time. Why does this grave have a hat? I feel like this is a short story waiting to happen.

We bought ice cream after hiking, and then it was time to head back. The horses were by our cabin again, so we brought out some carrots. I don’t think Rex or I ate one carrot out of that entire bag, but I don’t mind that the horses got them all. Those are well-spent carrots if you ask me.

After that, we sat on the porch again (shocker, right?). My editor sent over twelve book covers for me to review (eeeeee! YAAAAY!), so we had fun looking through those and choosing our favorites. Then we read our own books in peaceful quiet as the sun set over the pasture.

I’m sorry to say that this is our last night at our blissful cabin. I am hoping for an uneventful drive back home tomorrow, so for now I’m calling this my last post of the trip. Thanks once again for following along – it’s been great to have you with us. As always, I’m humbled that anyone would take time out of their day to read about our lives. See you next time!

I try hard to be a creative type of person, but I’m running out of ways to say, “and then we sat on the front porch for a while.” I don’t think I want to know the number of minutes we’ve spent on the front porch of this cabin, but it’s enough to prove we love it there. It’s so calm, the dogs love it, and we get to watch horses run around. Today I told Rex that when I’m stressed out and need to think of something calm, I’m going to pretend I’m back on this front porch again.

We did get off the front porch to go for a run. A while back I decided it would be fun to train for a half marathon…it was not my finest hour. Where were you, my friends, to say, “CHRISTINE, DON’T TRAIN FOR A HALF. THERE ARE PLENTY OF OTHER, LESS PAINFUL HOBBIES OUT THERE. YOU CAN PLAY THE CELLO. TAKE UP COMPETITIVE YO-YO. ANYTHING BESIDES RUNNING.” I obviously chose the wrong friend to tell about this endeavor, because now Lauren is training for the same half that I am. We’re supposed to be doing this together, so I can’t bail now. Ack! Any hobby that has me running five miles on an “easy day” is a hobby that should make me take a critical look at my life choices.

Luckily (or unluckily, depending on how you look at it), I have a very supportive husband. Instead of saying, “No, Christine! Don’t run! Pick another hobby like the hula hoop or learning Swedish,” he said, “Cool, I’ll run too.” That’s how we ended up running over five miles this morning while on vacation. And the worst part? I can’t even complain. It was kinda fun.

There is something wrong with me, I am telling you.

Our run was very hilly, but we passed a lot of beautiful cabins. We even saw a deer, which was SUPER COOL. “YAY! A DEER!! WHOAAAA!” Then we felt dumb because we see deer all the time at home, but somehow it was more exciting here. Here’s a picture of a deer from one of our hikes, not from the run, but you get the idea. You’ve probably seen a deer before.

We got chased by a lot of dogs on our run. Where were the owners? Why don’t people here believe in leashes? I have questions. And while I was not intimidated at needing to outrun a Yorkie, I will admit that I slowed to a walk and said, “Niiiiiiice doggy” when an angry chocolate lab thought I was getting too close to his yard. That was a little freaky.

After the run, guess what we did? You’ll never guess it.

Well, you might guess it.

We sat on the porch again! Here’s a picture of Rex and the dogs. I think it looks like preschool story time.

While in the porch swing, we took a picture called the “Double Dog Selfie.” The Triple Dog Selfie, however, was above and beyond our dog-wrangling skills.

Here’s a picture of how Penny really felt about the Double Dog Selfie:

I took a nap in a sun patch for a while. It was lovely.

For our hike today, we headed on a trail that is dog and cat friendly.

Imma stop us right there for a second – the trail was CAT FRIENDLY?! Who brings their cat hiking?! If you, reader, have brought your cat hiking, I have nothing but mad respect for you. I also want some pictures. If I were to attempt to put a harness on Elsie (our cat) and take her out into the wilderness, I fear only one of us would survive. I don’t think it would be me. She’s more what you call an indoor cat. Indoor diva. Indoor royal highness. All of the above.

