Well, we did. We officially completed 12 hikes (one for each month) in the year of 2015. Doing a monthly outdoor adventure was my best friend friend Mike’s New Year’s resolution and when he brought up to my husband Michael and I, we were so in.

You may have noticed that I haven’t posted a blog in about four months and well life (but mostly myself) has gotten in the way. 2016 is a fresh start and looks to be promising great adventures of all kinds. In the next few weeks, aside from starting some new posts, I will be reflecting on the year that was 2015 (the good and the bad) and musing about my intentions and goals for this brand new year.

In September, the Mikes split up for their hikes and it was one of the few we didn’t do together. Mike went camping for a night with a group of friends at Kettle Moraine State Park, north of Milwaukee, where I believe there was some nature, some hills, and some drinking. I wasn’t there, but that’s what I gather.

Michael and I couldn’t go on the camping trip for some reason, so we decided to give ourselves an easy month in September and just hike the brand new 606 urban landscape here in Chicago. It was fun, felt more like walking than hiking for sure, but hey, the point is to get outside! There were also not quite so many photo opportunities when “hiking” amongst hipsters, bikers, and strollers.

October was a big month for #hikeswithmikes. Our resident hike organizer Mike turned 30 years old! A week before his birthday, in mid-October, we invited our first ever guest, Mike’s BFF Ashley, on our hike at the Waterfall Glen County Forest Preserve. Oh, the fall foliage!

It was a fun easy hike. The weather was fantastic as you’ll see from the photos. The Mikes and I decided to up the ante so-to-speak by doing 10 push ups and 10 lunges at every mile marker. Fitness!

Thirtieth birthdays will likely be a running a theme in this blog for a while as we’re getting to that time in life. I’m about to turn 29 and Michael’s 30th birthday is just a few months after that. Mike decided to celebrate his 30th by waking up on a mountain top in Colorado and coerced his beau Harrison out into the snowy mountain trails. (Hiking is statedly NOT Harrison’s thing, but he’s a good sport.) Michael and I were not able to join the boys in Colorado unfortunately, but have resolved to do more overnight hiking trips (in other states, perhaps) for 2016. This year, we’re doing #CampsWithMikes!

Part of the reason we were not able to join Mike in Colorado was that my best friend Cara also turned 30 the same week. Cara has lived in San Francisco for seven years and I have been hashtag blessed enough to visit her many times when I was out there for work, as well as a few planned trips as well. In October, Michael and I spent an amazing weekend with Cara and her family in Sonoma and San Francisco (more on that later). Our last day all together in San Francisco, we hiked down a trail at Fort Funston, which is also known as Doggy Disneyland because its a dog park and pretty damn beautiful.

This hike definitely put to the fun in Funston. (Had to.)

November ended up being our second snowiest hike of the year (February was the most). The Mikes and I took a stroll through the Morton Arboretum, which I highly suggest. We plan to go back again in a different season (Spring or Fall) to see the difference in the landscape.

This December, as any Midwesterner will love to tell you was unseasonably warm. The Mikes and I took ourselves to the Deer Grove Forest Preserve where we hiked a cool 5 miles or so along their trails. Deer Grove is important because it’s one of the older forest preserves in the state and therefore, it has been mostly undisturbed by industry and the human population over the last hundred years.

In 2016, we’re taking #HikesWithMikes to the next level by doing weekend-long outdoor adventures with a goal of camping for half of our hikes this year. We plan to do more exercise integration into our hikes (push ups every mile, lunges, etc.) and really bring fitness to the forefront of our hikes.

During our December hike, we discussed how much fun it has been doing these monthly outdoor adventures. (Thanks Mike!!) Mike’s company incentivizes wearing a FitBit and Michael and I asked for them for Christmas from his parents so we are tracking our steps like never before. Mike also got a selfie-stick for Christmas, so we can expect more pictures of the three of us on our hikes this year.

Mike and I are working on a grading scale for each hike that I will start posting as soon as its ready. We’re up for another hike in the next few weeks.

After a lot of back and forth, the Mikes and I decided to do our hike at LaBagh Woods, a forest preserve about 4 miles west of our neighborhood in Chicago. It was recommended to us as an alternative to our original destination of the 606, which was trending a little too hard for us to feel like it was real hike.

The LaBagh Woods trail is similar to the 606 in that it’s a converted old rail line that folks hike and bike up and back — only it has been left a little more natural than the paved walkway that is the 606. Part of the hike is along an overpass of Foster Ave, a busy road in Chicago that I usually take on my way to the airport. The hike itself was very easy, but the scenery and dense bug populations left much to be desired. The Mikes and I decided that it was definitely our grossest hike yet. The lake located in the woods was overflowing due to quite a bit of rain in early June and created a muddy and swamp-like atmosphere full of bugs, which we were not prepared for.

