Traveling to 100 Countries as a Family of 5 ft. the Bucket List Family

We sold all our stuff, made about $45,000. And we had agreed that we'll only travel as long as that $45,000 from the yard sale last. Garrett and Jessica G started the bucketless family in 2015. When a six-month adventure with their three young kids turned into more than a decade of traveling the world. We took the kids' cage diving with great white sharks. And the gaps in this cage were big enough and our child was small enough. He just kept jumping off the bottom and then that kind of floating out the cage. And I have every single rational fear that a mom does. But at the same time, like I'm not gonna shelter my kids from seeing the world. Today, their family has explored over 100 countries and built a global travel brand, collaborating with companies like National Geographic. We expect a lot out of our kids and they have had some extraordinary experiences because of it. There's so much to gain from hardships and hard work. It's almost like on a daily basis of like, "How can I make my kids life difficult today in a controlled environment?" We talk about their origin story. A close call with a 16-foot crocodile and why they finally decided to settle down again. All on today's episode. We recorded this very special episode with Garrett and Jessica of the Buckelus family about two years ago and it's never before been seen. It's been sitting in our vault ever since and they graciously let us post this episode while Abby's healing and recovering postpartum from Giving Bird. So thank you Garrett and Jessica and enjoy this episode with the Buckelus family. I'm shocked that you guys just got off a 17-hour flight. I'm glad you bring that up because if I just take a snooze or pass out or just catch myself like yawning throughout this, it's nothing to do with the conversation. It's just that, yeah, it's been a long time. We had, well, so it was a seven-hour flight from Kuala Lumpur to Doha and then 17 hours to Doha. It's not a Doha to LA, so we just got off on like 36-hour travel day. Where is Doha? I don't even know where that is. In the middle east, where the World Cup was. World Cup. Yes, yes. Oh my gosh. You guys have to be the kings and queens of going on like, no sleep. You know what's funny? We've realized that I don't know. Sometimes you just go with it and maybe it's okay because our schedules aren't that like rigid. You know, when we flew to the other side of the country at the beginning of the summer, we were pretty jet lagged. We were just saying that on the way here. Like, it probably took us maybe five days to adjust, but you know, you fall asleep. We try to go to sleep when the sun goes down, which we do, but then sometimes we wake up four hours later. And so you're like, that's okay. If you stress about not getting sleep, then it gets bad. But you just wake up at three and you just get a bunch of work done, and it's fine. Oh my gosh. I would say our kids do better than us, right? Yeah, our kids are the troopers, yeah. I'm not going to lie. When you guys pulled up and you're like, you just called me with phone, like, hey, by the way, we're here. I don't know if it's the right house. If I walk out and then you guys get out with your kids, I was like, oh my gosh. You guys really do travel as a family unit. Like, you do this. Your life is no joke, you know? They need to go on the 36-hour travel day, yeah. They're rocked at. Honestly, well, because so we left Kuala Npore at 8 p.m. The kids slept most of that first flight. That was a seven hour flight. Then we had a two hour layover. And then the last 17 hours, I think maybe everybody slept for one to three hours. They're going to crash them. Our hero gets off the flight and he's like, you want to know what movies I watch? Like, what? And he rattled off like 16 movies. I took a melatonin. I was like, I'm going to bed and yeah, he raped. That's incredible. One of the kids don't get a ton of screen time. So you put them on a flight with a screen just right here first. That's two hours and they're kind of dialed in. They don't want to sleep because it's their one time to like have screen time. So they just soak it in. That's awesome. That's kind of how Griffin is. Like, he's only two, but he can watch a whole movie. Kids, we don't like use it really nearly. He'll just sit and stare at it. You can't break it. And how old are your kids right now? We have 11 and 9 and 6. Crazy. And when you started this whole journey of traveling the world, how old were they? See, Dorothy was almost three and middle had just turned one. So we left when they were super duper young. Which now looking back, if somebody asks us what's the most difficult age to travel with, it's like that age. It's for sure that. Basically, you guys are in it. And normally, I give a lot of credit to my son, Manila, my second, who was just a good little boy. Like, I think any other toddler, 18-month-old, like, that's like just the do not enter phase of travel. Just good luck. And he was just