The other day I wrote about how keeping a journal is a great part of the camping experience. The journal is a convenient way to keep track of your favorite campgrounds and more specifically, your favorite camp sites. Your camping journal allows you to relive that great moment later. Today’s tip goes along these same lines…

My wife, Amy, is a junior high school art teacher. She is very creative and has a great talent with art. As you can see in the pictures, Amy took a creative approach to tracking our camping experiences, based on a DIY project she found on the internet. First, she traced the state of Ohio (including counties) by using corkboard and a Sharpie. Then she created name tags for the various places in Ohio we’ve camped (tiny strips of paper) and used push pins to peg them on the map. Applying the same concept, Amy created a much larger version of the United States. Just like the Ohio map, this map shows the various places we have camped in the United States. As you can see, we have ALOT more to explore in America. On this map, she included a “legend” where we could peg our “want list”. In other words, places we hope to camp in the future. In the final picture, you see a state magnet board. Every time we visit a new state (together) for the first time, we buy a magnet and add it the board. We look forward to adding more and more magnets this summer.

I have all three of these hanging in my office at home. It’s a good motivator when I have had a rough week at work. It’s nice to reminisce about the places we have visited and the experiences we had. It’s cool to daydream about places we hope to camp someday. Maybe you can track places you have traveled or camped visually too….

HAPPY CAMPING!!!