One of the only highlights of this the light city hike was seeing a family of city deer who let us get very close all while keeping a watchful eye on us as they cruised the woods backing up to a row of houses on the edge of the woods. There was also a group of preteens setting off fire crackers who scattered once they saw us, not that they were hurting anything.

Although I will now always think of the trail as I drive under the overpass on Foster Ave on the west side, I doubt we will be going back.

Since moving to Chicago in 2010, I have been blessed by meeting some of the most wonderful people named Michael in the world. Prior to meeting my husband Michael, I dated two different Michaels and became good friends with my sister’s best friend Michael. When I finally met my soul mate Michael about a year after moving here, he introduced me to his best friend Michael (now mine as well) who stood up in our wedding with our other friend Michael officiating. Question: did you know that Michael was the most popular name for boys in this country for like forty years?

Just after the new year, our best friend, who henceforth will be known as Mike, started on one of his normal discussions about dreams and goals for his life. Strategically, he sold us on the idea of going on one hike every month. Michael would drive the car, Mike would plan the trips and I would, well, hike with Mikes.

For our first hike, we lucked out on a warm winter weekend in January being able to hike outside at the Indiana Dunes State Park, not too far out of Chicago in northwest Indiana — a state, I otherwise tend to speed through on my way home to visit my family in Metro Detroit. The dunes were a bit snowy and muddy, but otherwise it was a perfect adventure. We trekked about three or four miles up some dunes and down to the beach where you experience the wonder of Lake Michigan, all while surrounded by smokestack factories, just down the shore on either side. Standing on that beach, soaking up the sun on rare warm January afternoon, we vowed to come back again this year.

The weather wasn’t as cooperative in February, when a storm brought several feet of snow a few days before we had planned to go on our next trip. We decided that maybe the outdoor part of our hike would be shoveling our car out. I was little help, as we have one small shovel and mop bucket for digging out snow. After about 40 minutes, the Mikes were able to pull our trusty sedan away from the curb and head on an indoor hike at the Garfield Park Conservatory in Chicago’s Garfield Park neighborhood.

The conservatory was one of the first of its kind and is still one of the largest in the world. The chief architect Jens Jensen designed the building to house plants from many species and many climates all over the world, an idea that revolutionary for the time. There were warm rooms full of cacti or forest trees and cool rooms full of beautiful flowers and even a koi pond with a Dale Chihuly installation.

We rewarded our cultural betterment by eating at Inspiration Kitchens, this awesome American-style cafe in Garfield Park that hires students and has helped “hundreds of individuals gain the skills they need to find employment and exit homelessness and poverty.” Basically, they’re doing god’s work and their brunch is on point.

In March, we went to Kankakee River State Park, where we strolled around the mostly flat and even land surrounding the Kankakee river in central Illinois. We walked about 9 miles through the park, which had a designated trail for biking and plenty of folks out riding horses. We had to keep our eyes out for what comes along with heavy horse traffic. It’s definitely not my favorite hiking location, though I would like to try it again with rented bikes.

We did our longest hike yet at Swallow Creek Woods near Orland Park, Illinois, in April. This hike began and ended with a steep stairway climb up the “100-foot bluff” that makes for a sick toboggan or sled hill come winter and very well could be our December hike this year as well. We walked about 10 miles through the trails, taking time to enjoy the spring day that was finally upon us, escaping from our congested urban lives. This hike was celebrated by eating obscene amounts of tacos and copious adult beverages upon returning from our intense leg work out.

Last month, I went with the Mikes for my first time to Starved Rock State Park — a national treasure and a true favorite among the group, even if both Mikes took a nasty spill on the muddy trails. I attribute my ability to stay surefooted to actually wearing hiking shoes when I go on a hike. Although the mud was an annoying byproduct of the rainy May morning that preceded our hike, the other byproduct was a series of magnificent waterfalls. Mid-hike we took a break to eat tuna salad sandwiches next to one of the waterfalls.

While I don’t know exactly how the hikes have improved my overall health, I do know that going on these monthly outings into nature has improved my quality of life. As much as I love city living, taking the time to reconnect with nature and get myself moving has become something I look forward to every month. With the opening of the 606 in Chicago, we’re looking forward to another urban hiking adventure this summer. Here’s a short list of some other hikes we’re discussing:

• Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore (Glen Arbor, MI)
• Chicago Lakefront hike from downtown to Hollywood Beach
• Another out of state hike, possible for Mike’s birthday in October