such a good kid. And if I would put him down for an app, he would just go to bed. Or if I would, you know, would be in an hour line at security. And he would just stand by my side. Like, I think most taller boys are all over the place. I honestly had Cali come second. I don't think we would have continued our travels. We would have quit everything. But yeah, but our second Manila is just the sweetest little toddler boy. And he made the travels doable. We just did a flight with our two boys flying home from Nashville. And you guys, it was one of the most stressful flights we've ever had. It was only three and a half hours. Like, that seemed long to us. And you say you just took a 17-hour flight. I'm like 17 hours. I know we were 45 minutes and I like checked the app. I'm like refreshing and I'm like, oh no. But you're also in that zone where you're holding a baby. And it's just like a little bomb that you're just waiting to go off. Especially at six months where they're kind of like sort of grab it things. And they want to move, but they can't. And anyway, yeah. We're in a really nice cruise control mode where our kids are pros. We check in. They go through security. They pull out an iPad. They ask for their cranberry juice. Like, they're pros. I woke up and our youngest is like ordering himself some ice cream. And I was like, props, man, you can order by yourself. I can't stop you. So what did you guys do when you had a one-year-old? Because our 11-month-old turns one in a couple days at the time of this recording. And he tried for half the flight. It was one of the most stressful flights we've ever had. And it was during his nap time, which we couldn't like really control that. It just happened to be the flight that we needed that day. And I was walking him up and down the aisle, trying to give him the fall asleep. Like, shushing him, giving his Mickey. Nothing worked. So like, what do you do? I mean, there's a bunch of stuff you can try. You can try to not book a flight around nap time. You can try to just tire him out as much as possible. You can sit at the back of the plane, where it's a little bit louder, a little bit bumpier. And hopefully that'll like rock him to sleep. You can, yeah, just walk around with him. I think there's a bunch of things you can try. But at the end of the day, the best-laid plans are always going to go out the window. You know, I can count many times of when I had everything aligned perfectly. And then I'll send you your sitting on the tarmac for an extra like two hours. And so like maybe the baby sleeps, but then by the time you actually take up, take off, you know, you're delayed. And it just always happens. So you just got to be ready for it. You got the only thing you can control is your attitudes. And that's the way we go now. And we always take turns freaking out. That's probably my best piece of advice is with with parents, you have to take turns. And Garrett knows when I'm in like, like, travel days are my like stressful days. Like, I'm the one who's done everything. I've done all the logistics. So I'm normally like very like trying to stay on it. And Garrett is really good about taking the kids. During check-in, he pulls him over to the side. They're running around, getting their wiggles out and doing all the stuff. So I can like focus on what's happening. And he knows when he needs to step in and tell me to calm down and not stress. But and then like on the flip side, there's times where he gets stressed. And I'm like, okay, kids, let's give dad some space. Can we go way back for a second? Because I know you guys have been married for like quite a long time, right? Was like how, how many years? That's insane. Congratulations. We're just gonna give it up for you. We're just five. Okay. Yeah, five years. But 15, I mean, how did you guys meet? Like, where, like, can we go back to the very beginning? We met on our church missions. We were in Vladivostok, Russia. In our church, church at Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, you go on a mission and you're not, you're not, um, you don't choose where you go, right? Um, so we were just assigned both went to Vladivostok. And that's where we met, but you don't date on your mission or anything. You, you kind of forget everything and just try to focus on service during that time. And I knew who Garrett was. He was a really good missionary. He was very, um, focused. And we were just good friends. We taught an English club together. And then after our missions, we came home. And, uh, we had a buddy who was like, Hey, I want to take this girl out on a date. You guys should come. We're like, okay, cool, but like, who should we go with? And he's like, we'll just go with each other. And we both, but when he said that, he's like, you guys should just go with each other. We both looked at each other like, oh, no, like, that's weird. That's like taboo. But yeah, we went just like, oh, that's just goes like a hangout. And then that night, remember what we did? We went. And this is