January Food Post

Getting ready to do my monthly photo post and I am realizing that I took enough photos of food this month to make an entire entry!! Part of the reason is that I recently got a bigger cast iron skillet and actively sought out recipes to try in it.

Like this shrimp and sausage rice.

Three Good Trail Rides

I've recently had three nice rides on three nice horses and I figured I'd post about them here before things get super hectic and they get lost in the shuffle.

The last horse I rode in 2018 was Rushcreek Bobby.

Horse #1

Vacation Post Part 4: Taughannock Falls

The fourth and final installment of my vacation series. For many people, Niagara Falls and Watkins Glen would have been plenty of adventure for one two-day trip, but Mike and I really love to cram as much as possible into our days. We hit a few more spots that Saturday afternoon, but the main attraction was Taughannock Falls, the highest single-drop waterfall east of the Rockies! (Yes, taller than Niagara, thought the water flow was not as impressive.)

Vacation Post Part 3: Watkins Glen

When Mike and I planned our vacation, we discussed the idea of spending one day at Niagara Falls, and the other day exploring something else in the area. During the planning stages, I did a lot of scrolling, Googling distances, and making lists. One item that has been on my to-see list for ages and ages is Watkins Glen State Park. While doing a Google Maps search of Niagara Falls, I couldn't help noticing that the Finger Lakes popped into view after just a few clicks of the "zoom out" button. I had sailed the Finger Lakes with my parents as a kid, and rode the Hector Half Hundred in 2015 in the same area. Mike had... you guessed it... never been. When I realized that Watkins Glen and Niagara Falls were less than three hours apart, I went on a mission to find a hotel in between. When I booked the room in Batavia, Mike and I were excited to check out Watkins Glen on the Saturday of our trip.

Friday night, while we drank Captain and ate leftovers, I opened up the laptop and started vigorously mapping out more routes and searching more local attractions. There were about one billion waterfalls to choose from, and I was like a squirrel on crack trying to map out all the logistics. In the end, we decided to see what time we got up, casually make our way to Watkins Glen, check out the famous gorge, and then figure out food and the rest of the day, using our usual technique of, "Let's see what's nearby!"

Vacation Post Part 2: Lake Ontario

As I mentioned, Mike was interested in seeing the falls lit up at night, but we still had a few hours of daylight to burn, so we set off in search of adventure elsewhere. After browsing our maps and doing some quick Googling, we decided to head north towards Lake Ontario, hoping to check out Old Fort Niagara along the way.  Fort Niagara was another one of those things I vaguely remembered really enjoying as a kid (though, on a separate trip from Niagara Falls...)

The drive up to Lake Ontario was scenic and we really enjoyed having the open highway to ourselves. Along the way, we passed Whirlpool State Park and Devil's Hole State Park, which had also been on our possible to-see list. By that point, however, we had already done a fair amount of walking, and I wasn't sure either one of us was up for a more technical hike on top of it. The Niagara Gorge was breath taking, and we got several picturesque glimpses of it as we drove casually up the byway. We also passed the Niagara Power Vista, which caught my attention and entailed more Googling. (Seriously, you could probably do an entire week of just exploring the Niagara Gorge and surrounding attractions...)

About twenty minutes after we left Niagara Falls, we arrived at Fort Niagara, and the park was just about deserted. We were greeted by the sight of the Old Fort Niagara Light, which, if you know me, delighted me. I absolutely love lighthouses and I really want to do an entire lighthouse tour trip at some point (which is probably not exciting to other people, so I just break up my love of these buildings into little chunks...)

Vacation Post Part 1: Niagara Falls

Finally.

I have been sitting on these photos and this post for four months. I had actually thrown in the towel on ever sharing any of it because it's going to be long and photo heavy, and I didn't think anyone would care. But then I remembered how much I enjoyed Nicole's series of Puerto Rico posts, with all their details and gorgeous pictures, and decided that I really should put this all down in one place. Also, it's my blog and it doesn't really matter if nobody else reads it...

For those of you who are just here for the photos, I put all our vacation pictures in one album on my SmugMug (hey, I pay for a subscription, I may as well use it!)

(And now that I've spent a few days typing this out, I've realized that it's really long, even by my standards, so I'm going to break it up into pieces...)

2018 Goal Review

2018 was the first year that I actually brought myself to write down any kind of concrete goals. I still didn't publish them on the blog, but I did commit them to writing to hold myself accountable. The universe promptly decided that I had Jinxed Everything so this should be a funny entry. I will reveal my 2018 goals and all the ways in which I failed to accomplish most of them. I did make the same mistake for 2019, but I am optimistic and hope that I won't fail quite so spectacularly in the new year. Ha.

Bloghop: Favorites of 2018

Unlike all the other holidays, which stress me out, New Year's is probably my all time favorite. First of all, it signals the end of the other holidays. It's not so much that I believe that a new page on the calendar magically fixes or changes anything, but it's a good time to reflect on the past 365 days, whether it's to celebrate them or to dump them unceremoniously out on their behinds in the January cold. As a result, I'm probably going to do a whole slew of New Year themed posts, especially since January tends to be uneventful around here and there isn't much else to post about.


I'll start with the Favorites of 2018 bloghop, stolen from the $900 Facebook Pony. I'm going to make some effort at keeping this horse-related, but this was probably the least horsey year I've had to date. That's not saying  much since I still work with horses full time... but...

Favorite Show Picture

Kylie made me so proud at the Eastern States championships. I am planning to write a whole post about this!! Maybe. Some day. Photo by Stacy Lynne Photography, used with purchase.