Category: Celebration

Lens Artists Photo Challenge #407 – A Celebration Journey

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Patti challenge is to share celebrations from near and far.

Today I am celebrating my return to blogging after having a total knee replacement two weeks ago! I’m doing well but still have a lot of Physical Therapy in my future.

Fifteen years ago Henry and I celebrated great results from a different kind of health issue. After nine long months of grueling cancer treatments, my doctor told me my cancer was gone! So what did we do to celebrate? Go on a cross country RV Celebration Journey of course!

Surviving cancer made me realize how important it is to live in the moment, enjoy the little things, and celebrate life every day. We met many kind people and at the end of each day we made a toast to the gift of another day.

We toured Vicksburg National Military Park

I fed a Texas Longhorn

We toured Palo Duro Canyon in Texas

We ate steak at the Big Texan in Amarillo

We drove to the top of Sandia Crest with my brother and his wife in Albuquerque

We Wandered around the Garden of the Gods in Colorado

We hiked in the snow in Rocky Mountain National

We wandered around Custer State Park in the Black Hills of South Dakota

We walked across the headwaters of the Mississippi River in Minnesota

I’m still celebrating every day!

I enjoyed all of your responses to Anne’s challenge Summer Daze. Thank you to everyone who joined the challenge.

Many thanks to Patti for this week’s challenge. If you would like to join the challenge please be sure to tag your post with Lens-Artists and include a link back to her post Lens-Artists #407: Celebrations around the World.

Be sure to check back on Saturday, August 8 at noon eastern time when Egidio will be hosting the challenge.

You can keep up with all of our challenges by subscribing to the Lens-Artists team members websites: Tina, Patti, Ann-Christine, John, Sofia, Anne, Egidio, Ritva, Beth.

For information on how to join the Lens-Artists challenge please click here.

Every Day is a Gift

Birthday Celebration, Boats, Alligators, and Two Rivers

Posted in Celebration, Georgia, Nature, Road TripTagged , , , , , , , , , 48 Comments

I have reached the age where I don’t have to travel to an exciting destination or have a big party to celebrate my birthday. Last year we enjoyed our anniversary celebration in Darien so much I wanted to return this year for my birthday.

We traveled south on U.S. Hwy 17 to our destination on the Darien River in Darien, Georgia. Our first stop was Mudcat Charlie’s at the Two Way Fish Camp on the Altamaha River in Brunswick. After some delicious wild Georgia shrimp for lunch we walked around the dock and looked down on an 11 1/2 foot alligator in the muddy water.

Boats at Two Way Fish Camp on the Altamaha River
Alligator in the Altamaha River

Savannah is the oldest city in Georgia but did you know that Darien is Georgia’s 2nd oldest city?

Welcome to Darien, Georgia, Georgi’s second oldest city

For the next day and a half I swam in the pool, enjoyed the view of the Darien River from our deck at the hotel, watched young alligators swimming in the river, enjoyed seeing the huge Live Oaks draped with Spanish Moss as I wandered around the hotel, and ate some more delicious meals.

Boats on the Darien River
Darien River
Shrimp Boats on the Darien River
Young Alligator in the Darien River

Live Oak

Relaxing and spending time with my husband in a beautiful setting was a perfect way to celebrate my birthday.

Every Day is a Gift

Cellpic Sunday – Junkanoo for St. Patrick’s Day

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Every year, the Bahamian Junkanoo group Barabbas and the Tribe create special costumes for the St. Patrick’s Day and are a crowd favorite in both the Tybee Irish Festival parade and the Savannah St. Patrick’s Day Parades.

The fun starts a few days before the big Savannah St. Patrick’s Day parade when twice a night the Junkanoo Band marches through the Crab Shack on Tybee Island to the delight of everyone.

Shared with John’s Cellpic Sunday

Also shared with One Word Sunday – Green

Every Day is a Gift

Wandering Dawgs – Celebrating 13 Years of Blogging

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March 19, 2026 was the 13th anniversary of my first post on the Wandering Dawgs blog. I  started the blog in 2013 as a way to keep friends and family up to date on our RV journey from Georgia to Alaska and back. When I started the blog I never dreamed I would make blogging friends from all around the world!

I enjoyed keeping up the blog even after we returned from our Alaska adventure. For several years I mostly posted about our RV travels before I expanded my focus to include posts about gardening, birds, wildlife, coastal Georgia, and other random things. I still post about our travels even though we don’t take the RV any more.

I started participating in photo challenges somewhere along the way. In 2025, I was honored and excited to be asked to be one of the hosts of the Lens-Artists team. To learn more about the Len-Artists challenges please click here.

Wandering Dawgs then and now:

Thank you to everyone who visits Wandering Dawgs. I really appreciate all the visits, likes, and comments over the years. I value each and every one of my blogging friends! Thank you for your kind words and encouragement through the years!

I just renewed Wandering Dawgs for another year. I hope to keep this up until I run out ideas and photos!