I knew January was a very quiet month, but it wasn’t until I went through the photos that I realized just how little we moved. All my photos are from two days!

Early in the month, we had a beautiful sunny day, so we dropped everything and headed out to a park along the Grand River. This is a real testament to how few sunny days we see now, January has been so gray!

Kyle has been running in this park most mornings and there was a bridge he wanted to show me!

It was a nice hike, we love being so close to a lot of trails in our current area.

Afterwards, I talked Kyle into stopping at home to grab the rest of my camera gear and some food, so we could head straight out to the coast to watch the sun set! It was a little dicey, I wasn’t sure we would get there in time or if that cloud bank on the horizon would rise up enough to mute all the colors.

We caught plenty of colors and did just fine!

It was also shockingly calm on Lake Michigan, which made for some fun night shots with the reflection of the catwalk lights.

After that, we hardly left the house again for a couple weeks. We looked at a few houses and put a couple offers in, but the market here is absolutely insane (one house we looked at was listed at $230k and sold for $267k!). We’ve done dinners with Caleb and Amy a couple times; since we’re podding with them it’s really nice to have social nights that feel “normal.”

That being said, I had forgotten how dark and terrible Michigan winters can be. In December we still managed to get out and go for walks, but mid January it got so cold that I lost any desire to go outside. We can dress for the cold but there’s also icy sidewalks and slushy streets to contend with. Seasonal Affective Disorder is no joke, there’s a reason my motivation is waning! COVID is just amplifying all the worst parts of winter. It’s crazy to think that a year ago we were enjoying cold drinks on tropical beaches!

Our friends pulled me out of my funk for a snowshoeing trip! We had another rare sunny day and we met up for snowshoeing in Paris, MI, home of a surprise Eiffel Tower! We kept looking for it, I was expecting something…bigger.

Despite the temps in the 20s, the sun kept us warm and happy for a lovely hike through the woods. We watched ice floes race down the Muskegon River and watched trout thrash around at the fish farm!

Since we were that far north, we took a quick trip up to see my parents afterwards. We’ve hardly been social at all this month, so it was really nice to talk to so many people (even though everyone is saying the exact same thing: “We haven’t been doing much lately!”).

As we peruse the housing market here, our idea of a “home base” for in between travels has been evolving. I’m trying not to internalize my hate for winter too much, since this year is hopefully an exception and in the future we won’t be so isolated. Just being able to go out to dinner or try out a new brewery would do so much for my mental health! I’m jealous of all our boat friends who are currently enjoying those tropical beaches, but I know we chose to sell the boat for good reasons!

Not the most exciting recap, but we’re very hopeful for the future! With vaccinations accelerating, and longer daylight hours every day, we’ve got nowhere to go but up!