Yesterday we received a nice surprise in the mail from the Nebraska Tourism Commission Staff. As a thank-you for our help spreading the word about Nebraska’s tourism industry, they sent us two beautiful calendars and each page included … wait for it … a postcard!

Nebraska Tourism postcards were attached to each calendar page.

What a nice idea and a thoughtful gift. We enjoyed turning the pages and seeing gorgeous photographs that were chosen from more than 800 submissions from amateur and professional photographers. Each submission had to include a photo that captured the artistic view of the subject, and a brief narrative that described how the focus of the photos bridged the past with the present.

Nebraska Tourism calendar

Browsing through the calendar reminded us of all the interesting places we’ve been and written about in our home state of Nebraska.

Since we started our travel blog in 2014, we’ve written 46 posts about Nebraska destinations and attractions, in addition to hundreds of social media posts and pictures from our annual Nebraska road trips. This year alone, we wrote about why we love Valentine, our trip to North Platte to see the trains hump and our adventures through the Nebraska Sandhills with Steve’s dad and mom, the total solar eclipse, and a rather extensive post about 70 things to do in our hometown of Crete.

Two of our favorite posts this year were about Nebraska-owned businesses we adore and both posts were quite popular on the inter webs.

Our post about TripAdvisor’s most hilarious manager responses from Robert J. at Peppermill in Valentine had more than 700 shares on social media! You can read the blog post HERE.

TripAdvisor’s most hilarious manager responses

Not surprisingly, our most popular Nebraska post this year was about The Secret to The Village Pie Maker Pies. Here’s an excerpt:

[blockquote source=”Ann Teget”]Whenever we have guests for dinner or a special holiday celebration at our house, I simply go to the freezer, take out a pie from The Village Pie Maker, bake it for a little more than an hour, and voila — our guests savor bite after bite of the best fruit pie they’ve ever tasted and I can say (without lying) that I baked it myself.[/blockquote]

Village Pie Maker pies

We were invited for a brief, but wonderful, tour of The Village Pie Maker operation in Eustis, Nebraska, and our blog post about this Nebraska small business was shared more than 4,000 times. We heard from dozens of Nebraskans (and several out-of-staters) about how much they enjoyed the post and, of course, The Village Pie Maker pies.

Workers at the Village Pie Maker fit the crusts to the pans by hand.

As I’m sure you can tell, we love Nebraska and are so happy to share our experiences from our home state with all of you. And while many of our readers are from Nebraska, we also have followers from most U.S. states and 45 countries, so we hope all of you will come visit our great state someday!

Need some convincing?

Here are just a few of our favorite posts about Nebraska destinations and attractions.

Why we love Valentine, Nebraska

Eclipse 2017: An earth-shadowing experience from our home

Don’t judge Nebraska until you’ve gotten off I-80 and seen the Sandhills

Innkeeper Jeanne Goetzinger at the Olde Main Street Inn in Chadron

Sharing our postcards from Nebraska

Did you travel in/to Nebraska this year? What did you enjoy most? Let us know, we’d love to hear from you.