miscellaneous Monday…A-Z style

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In May, I enjoyed going through all the photos on my phone, picking out 26 and creating an A-Z-style compilation (HERE is the link to the previous post). So, I’m doing that again. Most of these things are extremely random. That’s why I want to do a post – to remember the randomness of them all! Here goes:

A is for Apostle Islands, Wisconsin (main photo above). There aren’t many places that we put on our “must return” list, but this is one place that is on the list! We didn’t get a chance to kayak through these cliffs and caves, and we think that would be awesome. So, we’re coming back…eventually!

B is for Bridge. This is the Mackinac Bridge in Michigan (and I’ll include the Fun Facts sheet about the bridge that I found in our campground’s laundry room). And, in case you didn’t know: you pronounce Mackinac and Mackinaw the same, whichever way it’s spelled. Mackinac is the French spelling, but both are pronounced MACK-in-awe.

C is for Commandments. I snapped this photo at the bottom of Horseshoe Falls, in Munising, Michigan.

D is for Dented by a Deer! Thanks to a deer, we now have new dents in our truck. Hubby temporarily “fixed” the part that was so bent we couldn’t open the door…with duct tape! That Dear Deer couldn’t just dent one panel of the truck…he had to dent the front panel, the driver’s side door, AND the driver’s side cab door. Ugh!

E is for Eagle. Yep, that’s an eagle. Really, truly! Clearly, I need a more powerful camera lens! :o)

F is for Fish Boil. We had heard that one of the “must” things to do in Door County, Wisconsin, was to go to a Fish Boil. So, of course, we did. When the cook throws kerosene on the fire, it’s not only for the show, but the fish oil and scum boils over, and the fish is ready to eat!

G is for Grandfather Clock…the largest in the world!

H is for Houses… birdhouses. When hunting for Dambo Trolls, if you see any birdhouses similar to these, that means you’re getting close!

I is for Island. There are a lot of little islands in Rainy Lake, in Voyageurs National Park. If any bit of land has a tree on it, it’s considered an island!

J is for Jack Pine Lumberjack Show. It was fun cheering for “our” lumberjack, Ian, and booing for the other team’s lumberjack (I can’t remember his name). :o)

K is for Kitchen…and trying my best to stay out of the kitchen during our various pickleball games!

L is for, of course, Lenore! My hubby saw this street sign near Astoria, Oregon, and on the way back from wherever we were going, we pulled over to get a shot. Cuz, why not?!? :o)

M is for Monarch…as in butterflies! So cute. I snapped these little guys at the Green Bay Botanical Garden.

N is for National Lakeshore. Our boat tour of Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore was beautiful, and we’re SO happy we chose to sit inside (many people weren’t so happy sitting on the top deck when it started to rain!).

O is for Oregon Shakespeare Festival. We attended A Midsummer Night’s Dream. It was very good!

P is for Pasties (pronounced PASS-tee for singular or PASS-teez for plural). It’s a portable meat hand pie, originally brought to the area by Cornish miners. We had to try one (while in Michigan!), they were… just OK. :o)

Q is for Quacking! These ducks all make a beeline when they see people on the pier. Dinnertime!

R is for Rafters. The Paradise Lodge at Mount Rainier National Park has some cool lanterns hanging from some cool rafters!

S is for Sea Stars. I used to call them star fish, but now that I know better, I do better, haha!(“Sea star” and “starfish” refer to the exact same marine animal, but “sea star” is the term because these creatures are not actually fish.)

T is for Teeny Tiny Camper! This little guy was perched up on some kind of platform, just on the side of the road in Tillamook, Oregon. How do people find the time to create such things!? Did they actually use it at some point? I want the backstory! :o)

U is for Underground. We visited Lava Beds National Monument in Northern California and went underground into some lava tube caves. The monument contains over 800 lava tube caves.

V is for Voyageur (whew! V wasn’t too hard to find this go around!). This giant Voyageur is just outside Ranier, Minnesota, near Voyageurs National Park.

W is for World War II. This tugboat, Tug Ludington, participated in D-Day. Thank you for your service! It now lives in Kewaunee, Wisconsin.

X is for Xercise. We climbed 207 steps but were rewarded with a great view of Lake Huron and this arch on Mackinac Island. We rode our bikes around the island (which is only just over 8 miles). Pro tip: ride clockwise rather than counter-clockwise. We did this, and we avoided the masses of people going the other way. Yay!

Y is for Yellow. Acres and acres of yellow!

Z is for Zoo. We rode our bikes on the Ahnapee Trail in Wisconsin and came across a small town zoo. We had the place to ourselves. There were goats, pheasants, a white fox…and not much else, haha!

That’s it for the random A-Z photos! Certainly not all of them, but I’ll be able to recall at least these 26 bits and pieces from our 2026 summer travels. I hope you have a terrific day and get to do or learn something NEW today!

