Travel Charm Bracelet

I've decided to share my charm bracelet as well.

To me, the most interesting bracelets are the souvenir travel kind.  I thought it would be fun to recreate my own travel bracelet with charms from the places we have visited.

We traditionally take one vacation a year during the last week of August.  When our kids were younger, this represented the uncovered child care week between the end of camp and the beginning of school.  The girls are in high school now, but I still look forward to that week as the official end of summer and start of the new school year.

Since I retrofitted my bracelet, I had the luxury of scouring eBay, Etsy, and Ruby Lane to find the perfect charm for each trip.  I will describe them now, moving from left to right:

1) Bovina Center, NY - Bob and his family spent a week at Bovina Center every summer when he was young.  They stayed on Mrs. Todd's dairy farm, and he loved playing there with his cousins. We took the girls back to the farm when they were toddlers, and they loved it just as much.  To represent this trip, I found a celluloid Elise the Cow charm from the 1939 NY World's fair.

2) Montreal - We went to Canada in 2015 and toured Montreal, Toronto, and Niagara Falls.  In Montreal we visited the science museum and saw an imax movie about pandas who were bred in captivity and then released into the wild.   Before releasing the pandas, scientists tried to teach the pandas some basic survival skills.  And to do so, the scientists dressed in full sized panda suits that were smothered in "panda scents" so they could approach the pandas without suspicion.  (The suits looked a bit like the Elmo costumes in Times Square.)  The narrator described the process of covering the suits in panda urine.  During this description, the camera focused on the face of one of the scientists who was dressed in full costume, but carried the head piece as he walked closer to the panda habitat.  His expression was both miserable and  priceless.  And to remind me of this experience, I chose this retired Pandora panda head, which looks very much like the costume.    

3) Niagara Falls - This was part of the same Canada trip in 2015.  There are many vintage charms available from Niagara Falls, both New York and Canada.  I chose this art-deco Bates & Klinke charm from the 1940s/1950s.

4) Nantucket - Nantucket was our tradition for a while.  We rented a house there for a week during the summers of  2012, 13, 14, and 16.  We live in an apartment in Queens, so it was a nice for the girls to experience stairs, grass, and their own rooms.  We rented bikes for the week, and toured the island by bike and on foot.

Our longest bike ride was from Nantucket to Siasconset, roughly 7 miles each way.  It was a beautifully scenic ride which took most of the day to complete.  But since our girls are from Queens, they were unaccustomed to biking, and one of them (I will not reveal which) spent the majority of said ride and therefore said day screaming "MY BUTT HURTS!" So I chose this "Entering Siasconset" road sign to remind me of this magical moment.

5) Yellowstone - We visited Yellowstone National Park in 2017.  Yellowstone was extraordinary, and I was completely amazed by the landscape and geology.  Here is a picture of the girls enjoying Sulphur Caldron:

But my favorite part of the Yellowstone trip was seeing the bison up close.  For this reason, I chose a bison Cracker Jack charm from the 1930s to represent our Yellowstone trip.

6) Disney World - We went to Disney World and Universal Studios in 2018.  There are many Disney charms available, but I opted for this Mickey topiary bead.  It reminded me of the beautiful landscaping that we saw at the parks:

7) First Robotics National Competition - Detroit, Michigan- Megan is part of an all-girls robotics team called the Fe Maidens.  They made it to nationals in 2018, and I went with Megan to the competition.  This was a fantastic experience, and I found this Pandora robot bead to mark it.

That summarizes our travels to date. I still have room on the bracelet, so more to come in 2019!