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Welcome to Postcard Jar (and 2024)
Welcome to Postcard Jar and happy new year! Whether you've been reading our blog for years, follow us on social media, or are brand new, we're glad you're here. Sharing our best tips for living and traveling well and helping you to take stress-free vacations brings us...
It’s Postcard Jar’s fifth blogiversary!
Five years ago today, we sat in a lounge at the Doubletree Hotel in Rochester, Minnesota, and published our first-ever blog post on postcardjar.com. It was the day before I would undergo a procedure at the Mayo Clinic that would eventually diagnose me with a chronic...
Yes, our marriage survived a 5,000 mile road trip
When we returned from our 5,000 mile road trip through the Southeast, we told you that we'd be locking ourselves into our house in Nebraska so we could write all about it. And, with the exception of a seven course whole-hog Valentine's Day dinner at The Pioneer Woman...
It’s National Plan for Vacation Day!
For more than 20 years, I didn't have any choice on when I'd take a vacation. The school board granted my days when they approved the yearly calendar every February. And even though I did have some time off in summers, there were always more meetings, more planning...
Woo-hoo! Our updated travel blog is here!
After weeks of editing, cropping, categorizing and designing, our updated travel blog is here! So, what do you think? If you’ve been a reader of our blog, you'll notice it looks a little different. If you're new here - welcome to Postcard Jar. Why the change? Over...
How we ended up eating kolaces with readers of our blog
A few months ago, we got a sweet comment on our blog from a man who had read our post about 70+ Things to do in Crete, Nebraska (our hometown). He wrote, "My newly discovered half-sister and I have planned a trip to Crete in June to explore our family roots. Your...
Ann’s visit with The Weary Teacher
A couple weeks ago, while helping our daughter, Meghan, get settled at her new place in Tulsa, Oklahoma, I met another blogger who is just inspiring! Her name is Haley Curfman and she is a second grade teacher in Blackwell, Oklahoma. You might remember her (or at...
We’ve been invited to tour Italy with Deb and Massi the Driver and we can’t wait!
Yes, we've been invited to tour Italy with Deb and Massi. She's from upstate New York, backpacked through Australia and New Zealand, and worked in Silicon Valley and in Texas. He's small town boy who grew up on a Tuscan hunting estate and winery and took a job in a...
We’re sharing postcards from our readers!
As the busy travel season gets underway, we thought we take the opportunity to share a whole bunch of the postcards y'all have sent us. In this electronic age, we love going to our post office box and seeing hand written postcards from readers like you who have...
Fellow travel bloggers publish book about one of our favorite cities — Omaha
This week, we are helping fellow travel bloggers and friends, Tim and Lisa Trudell of The Walking Tourists celebrate the launch of their new book, 100 Things To Do In Omaha Before You Die. The book is a compilation of 100 vignettes covering a wide variety of things to...
At least for us, blogging is more about relationships and not just the numbers
This week marks the fourth year of our travel blog, Postcard Jar, and we can't thank you enough for following along on our journeys. Since we wrote that very first blog post from the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, we've been collecting all kids of data and...
Join us in Kearney, Nebraska, for the Plains Safaris conference April 18-20
We are excited to announce that we've been asked to speak at what is sure to be an incredible ecotourism symposium in April called Plains Safaris. That's right Plains Safaris. If you've followed our blog for any time at all, you know that we live in a small, rural...
How we spent our Valentine’s Day
We love being home together on Valentine's Day. Typically, we spend the evening cooking together while listening 80's love songs and then enjoy a nice dinner by candlelight. This year, our Valentine's Day celebration started a bit earlier in the day, as we were...
Did you know that statistics show planning a vacation makes us happier?
Get this. In 2016, Americans left more than 662 million vacation days unused. Let that sink for in a minute. Six hundred, sixty-two, million PAID VACATION DAYS were left on the table. Does that not just sound absolutely ridiculous? Like many career-minded people, I...
Where we’re headed in 2018
Some people make resolutions on New Year's Day. Not us. We make reservations. It has become a bit of a tradition for us to sit in bed on New Year's morning, sip mimosas and finalize vacation plans for the year. The best part of the day is when I get to click the,...