Miscellaneous Monday…SO many NEW list updates!

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Happy Monday! Boy, am I behind on updating my various lists! I think I have something NEW for each and every list!

For my Waterfalls list, we visited Wagner Falls, Miners Falls, Horseshoe Falls, Spray Falls, and Bridal Veil Falls – all in Michigan. The main photo above is of Spray Falls on the Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore.

Next, for my National Parks list, we recently visited Voyageurs National Park. We have 24 more to go until we have visited them all. Can we make it?! :o)

Then, for my Lighthouse photo collection, I’ve photographed Devil’s Island Lighthouse, Raspberry Island Lighthouse, Round Island Lighthouse, and Cheboygan Crib Rear Lighthouse.

For my Trolls list: We visited all five trolls in the Detroit Lakes, Minnesota, area. They were Ronny Funny Face, Alexa’s Elixir, Barefoot Frida, Jacob Everear, and Long Leif. Then we visited Benny the Beard Fisher in Germfask, Michigan. He was a favorite (photo below). The other photos are on the Troll list page.

And lastly, for my movie location list, we visited Mackinac Island, where Somewhere in Time was filmed. We watched the movie the night before we visited and cracked up at how sort of cheesy and dramatic this 70’s film was. Haha! I had seen the film, but my hubby had not. The Round Island Lighthouse gets put on my Lighthouse list as well as on the movie locations list. A two-fer! :o)

Updates complete. It’s been fun visiting these NEW-to-us places. I hope you all have a terrific day and learn or do something NEW today!

a NEW Thursday thought

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Happy Thursday! As we traveled through North Dakota, we passed several sunflower fields, but we were usually on freeways and couldn’t stop to take photos. We finally found one where we could stop. What a cute, happy-looking scene! I loved it! Here is more of the field:

Have a great day! I hope you get to do, learn, or experience something NEW today!

Miscellaneous Monday…NEW stuff i gotta share

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Happy Monday! I’m updating my National Parks bucket list. We’re at 38 out of 63. We visited Theodore Roosevelt National Park in North Dakota recently. Also, North Dakota is a NEW state for us… another state, another sticker on the side of our RV!

We saw wild horses, bison, and prairie dogs. I didn’t even notice this little prairie dog (front and center) until I uploaded this photo.

In other NEWs, we visited the world’s shortest river. The Roe River in Great Falls, Montana, is said to be the world’s shortest river. We were riding our bikes on the River’s Edge trail, and while we were stopped at Giant Springs, we chatted with a gentleman who told us that his brother had to get lawyers involved to have the Roe River designated as the shortest river. Giant Springs flows 201 feet and then joins the Missouri River. That’s pretty short! The Giant Springs State Park is very near the Lewis & Clark Interpretive Center that we also visited (on a different day). It was great to learn NEW things!

Also, I’m updating my waterfalls bucket list. While up visiting Banff, Canada, we hiked the Johnston Canyon trail. It was great! It has an upper falls and a lower falls, but there were a few more unnamed falls along the trail too.

We’ve been keeping our retirement active. Our favorites are playing pickleball, riding our bikes, and hiking to waterfalls. We’re blessed to have our RV to travel to NEW and very beautiful places!

I hope you have a great day and get to learn or do something NEW today! Take care!

Miscellaneous Monday…NEW stuff i gotta share

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Happy Monday!

When the air is smoky from wildfires, these are the type of sunset photos you get! The funny thing is, the air didn’t seem overly smoky – I guess a little goes a long way.

It’s a little bit past mid-year, so I recently reviewed my 26 for 2026 list of things to do. I accomplished some things, failed at other things, and some things are still in process. For some of the things I’ve failed at, I tell myself, “You should have known not to put that on the list!” Oh well, live and learn! Here’s my accounting of what I’ve succeeded at and what I’ve failed at. Here goes:

**Do a slow read of Count of Monte Cristo (1900 pages divided by 365 = 6-ish pages a day!) SUCCESS! I did a slow read for quite a while, but then I just wanted to finish it, so I did. When people ask what my favorite movie is, I used to always say, Count of Monte Cristo. But now that I know the movie is pretty far off from what actually happens in the book, I’m not sure. Well, OK, I think it’s still my favorite movie, even with the additional knowledge that it’s not true to the book.

**Read an actual paper book at least once a month (get your reading stamina back in shape!) I’m on track…maybe one month behind, but I’ll catch up!

**Attempt to make macarons. I have not tried this YET. I’m not going to even attempt this while traveling, so when we get home in October, I’ll hopefully get to this. Maybe I’ll set a reminder in my phone to do this. Scheduling is life!

**Visit 26 NEW places. In process! With traveling to Southeast Asia earlier this year, and now on our RV trip, I think I’ll accomplish this one!

