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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 so much joy.

Note: Postcard Jar is a reader supported blog and we have partnered with EF Go Ahead Tours. If you make a purchase through links in this post, we may earn a commission.

This month, we returned from our biggest trip yet. It was a nearly two-month long vacation around the world. We drove from our home in Nebraska to Minneapolis. From there, we flew to Dubai, then cruised from the Middle East all the way to New Zealand and back to Australia. It was truly the trip of a lifetime. Stay tuned, as we’ll be sharing more about our adventures abroad very soon. For now, have a look at (below) at this postcard-perfect view of Whitehaven Beach in the Whitsundays. Absolutely spectacular!

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What’s in store for 2024

Following the success our our first Postcard Jar Friends Cruise to the Caribbean in 2023, we’ve decided to host more group trips. It was such a pleasure to meet so many of you on our Caribbean cruise. And, we genuinely enjoyed making travel memories together with followers of our blog. Some of our group trips will be cruises (of course). But we’re also planning a land-based EF Go Ahead Tour to Costa Rica that you won’t want to miss. Costa Rica is one of those bucket-list destinations and we can’t wait to go back there! Speaking of travel bucket lists – do you have one? If not, sign up below for our FREE travel bucket list digital download.

Time to head south

After a few weeks at our home in Nebraska (where we’ve endured a week of sub-zero temperatures and a bazillion inches of snow), we’re headed south. Our first stop will in Pawhuska, Okla., where we have a home we share on Airbnb called Postcard Place. Pawhuska is home to The Pioneer Woman, the Osage Nation, and is where Martin Scorsese filmed much of the newly released movie, “Killers of the Flower Moon.” We just love it there and think you will, too.

Come see where they filmed the movie, eat at The Pioneer Woman Mercantile, and do some retail shopping in downtown Pawhuska. For a town of 3,700, there really is a lot to do there. In fact, we wrote a blog highlighting 70+ things to do in Pawhuska!

Relax and unwind on Alabama’s beaches

Next, we’ll drive our trusty Chrysler Pacifica to Gulf Shores, Ala., where we’ll spend a few weeks being hosted at Turquoise Place by Spectrum Resorts right on the beach!

We stayed there for a few days last winter and are over-the-top excited to return for a longer stay. Gulf Shores is a great option for families, couples, girls trips, wellness vacations, and solo travelers. Of course, we’ll share our experiences there on social media. Be sure to follow along on Facebook and Instagram.

Postcard Jar Friends Cruise to Alaska

In May, we’ll travel to Alaska for our second Postcard Jar Friends Cruise. We’ll lead a group of more than 80 Postcard Jar friends (and family) on a seven-night cruise aboard the gorgeous Celebrity Edge. We still have a few cabins available if you’d like to join us as we travel to this must-visit destination.  If you’re wondering what a group cruise with us is like, you can check out the links below to read all about our first Postcard Jar Friends Cruise to the Eastern Caribbean.

Postcard Jar Friends Cruise – Eastern Caribbean (Part 1)

Postcard Jar Friends Cruise – Eastern Caribbean (Part 2)

A new Postcard Jar partnership with EF Go Ahead Tours

In the coming year, we’re happy to announce that we’ll be partnering with EF (Education First) Go Ahead Tours on our first ever Postcard Jar land-based trip to Costa Rica!  When he worked in education, Steve led several tours for high school students through EF. Shortly after we were married, Ann and Meghan even participated in one of the tours (something they’d been planning since before we’d even started dating). As a result, we were familiar with EF and their exceptional student-based tours.

So, when Ann met a representative from EF Go Ahead Tours at a Women in Travel conference and learned that they were now offering customized adult-based tours, we decided to look into it. We’ve really enjoyed EF because they took care of all of the travel arrangements from the moment we arrived at the airport of our destination country until we were back at the airport on the way home. They arranged for all of our transportation while there, made sure we had quality hotels, many meals, and provided knowledgeable local guides. This meant that all we had to do was book the trip.

We’ve been meeting with EF Go Ahead Tours representatives for more than a year now. Together, we’ve crafted a unique Postcard Jar itinerary to beautiful Costa Rica. Because we want a small, intimate group, space will be limited. People who subscribe to our newsletter always have the first opportunity to learn about our group trips. Don’t want to miss out? You can SIGN UP FOR EMAILS HERE.

If you’re new here

If you’re new here, you may be wondering how this travel blog got started. Here’s the abbreviated story. In 2014, Ann became very sick and was diagnosed with Crohn’s disease and an inflammatory heart disease. She had five surgical procedures in 17 months and needed something to bring her joy as she was recovering at home. So, we started a travel blog. Our very first post was published from a hotel near the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. We started sharing our past travel experiences and posting photos of the places we’d been. And our blog took off. After awhile, destinations and travel partners began reaching out and inviting us to visit and write about our experiences. So, in 2017, Steve quit his job as a middle school principal to focus more on travel writing.

In 2018, we purchased a small home in Pawhuska, Okla., and in 2019 began sharing our home we call Postcard Place on Airbnb. That same year, we embarked on a healthy living journey and together lost 200 pounds with the help of Noom and the Mayo Clinic Healthy Living Program. Now, we enjoy traveling around the world, blogging about unique destinations and travel experiences, and sharing tips to help you live and travel well.

Why Postcard Jar?

Both of us have always enjoyed sending postcards to friends and family when we traveled. When we started dating (and married about a year later) we decided to send postcards home to ourselves when we vacationed. One of us jotted down highlights from our visit on the postcard. We made sure mention things we’d especially want to remember, like a special restaurant, someone we met there, and how the place made us feel. Then, we’d mail the postcard to our house and soon, a collection was born.

Instead of tucking the postcards away in a box or drawer, we bought a big glass jar with a lid and stored our postcards there. The jar now adorns a table in the entryway of our home and is filled with hundreds of postcards from our travels. Our postcard jar is a constant reminder of where we’ve been and the things we’ve experienced together and we couldn’t think of a more fitting name for our travel blog.

In addition, followers of our blog have sent us postcards from all seven continents and too many countries to count. Hearing about your travels and seeing where you’ve been brings us joy! You can mail us a postcard at: Postcard Jar, P.O. Box 334, Crete, NE 68333 USA.

How about you?

What are your travel plans for 2024? Are you planning a roadtrip through the Midwest? A cruise to sunny islands? Maybe a trip to see family or friends? Let us know in the comments below. We’d love to hear where you’ll be traveling. (Don’t forget to send us a postcard.)

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