So anyway, I was keeping an eagle eye out for these hardcore cats that like to traipse around the Tennessee forests. Unfortunately, I didn’t see any on the trail. We didn’t see any dogs either. Or people. From the number of spider webs Rex broke, I don’t think people had been on that trail all day. It was awesome! We saw a couple people when we finally got to Piney Falls (they came from a different direction), but all in all it was basically deserted. Fall Creek Falls is not a hoppin’ joint on a Monday night.

It was tough to get pictures of Piney Falls because they were so far off, but it was still a beautiful spot. You’ll have to come see the falls for yourself. We stopped on some rocks and enjoyed snacks (we’re all about snacks).

Dinner was a grill out again, and then we rested our tired legs in the hot tub. Running and hiking will really tire you out. Lightning caused us to come inside, so I’m kind of hoping for a storm tonight. Tomorrow we plan to go visit Rock Island State Park as long as the weather cooperates. Wish us luck!

Sunday morning started here the way it starts at home: with Rex pouring himself a cup of coffee and turning on his “Sunday Morning Hymns” playlist. We sat on the front porch for a while and chatted about what we should do for church. I suggested we try the nice-looking Methodist church down the street from us. Rex looked appalled. “But they’re Methodist!” This was somehow totally unacceptable. Google showed a Church of the Nazarene church nearby. That one was also a no-go.

Me: What’s wrong with the Church of the Nazarene?

Rex *alarmed*: WHO KNOWS?!

Rather than try to convince him to broaden his denominational horizons, I agreed to go to a Presbyterian church. The nearest one was forty minutes away, but Rex would say no drive is too long for good theology (he does acknowledge that lots of different denominations will be in Heaven…he just wanted to give us the best shot at good preaching this morning, and to him that means Presbyterian).

Luckily, it was a beautiful drive through the Cumberland Plateau. We arrived at church with a few minutes to spare, and we walked into the tiniest church I have ever attended. There were around fifteen people there, and I got the vibe they don’t get visitors often. They were very friendly, though, and a bunch of people introduced themselves to us. The woman who sat behind us, Pearl, was so old she could have called Moses a personal friend. We really liked her. During the congregational prayer (where, in a congregation of fifteen, people take turns praying their prayer requests out loud), Pearl prayed, “Dear Lord, thank you that we can be here in your house today. Thank you especially for our visitors, and please bless them!”

Yahoo! A shout-out from Pearl! And I feel like her prayers are probably supercharged from her decades of honing her praying skills.

After the service, there was a church potluck. We almost didn’t go since we obviously didn’t bring anything, but two factors convinced us to stay:

1. At least four different people came up and asked us to stay.
2. Presbyterians are, as a rule, good at pot lucks. It’s like, in the confessions of faith or something.

So we enjoyed food, fellowship, and sweet tea with the congregation of Rock Island Cumberland Presbyterian Church. We even got to eat first as the “honored guests.” I didn’t take a picture of the people eating because it felt a little too weird, but I snuck this picture of the inside of the sanctuary (don’t mind the guy up front staring at me like, “What is this weirdo visitor doing??”)

I have to hand it to Rex – I was skeptical, but he did pick a good church. The sermon was stellar, the people were kind, and the food was delicious.

When we got back to the cabin, I took a Sunday afternoon nap (yet another important staple in Presbyterian culture, lol. I’m only mostly kidding). The dogs played outside for a while.

After the nap, it was time for hiking again! Today we did the Paw Paw loop and the Cable Trail. The Paw Paw loop was listed as “easy” in our trail guide, but we had to climb over quite a few rocks and go on a lot of uneven terrain. It made us nervous for the Cable Trail, which was labeled “Difficult.”

Partway through the Paw Paw loop, we came to a gorge that was absolutely stunning. We didn’t want to get too close to the cliff edge because the drop was a few hundred feet. Even lying on our stomachs and looking over the edge was terrifying. What if the rock chose that moment to crumble off the cliff and plummet us to our deaths? Well, I’m here telling you about it, so spoiler alert: we lived.