such like a Utah date. The guys all brought their trucks. And then they put bean bags in the back of their trucks. And they set up a white sheet and like a projector from their cars. Like, we were in the mountains, we were in the canyon. We were in the canyon. That's fine. Watch, I think we're like one of the board movies. And anyway, we ended up cuddling that night. And it sounds so lame. But I just, it just felt really right. Like the whole thing, I was like, over just like two puzzle pieces that just felt right. But also it was, you know, it was taboo in our church because people are like, no, you need a focus and it needs to be all about this work. So sometimes it's this taboo thing to meet your spouse on your mission. But even though we were super focused and good missionaries and all this stuff, it's still, you know, sometimes it's not. It was after the mission. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So after the mission. So honestly, nothing was wrong. But as she means taboo, like people might assume like, oh, I bet they were like dating or like flirting with them when they were on the mission. Kissing in a back room or something. Yeah. But like none of that happened. None of that happened. And living in Russia, what was that like? Russia is, um, I mean, it lives up to its reputation. It does. It lives up to everything you see. For good, bad, and crazy, all the things. You know what those like dash cam videos or. If you ever just get bored. This is like YouTube. YouTube. Russian dashcam and the craziest, not the least things literally will just be a guy because there's so many Crazy things that happen that people will set up for insurance purposes a dashcam in their car Okay, because like an example would be someone will be driving an old grandma or Babushka We'll be like walking across the street and then throw herself in front of your car trying to like get the insurance from the Injury so if you have a dashcam you have like evidence of like not she threw herself in front of my car or stuff like that the craziest stuff I have anyways you'll see like a grizzly bear like take out the car in front of them We're all gonna be driving and like a rocket will just pass the real like the craziest stuff that actually happens And then you go there and you're like, oh, this is for real like this isn't just like the highlight real on YouTube like this stuff happens The craziest thing you saw on your own eyes because we're there for two years. You saw probably some crazy stuff than I did I mean at that time in my life I was a young 19 year old and I don't think I'd ever seen anybody die and Then I came back home two years later having seen a handful of people die Like it's yeah, that was the hardest on me is like a 19 year old That was the craziest because of an accident diable age There's a handful of things. I remember like how cold it gets there on a daily basis like during the dead of winter If people were not in a state to like get home safely, it would just get too cold that night It was like intense Siberia, Russia So you'd like be walking on the street and see someone who's like literally frozen to death the next morning was like like clean up Yeah, it was crazy crazy. That is so wild. I definitely think you love you learn to love Who you serve right and and after two years in Russia? You like truly learned to love these people and all their you know quirks and history and realize who they are and why they are the way They are because of you know their history They can be very cold You know when you see them on the street, but you get into their homes and they're and then they just give you the shirt off They're back. They are your family so the most loyal people to be like go and door to door and it can be really difficult But as soon as you get into someone's home, they're just the most kind-loving wonderful people So the first like few months you're just exposed to all the craziness You're like where am I and then by the end of the two years you're like this is the most special place on the planet Like love Russia love the Russian people. It's a yes, it's a special place That's have you guys been back since no we were supposed to go back March 2020 And we haven't been back as a family. I've been back twice Oh, really, but not as a family like the bike of this family hasn't been to Russia yet now. I don't know full ever go back We actually we had a cruise planned to Russia and then 2020 hit yeah And so that cruise never happened it was a family cruise with like Abby's whole extended family And there's what's the cathedral? That's like faint like world famous like a red square. What is it? All right? Not it's that's not even a bullet St. Peter's bird. Yeah, we were we're gonna go there and then yeah 2020 hit and it never happened and now you got the the war with Russia and Ukraine. So It's gonna be a minute. Yeah. Oh, it's gonna be a while Um, I guess like serving there. Do you is that a bucket list stop with your kids that you'd like to take your