Keep Your Traditions #FeelingFriday

Source: I Love You

Every October for nearly twenty years, my husband and I take an annual roadtrip up the Hudson River Valley and hop along the river towns that dot the Hudson River in New York State. In total it’s about a 2.5 hour drive from New York City if you do it all at once, but of course we stop multiple times along the way and stay over at least two nights. The towns sprinkled along the river include Tarrytown, Sleepy Hollow, Cold Spring, Hyde Park, Rhinebeck, and Hudson among others.

One more cuter than the other … loaded with shops, restaurants, artists, foodies, farmers, and everyone/thing else in between.

We generally stay overnight in Rhinebeck but also make sure we plan a full day in Hudson where the main street is lined with more antique stores that I have ever seen in one place anywhere in the world, including dare I say Paris. And Rhinebeck includes some of our favorite restaurant/cocktail places in the world, including dare I say Paris as well.

It’s an annual tradition that we look forward to each year. We’ve missed it a few times including during the pandemic or when we literally couldn’t afford the gas or hotels and boy did we miss it those times.

Traditions keep us together. They bind us. They help reduce stress. They keep us steady in turbulent times. They help keep out the noise of the world.

Right now the world is stressful, turbulent, and noisy so it was particularly important to hold our traditions this year. So important. And as we look towards the holiday season we are doubling down on our holiday traditions this year too because we can feel the stress, turbulence, and noise getting worse and worse coming up.

Our traditions will help us to get through it all. We are embracing them.

You? What are your traditions? What’s your experience? JIM