When we finished the Paw Paw loop, we decided to try the Cable Trail because there was allegedly a beautiful waterfall at the end. When we saw the beginning of the trail, though…we weren’t sure it was worth the danger. I have hiked a lot in my thirty-two years, and I have never been on a trail as steep as the Cable Trail. It was named because of the steel cable that you have to hold onto while lowering yourself over rocks (or, on the way back, pulling yourself up over rocks). We tried to get a picture of it, but as is so often true with pictures, it doesn’t do it justice. This thing was STEEP and SCARY.

When we got to the bottom, the waterfall was absolutely worth the hike. Also, it was almost deserted. That’s probably because the hike was so treacherous that smarter people take other trails. There were two people leaving as we arrived, but then we had the whole place to ourselves. Rex set up his tripod and went to work taking pictures of the glorious waterfall. I sat on a rock and helped by saying, “Ooooooo, what a great picture” every now and then (every artist needs fans!).

After Rex had about a kabillion pictures, we headed back up the Cable Trail. It was a little too overwhelming to look all the way to the top, so I focused on one rock in front of me at a time. But, one rock at a time, I made it to the top! There’s a metaphor for life buried in there, I know it.

We watched the sunset over the horse pasture, and then I made some spaghetti for dinner. Yum! Now I’m blogging, Rex is feeding the dogs, and we’re all a bit exhausted. I may go sit in the hot tub for a while.

I have no good conclusion. Here’s a horse from the pasture. Good night.

It’s not like we sat on the front porch ALL day.

Just all day so far.

It’s almost 11:00 AM as I type this, and we’ve had a fun morning. I’m checking into the blog because Rex is cooking breakfast for us (what a guy), and I’ve got some time to write.

The front porch of our cabin is perfection: it has a porch swing, rocking chairs, side tables for our coffee/tea, and it overlooks some horse pastures where we can watch horses grazing and doing horse things. The best part of the porch, though, is this:

Yes, a gate. To the casual observer, this gate might not look very important. To us, though, it means that dogs can be on the porch with us without fear of them running off! Yippee!!

We spent the morning watching horses and dogs. So fun.

At one point Rex said I should stop trying to stage pictures (which was probably true), but I said “It’s for the BLOG!” and kept trying to get pictures of the perfection. “Ruby, sit!” “Elvis, get your head out of the rails!” “Penny, stick your tongue out!” “Rex, pretend like you’re enjoying a sip of coffee!” (lol). Then, as if on cue, Ruby jumped in front of a picture of Penny and tried to grab the phone out of my hand with her mouth. It’s like she was saying, “STOP TAKING PICTURES AND ENJOY THE MOMENT, LOSER!” So I did. Here’s your picture of my life lesson by Ruby:

When I put down my phone, Rex snapped this picture of me and Penny. Who’s taking too many pictures NOW? But it was cute, so here you go:

Oops, gotta go. Breakfast is ready. More later!

Okay, I’m back. It’s now 8:15 PM, so we’ve had a full day. When I last left you, we were eating the delicious breakfast that Rex cooked. After that, we went back to the front porch again and watched a storm front move in. Our dogs didn’t like the thunder. Once it started raining, it was time to bust out the indoor activities we brought for just such a situation. Hooray!

Rex worked on the thousand-piece puzzle we brought, and I worked on my cross stitch project. I know, I know….cross stitch?! Who do I think I am, some pioneer days woman? Except they can be forgiven for cross stitching because TV and the internet hadn’t been invented yet. I don’t know why I thought buying a cross-stitch project was a good idea, exactly. But it’s a fun indoor activity, and I made some headway while it was raining. Can you guess what the picture will be?

It’s a work in progress. Don’t judge me.

The rain let up after a while, and we went down to the pasture to feed the horses some of our carrots. They loved them. I could see this becoming a daily occurrence.

After feeding the horses, it was time to go hike! We went to Fall Creek Falls State Park and sought out some waterfalls. Rex also found this weird cave thing, where I was sure he was going to get eaten by a bear or swarmed by bats or something. Who walks into a random cave!? Rex, that’s who.