**Take a daily photo for at least 1 month (better if more!) Not yet. This is something I could easily do if I’d just remember. Again, maybe I’ll set a reminder on my phone. August is coming up. That should be the month!

**Deep clean an entire room. Nope. Not yet. I guess I could choose a room in the RV to deep clean! Hmmm….

**Do the Amy Johnson Crow’s 52 Ancestors challenge (at least 15 of the 52). Nope. Haven’t done a single one! Will I? Can I commit? We’ll see.

**Get family photos taken. SUCCESS! They turned out great. I have to thank my daughter-in-law for suggesting and scheduling the photographer. Otherwise, this one may have failed. But I’ll take the success, any way I can get it! :o)

**Read/listen to at least 52 books. In process. I’m at 43 of 52. I think I’ll probably succeed.

**Do a random act of kindness (multiple times). In process. I’ve done at least one! As we travel, we do our laundry at laundromats. Usually, they are in the campgrounds where we are staying, but one week, the campground didn’t have a laundry, so we went to a nearby town to do it. Some of the people doing their laundry seemed to be down on their luck. So, I sneakily stacked enough quarters for a load of laundry on top of 3 or 4 washers, when no one could see me doing it. As I sat waiting for my clothes to dry, I watched to see if anyone would use those quarters. One guy looked at the quarters, but left them there and put his own money in. I’m not sure what people thought. I’ll never know. I just hope someone who needed a free load of washing done actually used the quarters. And I hope the manager didn’t scoop up the quarters and add them to their coffers! :o) Oh well, I tried.

**While traveling, mail a book to “A” (granddaughter) with accompanied audio of me reading it. DONE! SUCCESS!

**Plan an anniversary dinner while in Singapore. FAIL. We did eat dinner, but it was not planned, and it was at a burger joint in a mall. I won’t count that as a success!

**Research all-inclusive resorts for a possible family Christmas trip. FAIL. We won’t be able to get everyone together this year, so I haven’t even tried this. Maybe next year?

**Design and print out the 2025 photo pages. Nope, not yet.

**Track your steps. FAIL. My watch does this, but I haven’t been intentional about it.

**Track your sugar intake. BIG FAIL. It’s hard to do! Any suggestions on how to make it easier?

**Track protein and fiber. FAIL! Same complaint as above!!

**Attend at least 5 live performances. SUCCESS!

**Finish reading all of Susan Meissner’s books. Almost! I’ve read all of her books except a children’s book that I just need to get from our library when we get home.

**Complete a writing course. No. And I’m not really in the mood anymore, so…???

**Consistently use weight training app. FAIL. What can I say?

**Systematically keep in touch with friends and family while traveling. Mostly fail. It’s sporatic, so I clearly don’t have a system.

**Plan activities for family get-together in Yellowstone so it’s memorable. Mostly fail, but my daughter-in-law said she’d plan some activities, so it’ll likely happen – just not by me. Do I count that? Probably not huh?

**Work in your art journal and your junk journal regularly. Nope – not regularly.

**Take vitamins daily. Not daily. I usually only remember if I see my hubby taking his! Ha!

**Make two more Retirement Journal versions (Southeast Asia and NW RVing). SUCCESS! I have a journal for the Southeast Asia trip, and I’m caught up on our RVing journal. Yay!

Phew! That’s it. I’ve made a few reminders in my phone, so we’ll see if a few more get completed before the end of the year.

I hope you all have a fabulous day and get to do or learn something NEW today!

    a NEW (to me) sign

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    Happy Friday! I thought of my blogging friend, Terry at Radically Retired, when I saw this sign recently (And NOT because she’s a tweaker or an idiot!!!!) Terry has been posting funny signs lately – and THAT’s why I thought of her! I wanted to join in the fun and post this funny sign too. This sign was posted just before a very tight bend on a very skinny rural road. I’m sure some idiots take the curve way too fast!

    I hope everyone is having an excellent day and doing, learning, or laughing at something NEW today!

    another NEW national park crossed off our bucket list

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    Happy Wednesday! We’ve crossed off another national park from our bucket list. We visited North Cascades National Park. This is Diablo Lake. Isn’t the water a gorgeous color of aqua green?!?

    I learned something NEW (from Google, of course) about how the lake gets this beautiful coloring. It’s partly because of “glacial flour”. I’d never heard of glacial flour before. When massive glaciers move down the mountains and grind against mountain rocks, it makes an ultra-fine powder called glacial flour. Then, on a bright, sunny day, the tiny dust particles floating in the water bounce blue and green light back to our eyes, while absorbing other light colors. So pretty!

    We’ve hit all 3 national parks in Washington in the last few weeks. Time to move to another state, haha!

    I hope you have a terrific day and get to learn or do something NEW today!