![Best of 2017 [part 2]: Our pics for best food, museums, views, and experiences](https://postcardjar.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/2017-part-2-e1514753302821.jpg)
Best of 2017 [part 2]: Our pics for best food, museums, views, and experiences
In Best of 2017 [part 1] we posted our picks for best attraction, show, new place, and people. Today, we're back to share some of the best food, museums, views, and experiences from our year in travel. Best food - Chicken fried steak at The Pioneer Woman Mercantile...
![Best of 2017 [part 1]: Our picks for best attraction, show, new place, and people](https://postcardjar.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/2017-part-1-e1514753314523.jpg)
Best of 2017 [part 1]: Our picks for best attraction, show, new place, and people
It is -6 degrees today where we live in Crete, Nebraska. Church was cancelled. We're still in our jammies. And we're not going outside. Instead, we're pouring a second cup of coffee, cranking the heat up, and reminiscing about some of our favorite travel experiences...
A gift from Nebraska Tourism and the most popular post from our home state
Yesterday we received a nice surprise in the mail from the Nebraska Tourism Commission Staff. As a thank-you for our help spreading the word about Nebraska's tourism industry, they sent us two beautiful calendars and each page included ... wait for it ... a postcard!...
All about Kristin Chenoweth, page caches, and a Pawhuska post (say that 10 times)
Let me just tell you about our weekend. After a busy Halloween week filled with college ministry, cooking, trick-or-treaters, doctor's appointments, and blogging, we finished a loooooooong post about 70+ things to do in Pawhuska, Oklahoma, on Thursday, posted it, and...
Yes, we’re going to be celebrity judges at the National Indian Taco Championship!
Between the two of us, we've got some interesting titles on our resumes. Sports writer, lifeguard, vice president of public relations, athletic director, lobbyist, middle school principal, travel writers, and bloggers. And now, we get to add ... wait for it ......
His boxes and our bags are packed
Today was Steve's last day of work as middle school principal at Crete Public Schools. You can read all about his decision to move on to something new HERE. At the end of the day, he packed up the last of his personal belongings from his office while I was home...
So, I kinda quit my job.
A little more than a month ago, I sat down and wrote a letter to my boss. It is one I'd been thinking about for awhile, and as I said in the letter, I wrote it with mixed emotions. I have been an educator most of my adult life. I didn't really set out to be one, it...
Our first cover story!
How cool is this? My college alma mater, the University of Nebraska - Kearney, just featured one of my photographs and our travel blog on the cover of its alumni magazine, UNK Today! It was so nice to see the story posted online today and we are looking forward to...
Blogiversary 3: By the numbers
Bloggers seem to be into numbers. Likes, followers, comments, page views, posts, sessions, bounce rates ... The list goes on and on and on. When Steve and I started our blog, we couldn't help but watch the numbers ourselves. Then, last May, we went to TBEX North...
Blogiversary 3: What a year!
Who'd a thunk it? Three years into this crazy adventure we call travel blogging, we're having the time of our lives and we can't thank you enough! Readers like you have inspired us every day with your comments and suggestions, notes about your travel experiences, and...
Crete’s Great Pumpkin Festival
Our hometown of Crete, Neb., hosted its 2nd Annual Great Pumpkin Festival this weekend and we had so much fun hosting the photo booth and meeting so many new people. This year's festival was even bigger and better than last year's inaugural event [read more about that...
Celebrating our 2nd blogiversary!
Two years ago today, we sat in a Doubletree hotel in Rochester, Minnesota, where we had returned for a third time since that January for appointments at the Mayo Clinic. The next day, I was to have an electrophysiology study and a heart biopsy in hopes of helping...
And we’re off!
After months of dilly dallying around with the idea (slash dream) of a travel blog, we decided to just get it going this weekend. We've got a day to kill in cold and gloomy Rochester, Minnesota, before I return for the third time since January to the Mayo Clinic....
Inspiring the next step on your journey