Here are some waterfall pics:

Fall Creek Falls, the park’s namesake, was probably my favorite waterfall. It was so beautiful as it flowed over the edge of the rock, and pigeons flew behind it to get to their nests (which made Rex comment that he misses our pigeons. Who misses pigeons!? Rex, that’s who). We set out to get to the bottom of the falls, which was quite a steep hike but definitely worth it.

At the bottom of the falls, we had a small picnic of poptarts and Doritos. Rex gazed up at the falls and said, “Can you guess what I’m thinking right now?”

“Pigeons?” I guessed. BECAUSE HE’D SAID HE MISSED THE PIGEONS. THIS IS A LOGICAL GUESS, PEOPLE. Rex, however, looked horrified. “Pigeons?!” he screeched. You think I’m staring up at this majestic waterfall, and the first thing I think of is pigeons?!?”

“Uh…I guess not?” I answered. “What were you thinking about?”

“Psalm 121!” he said. “‘I lift my eyes to the hills; where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the maker of Heaven and Earth.'”

Okay but like…there is no way I would have guessed that. Maybe when we’re married for fifty years or something. With our measly eleven, I had no shot at that level of mind reading.

“We’re looking at a hill!” Rex didn’t give up, gesturing wildly at the mountain in front of us. “And the water is like our help that is coming down from the Lord, and he made all the majesty of this waterfall. It makes perfect sense.” He hung his head. “Pigeons?!?! My wife thinks my first thought was pigeons?! I have failed somewhere.”

Tee hee. Oops. So we had a good laugh about that. Apparently Rex is a much deeper thinker than I gave him credit for in that moment.

When we came back to the cabin from hiking, we had dinner on the grill: burgers and brats. Yum! Now we’re watching the Olympics (again. Oh how I love the Olympics) while I blog and Rex edits pics.

Thanks for the comments, people who commented. It’s always great to know someone reads this thing. See you tomorrow!

I go back to school in about a week and a half, but Rex and I are sneaking in one last summer trip. We’re in Tennessee, staying at a cabin on some property that used to be a golf course. It’s beautiful!

The cabin is also dog friendly, making it even better, so we brought the whole muttley crew.

Most of the nine-hour drive here, whenever I turned around to check on the dogs, I saw one eyeball sticking out of one of the kennel holes. No prizes for guessing which dog was sticking her eyeball at me the whole time.

We kept telling the dogs we were going to a really far away vet. “Only one hour until we’re at the vet, guys!”

We passed the time by listening to some Dateline podcasts, and Rex turned on a jiu jitsu podcast that was THREE HOURS AND TWENTY-SIX MINUTES LONG. Who knew there was that much in the universe to say about jiu jitsu?! I may have fallen asleep for part of it. Not because it was boring, of course…

Or maybe because it was boring. *shrug* At one point, the guy on the podcast said, “Jiu jitsu is not just a sport. It’s a philosophy. It’s a way of life. It’s at the root of everything we do.”

Like, whoa Rex. Is this a hobby or a cult?!

There’s not a lot I can say about nine hours in the car…basically there was the Penny eyeball trying to bore a hole into my brain, Rex learned a lot about jiu jitsu, and we saw this life-size T-Rex.

Don’t ask questions about the T-Rex. I don’t have answers.

After arriving at our cabin, we unpacked and settled in. Then we decided to go get some groceries for the week. We went to the Gly Wiggly, which is Piggly Wiggly with some letters broken.

We had to drive over twenty minutes to get to the nearest grocery store, which should tell you how remote our cabin is. It’s kind of awesome that we’re in the middle of nowhere, yet the cabin is fully equipped with all modern amenities.

As we were leaving the Gly Wiggly with way too much food, a man in a red truck pulled up to talk to us. He was around sixty years old and looked friendly enough. “Excuse me,” he said. “I noticed the stickers on your truck. Do y’all have bird dogs?”

“Yes, sir!” said Rex. I immediately thought, “OH, HERE WE GO.”

