Category: accountability

August Adventure Date 4: Trout Lake, Fiborn Quarry, and Castle Rock

Posted in 52 Hike Challenge, accountability, adventure, family, fun, Goals, Hiking, relateTagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

The plan for our last full day of our trip was to let the kids sleep in, head to Seney National Wildlife Refuge for the afternoon, and then have dinner at the fire ring with my brothers and some of our nieces. A pretty low key day to end our trip, just what everyone needed.

I had been doing research and had discovered that there is place called Fiborn Quarry and Karst Preserve very near Trout Lake. The town that existed while the quarry was in operation is still partially standing, so I really wanted to go check out the “Ghost Town” and see if I could get some cool photos. I planned to get up and check it out in the morning while the kids slept in, and Keith decided to go with me. It was really nice to have an adventure on our own during our trip. The walk back to the town is along what used to be the train tracks that took all the stone out of the quarry. It was a beautiful walk with so many birch trees – the wind in their branches sounded like trickling water at times.

The path was relatively straight back, so it was surprising to me when we suddenly came upon buildings.

We enjoyed poking around and exploring the different buildings. It was so weird to think what they would have been like 100 years ago when the town was actually inhabited and the quarry was active. We came upon an area that had lots of these interesting rocks, so I picked up a few to share with the girls since we did not invite them.

Probably the most exciting part of the whole adventure happened when we were in the car on the road back out of the preserve. We came around a small curve and there was a black bear in the road! We spooked him, so he bounced off into the woods quicker than I could get out my phone to take a photo, but we both saw him. I have never seen a black bear in the wild in the UP, so that was a first for both of us. We were very excited to share the whole adventure, but especially that part, with my family that evening. 🙂

We got back to the house and got the kids up and around to go to Seney. We did not pack our lunch because we were running low on supplies and would still need lunch on the way home the next day. We also knew we would pass a Subway on the way, so we decided to get lunch there and have a picnic at the Seney Visitor Center. This is where things took a bit of a turn. It seems that they are building a new visitor center, so they have a temporary one set up about 20 minutes further away. It does not have the store or the displays or the lovely lake with a hiking trail around it. It is on a dirt road and very small. They did have picnic tables, though, so we at least had a place to eat. We went in to talk and found out that they still had some of the drive open, so we decided to take a slow loop and see if we could see anything. We did end up seeing a lot of waterfowl and what was probably a muskrat or mink. The refuge is beautiful anyway, whether you see any wildlife or not, but it was nice to at least see a couple things.

At that point, it was time to find a restroom and then head back to the cabin to make curry. We did stop at the cabin to make sure they did not need us to cook anything else in our house since we had electricity and an oven, but they were set. Keith took the girls back while I visited with my family for a little while, and then I went home to make rice and curry to share. The dinner at the fire ring was wonderful – it was great to spend time with so much of our family in one of my favorite places. I got the traditional photo of everyone before it got dark, and then it was time to eat. 🙂

I love that my parents had a special fire ring made that says Howard City Club. It is so pretty when the fire is going and it gets dark.

And just like that, it was time for one last sleep at the rental house and then the long trip home. We said a quick goodbye that night because we were all planning to meet for breakfast before heading our separate ways in the morning. We got up, packed up, straightened up the house, and made it in to town just in time to meet everyone else. Breakfast was wonderful – it was so good to be with both of my brothers and my parents. The kids even got to know each other a little better at the younger adults table. I was sad to leave, but we had to get going as we had a few stops we planned to make. The first stop was Castle Rock just north of St. Ignace. Somehow I didn’t take a photo of Castle Rock, but I found this old one. As you can imagine, it takes a lot of steps to get to the top.

Once we got back down, we made our way into St. Ignace the back way as the express way was pretty backed up. We kept seeing Mini Coopers and found out it was because there was a gathering of Mini Coopers called Mini on the Mac – that was a surprise! We got across the bridge pretty quickly all things considered and then made a couple stops in Mackinaw City. Charlotte and her friend Steph had been shopping in Mackinaw about a week prior (while on vacation with Steph’s family) and a ring Charlotte bought had chipped, so we stopped in to see if it could be repaired. They did a little work on it and we shopped and explored. Then it was time to stop at Alice’s Kandy and Korn – one of my favorite traditions. Their caramel corn is addictive and their chocolates are amazing. I’m a huge fan of the chocolate covered sea foam especially.

We got on the road headed for a scenic rest stop for a picnic. Of course the one I was hoping for was closed, but we made it to another that was very nice. Then was the long slog home. We stopped for dinner at Chipotle in Toledo, and then Maddie and I were on our own to drive home – no more caravan required. It was so nice to get home and unloaded. I can be on my dream vacation and have the time of my life, but there will always be a feeling of peace and contentment that washes over me when I get home. It’s seriously the best.