The guy asked if Rex grouse hunts, and Rex smirked. “I do. It’s…kind of my thing.” The subtext was, “It’s all but consumed my life and I LOVE IT!!!!!!!!!!!!” but Rex was playing it cool.

The guy stuck his hand out of his truck window. “George Hamilton,” he said. “Nice to meet ya.”

I’ll spare you the details, but now George Hamilton and Rex are friends and are planning a grouse trip in Michigan this fall. Rex meets his friends in the weirdest ways. One was by the blueberries at Meijer…one was in the fishing department at Gander Mountain…and now one is in the parking lot of a Tennessee Gly Wiggly. I mean, was Rex not paying attention during those Dateline podcasts?! This guy could be a serial killer who preys on unsuspecting grouse-loving tourists!

Not likely, but still.

Now I’m cooking a frozen pizza while we watch the Olympics, and Rex is scouring the Google for information about his new friend George Hamilton. He’s an auctioneer, which is a pretty cool job if you ask me.

Overall, the trip is off to a great start. Stay tuned for stories of hiking and… actually, I have no idea what else we’re doing. Probably eating a lot of the food we just bought and hopefully having a lot of fun!

I just got back from a trip to Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, and I didn’t plan to blog about it. After all, I was backpacking in the Porcupine Mountains for a few nights and then staying at a remote campground. We didn’t have access to a shower, let alone wifi.

But then, as our friends’ motor home was on a steep slant, broken down, and threatening to roll into the lake? Well, my fingers started getting twitchy. I needed a keyboard and wifi, but I made do with a notebook and pen (because after all, it’s not like I would travel without at least a notebook – who knows when something like this might happen?!). So that’s why you’re getting a one-post blog instead of daily anecdotes. Sometimes life just throws you a singular blog post.

We were on a fishing trip with our friends Chad and Amy. At the point of this bloggable story, Rex and I were setting up camp at our campsite. Our friends had a camper, but we had a tent (because we’re more hard core….or because we simply don’t have a camper. Take your pick).

Anyway, a text came through to Rex (whoo hoo! Momentary service! We hadn’t had service for days!). Our friends were stuck, broken down, on the public fishing launch where they had been putting in their boat.

We hopped in the truck and went to see our friends (not that we could really do anything, but it seemed like the right thing to do). Their motor home isn’t new, exactly. As a matter of fact, it’s older than me. So. It could be that this trip was too much for the lil guy, and he finally crapped out on them. Or maybe it was something easily fixable. At that point, we had no idea. Chad and Amy thought the battery might need a jump, so they’d requested help from a random guy named Mike.

Mike was a middle aged guy wearing a faded yellow University of Michigan shirt. He was out with his dog Pumpkin, the sweetest orange-colored retriever that you ever did see. Mike had a strong Yooper accent and a disdain for “city folk,” though he determined we were not, in fact, the dreaded “city folk” once he and Rex started talking about grouse hunting. *eyeroll*

When our friends attempted to jump the battery, the engine started smoking. This, as a rule, is never a good sign. After that attempt, the engine wouldn’t do anything when they tried to turn the key. It was super dead.

Because we are more city folk than we’d care to admit, all four of us did what any good city folk would do in this situation: we whipped out our phones.

“Yer not gonna get good service,” Mike said, petting Pumpkin. “We don’ like all that cell service up here. No service keeps them city folk away.”

Yeah, well, WE NEED SOME SERVICE AT THE MOMENT, MIKE. I called Pumpkin over to help keep me calm. Dogs are great for that. She walked over, turned around, and promptly sat on my feet. Mike said that Pumpkin does this because she knows people can’t walk away if she’s sitting on their feet, and they’re more likely to keep petting her. Sweet dog.

Rex finally got a bar of service (hooray!). He looked up all the local auto repair places (two of them within about a gazillion mile radius).

“Aw, they’re not gon’ be open,” said Mike. “The rodeo’s in town!”

Of course it was.

And of course they weren’t open. Because who could have car trouble when the RODEO was in town? It goes against the laws of science or something.

The one place had an after hours number to call for emergencies. “Write this down,” Rex instructed me. I held my pen ready.