And that’s all she wrote on the great Emigh vacation of 2023. Thanks for coming along on the ride. Did one of our adventures stand out to you? Is there something you are planning to do after reading about it? Is there something you will now avoid? Let me know in the comments!

February 2023 Goals

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I have heard so many people talking about how long January felt this year, and I have to disagree. January was the break that I needed after an extremely busy fall and before we launch into the craziness of the theatre and senior spring seasons. I am extremely sad to see the month go because I know what is coming. Starting tonight, there will be 5 theatre performances, 3 choir concerts, 2 choir competitions, 2 spring breaks, a choir trip, an art show, 4 birthdays, graduation, and countless parties in the next 5 months. I will be longing for a break by the time we hit May, so I tried to soak in as much down time as I could in January. I actually read 2 books and I have worked on goal setting and my vision for my businesses. I am proud of myself for letting things stay slow as much as possible.

Having said that, I did still have goals I intended to meet, so let’s recap those:

  • Get my goals for 2023 and my first quarter goals ready – I am working through 12 Week Year and plan to implement the goals I am working on starting later this month. I am excited about this and can’t wait to share a special goal post about it soon!
  • Get matte screen protector for iPad so I can photograph Valentines products and get previews made – This is half accomplished. I have the matte screen protector. I am still stalled on product previews. I am sure that I am making them into something far bigger than they really are.
  • At least 1 adventure and 1 create date with blog posts – We did this! It was close, I was worried, but we pulled through.
  • Film 12 craft videos for Crafty Phonics – L Sound FLEX class – This is done. In fact, I have all but the last week of posts created/scheduled.
  • List a sewing class and a Communicate and Create for the Make Your Year Edventure Conference with classes to continue after – I have listed these classes and several others and not had any enrollments. None of my one time classes have booked in the last year unless they were specifically requested and created for a current student. I have been marketing and tracking stats, so I will be ready to make a new game plan after this month.
  • Finish the ACE Educator process – I did not do this. I chose classes and then they all disappeared because a new month started. I feel like this is probably going to happen again, so I better get with it.
  • Walk outside or on treadmill 20x – I hit 15 walking workouts in January.
  • 12 hikes – finish my last few for 2022 and begin 2023 52 Hike Challenge – I did 3 hikes. I added the two that were technically within a year for 2022 to that year, but then I went ahead and counted them for this year. I make my own rules. I have been struggling with hand pain that gets worse in cold, so I just need to figure that out so I can get out and hike. We have lots of fun hiking planned in March, so I need to build up my stamina before then.
  • Make dinner 20x – I am actually pretty sure we hit this. I have been cooking so much more which is good since we have the new budget now.
  • Pay off $1500 in debt – We had a car repair that caused us to add about $25 in debt this month in spite of my aggressive payments to our credit cards. We are refilling our emergency fund, so hopefully we will be better equipped to pay for things like this in the future.

I see a lot of growth here. I am at 6/10, which is pretty good compared to the last few months. I have made the decision to just let TpT be for a while and focus on my main income over at Outschool. I have also made the decision not to pursue Allschool since they raised their fees to almost as much as Outschool so there really isn’t any benefit to moving over. With that in mind, here are my goals for February:

  • Adventure and Create Dates.
  • At least 4 blog posts.
  • Get new email list up and running with a freebie.
  • A Random Act of Kindness every day.
  • $1200 income across businesses.
  • 2 new classes – look at insights and topic requests to see what would be best fit.
  • Hit 900 learners taught.
  • Pay off $1000 in debt.
  • Close Stand and Move rings daily.
  • 5 hikes to get back on track.

I think this is a good mix of business and personal, and it seems like something I can accomplish. I am actually really excited to have a pretty solid plan for my business and personal life this month.

Do you have any goals for this month? Let me know in the comments so we can support each other and have accountability! 🙂

January 2023 Create Date – Creating a Budget

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This month was a little rough as far as going on dates goes. I’m not going to lie, I thought we were going to have to skip it. Then I realized that we have some big goals coming up this year (travel, paying down debt, both girls in college in the fall) and we will probably need to be better about budgeting. So, we had a Create a Budget date at home.

I wish I could say that we didn’t find any surprises when we dove into our finances, but I would be lying. It is amazing how much we have been spending on restaurants – and I have actually been cooking a lot, so I would hate to see what it was just a couple months ago. Rising prices have not helped, but we have definitely gotten used to the convenience of grabbing food on the go or treating ourselves to a nice dinner more than we should.

We’ve also been spending more on coffee shops (Tim Hortons, Dunkin’ Donuts, and Starbucks) than I would have ever suspected. I will take full ownership that this is mostly me, and I have been taking steps to eat breakfast at home more, so I know this will improve dramatically.

After analyzing several categories over the past few months, we have made a budget that should allow us to pay down some debt and also save some money towards other goals. We did not include my income in the budget, so that is where our Adventure and Create dates will likely come from and also where things like hair cuts, mani/pedis, and gifts will come from. It isn’t perfect and will likely need adjusted, but it should make a real impact on our spending habits.

For your viewing pleasure, here is our workspace and our faces when we finished.

Do you have a budgeting system? Any tips on things we should always include? Let us know in the comments! 🙂

January 2023 Goals

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I am having a very hard time believing we are in a new year – but I am super excited by the possibilities! I am currently working on reflecting on my goals from last year – what went well, what I need to update, what I want to add, what I want to leave behind. I can tell you that I did accomplish so much in the past year. I can also tell you that I had several goals that I did not even start or that I made progress on and then lost the progress. I do think I need to make my yearly, quarterly, monthly, and weekly goals line up just a little better. There are definitely monthly goals that were lovely but didn’t move the needle on my big goals. There were definitely things I could have been more consistent with. But there were also things I did very consistently and things that did impact my goals in big ways.

Let’s start this month by reflecting on my goals for last month. I think this is going to be a mixed bag because I was very sick for 2 weeks in December, so I did not do anything that wasn’t absolutely necessary. But I know I also tried to plan goals that allowed me time to get ready for the holidays and celebrate with my family, so we shall see….

  • Add previews to my Time, Winter, and Arctic products – I did not start this. I am obviously at a block here, so I need to start really small with a goal for January that I can accomplish and that will move this forward.
  • Market my January classes on Instagram and Facebook groups to fill my classes – I have been doing this – I need to make a big push this week. I actually have decent enrollments right now for my classes that start next week. It could definitely still get better, though. 🙂
  • Add 20 Pinterest pins – I did not start this. Again, I know it is important to move the needle here, but I just need to rethink how it will work.
  • Figure out sewing machine logistics in my classroom and list a sewing class – I did not do this. But I do have ideas for a sewing club and will try to get it listed this week.
  • Make 4 blog posts – I did 2 blog posts – and then this will be the 4th one for this specific day in the beginning of January. I’m going to count this as a done.
  • Hang blinds and plates in my office – I did not start this one. I completely forgot about it, actually. Adding it to my list for this week.
  • Send Christmas cards to friends and family – I did this! And they probably even received most of them before Christmas!
  • Make dinner 12 times – I am pretty sure I did this as well.
  • Hike 4 times – visit 4 winter hike series parks – We visited 4 of the winter hike series parks and we did 7 hikes total in December!
  • Do my 20 hours of continuing education for my SLP licensure – I actually ended up doing 22 hours of CE this month.

It looks like I get about a 6/10 on this one. I am super pleased with this because, as I said, I was out of commission for a good chunk of the month. I have been feeling really, really frustrated with having 2 businesses I am trying to grow at the same time recently. When I started my TpT business, I was averaging about $1500-$2000 a month on Outschool. I thought it was stable, so it seemed like it would be easy to maintain while also building my TpT business. Instead, I have really had to put in a lot of time into both. I am feeling stretched and need to find balance there. So, I think adjusting my goals a bit to fit where I am in my businesses and life will really help.

So, for January, while I am still working through goals and my visions for my businesses, I am going to make some pretty simple goals. Here is what I have:

  • Get my goals for 2023 and my first quarter goals ready.
  • Get matte screen protector for iPad so I can photograph Valentines products and get previews made.
  • At least 1 adventure and 1 create date with blog posts.
  • Film 12 craft videos for Crafty Phonics – L Sound FLEX class.
  • List a sewing class and a Communicate and Create for the Make Your Year Edventure Conference with classes to continue after.
  • Finish the ACE Educator process.
  • Walk outside or on treadmill 20x.
  • 12 hikes – finish my last few for 2022 and begin 2023 52 Hike Challenge.
  • Make dinner 20x.
  • Pay off $1500 in debt.

I’m not going to lie, a lot of this list is things that is already in progress. I am working through writing my goals. I have chosen the workshops for my ACE educator pillars. I have already hiked twice. I ordered the matte screen protector last night. I am paying bills this morning. But, if I write this list and actually finish the things on it, I know that it will propel me into February with so much momentum. I am excited and hopeful and feel more in control of my businesses already.

What are your goals for January? Do you have goals for this year to share? Let me know in the comments!