“Okay, it’s 906-327-56…. dang it! I lost service! I don’t know the last two numbers!”

“Well,” I said, trying to be helpful, “there are literally only a hundred possible phone numbers with that beginning. We could try them all.” (This wasn’t as hopeful as I thought).

Chad tried calling. He got one more digit before he lost service. Whoo hoo! We were down to only ten possible numbers!

Time out: can I remind you that this motor home is broken down IN the public boat launch? So not only is it slanting down toward the water, but it’s blocking the launch, making it impossible for anyone to get in or out? YOU’RE ALL SPENDING THE NIGHT ON THE LAKE, PEOPLE! GET COMFY!

Hehehe…not exactly. There weren’t people actively trying to get in or out at this time (thank goodness for the U.P. being so remote), but if there were people, they weren’t going anywhere. We were blocking the whole thing.

When we finally – finally! – got the blessed last number to the phone number, we called it. The guy’s answering machine said he was “out of the office.”

“He’s at the rodeo,” said Mike. “I guarantee yeh.”

Thanks Mike. Why was Mike even still here at this point? He wasn’t being helpful…he couldn’t do anything…I think he was enjoying this excitement that we brought into his life. “Call 911” said Mike.

“This isn’t a life-threatening emergency,” said Chad.

“Yeh, but 911 will know what to do. They kin give you some advice.”

Please tell me Mike has called 911 for life advice before.

“There’s got to be a 24-hour towing service somewhere,” I said.

“No, there doesn’t,” said Amy. “It’s the U.P.”

Amy was right. It was Friday night, and nowhere was going to be open until Monday.

“Maybe we can ask the camp host,” Chad suggested. The camp host is basically the director of the campground.

“Well sure yeh can ask him, if he’s sober today! Hahaha!” Mike, once again, was enjoying our peril a little too much.

Rex and Chad left to go find the camp host, Mike finally left to walk his dog, and Amy and I waited in the motor home.

Before too long, the men came back with the camp host. He was at least mostly sober. “This is gonna be great!” he said, hopping out of his truck. “We’ll hook up the ratchet straps to my truck and try to pull the motor home out. When you put it in neutral I might be able to pull it, or it might pull us into the lake. But what do I care because this isn’t my truck! Ha!”

I didn’t pause to wonder whose truck it was. Now that I’m typing this…whose truck was that?! But after over an hour of waiting for help, we were happy for any chance at salvation. Camp Host guy hooked up the ratchet straps, Chad put the motor home in neutral, and we all held our breath.

For a heart-stopping moment, nothing happened.

Then, slowly, the motor home started moving up the ramp. It was working!

Camp host guy was a total star. He towed our friends back to the campsite so that they could at least be broken down somewhere where they wouldn’t be blocking traffic. Mike drove by to check on us, and he and Rex talked grouse for a while longer. Mike really didn’t have a lot going on.

Rex had to be back to work on Monday, so we had to leave our friends stranded. I know, I know – we’re terrible people. But they were stranded AT the campsite, and before we left we drove them to town for extra groceries, propane, and other supplies. We tried our best to help.

Karma still kicked us in the butt, though – when we tried to stop for a hotel on our way home Saturday, we called FIFTY-FOUR hotels and couldn’t find a vacancy. FIFTY-FOUR. The entire lower part of the U.P. and the upper part of the lower peninsula were completely sold out. It was a crazy Mary and Joseph situation. Rex said I should start asking if anyone had a stable out back where we could sleep.

In the end, we drove through the night and got home at 5 AM. Bleh! We stopped a couple times at rest areas for nap breaks. We had too much in our back seat to put the seats down, so we had to sort of curl around the center console together. It was NOT GREAT. At one point, though, Rex reached out and held my hand as we tried to catch a nap. Maybe we were kind of miserable, but at least we were miserable together.

Our friends are still in the U.P. She’s a teacher, and he’s a truck driver with a flexible schedule, so I think they’re both a little secretly excited for the extended vacation. Keep your fingers crossed that they make it out soon!