kids back to where you served your mission? Oh my gosh, I had convinced Jessica to go there in 2020 and before I got canceled and Oh my gosh, I was just so excited to show our kids. I mean something as simple like when you live there I wanted to take them like grocery shopping which there that meant like going to the milk stop Then going to the egg stop then going to the meat shop shop like it was so like Old school and different as it's really excited to show that to our kids. Yeah, it's probably not a lot of Americans there Not where we were no I remember again people there was we're just painting a picture there I was walking down the street one day having been in Russia for like a year and a half and like across the street I noticed a girl like with a bright white smile like walking down the street smiling and I was like American American I run across the street and I was like hey, hey excuse me and she was like whoa You speak English and I was like yeah, like I knew like you can just tell Yeah, and it's just it's just different like cultures and again. This was like Eastern Russia But like I I could tell I mean how often would you go up and say hi to someone or even just be on the street and someone Would immediately would it cut you off and be like in Russian? It would try or in English it would translate They yeah, like your teeth are really white. Are they yours? Are they you know way and so you just have to yeah They're mine. They're my two. They're like they're so white and they were just always like how did you get your teeth so white? So you guys had to learn Russian while you were yeah, yeah, yeah, you learn you learn so in our church You go to an empty seat the missionary training center and if you're learning a different alphabet You go for three months or you did at the time So we went to an empty seat and probably you talk for three months you like go through a really intensive course of learning to read and write and Teach I mean, but you leave this empty see and you can pray in Russian. You know, you can speak like church talk Yeah, you can church and you could maybe like order some food or something But and you're also at least you feel confident that you can speak the language and understand the language I remember getting to the airport and like seeing my first Russian and being like amazing I'm gonna go speak to this gentleman and I like in Russian. I'm like, hello, hi sir. How are you and he like rattles off Russian back to me And I'm like, oh shoot. What's that language like that is not what I learned. Yeah, you so you think you know, but so doing your mission in Russia You know clearly it wasn't just eat like a super easy experience just trying to learn Russian Like did that toughen you up then to take on world travel? Definitely and definitely me like I like I said I'm such a a peaceful person and so when someone's just gonna like call you out on things Or be like really blunt about things like I've learned I don't know It was easier for me to be blunt and I want to say rude because I wasn't rude But it was easier for me to be more direct in Russian than even I would be in English Okay, you know and for some reason just being having that cultural difference and just being able to say it You know to invite somebody do you want to learn about Jesus Christ that kind of just I don't know it makes me a little bit more like nervous Saying that in English whereas when I learned to say in Russian I was like do you want to learn about Jesus Christ and people were like Either yes or no and that was you know, you know, you know, you know? Yes, you must have a say no It's a lot of know. Yeah, there's a lot of notes. It truly honestly is the Hardest thing by far. I've ever experienced in my life like even just like talking about the whole time It's just like holding back like tears remembering what it was like to experience it Especially the first six months. I would say people there that part of Russia didn't really speak English and so For me, I like went six months without being able to like speak to someone I either like had to learn the language, which I didn't know yet And so it's just a very very lonely six months without anyone to talk to or listen to and Yeah, so it just went from like miserable like survival mode, but also to talk about motivation to like learn a language Yeah, after six months like fully fluent reading writing everything But again has came out of like necessity in survival mode. Could you play sports with people like it could you it was a waste of communicating that Work just over I think have changed quite a bit since but it was intensely strict where it was like you're going to wake up It's 6 a.m. You're gonna exercise and eat breakfast for an hour, and then you're gonna study the language and study like church Materials for like the next two hours, and then you're gonna be outside like profiting and serving The entirety of the day until you come back at eight or nine p.m Whenever that before the sun goes down and then you're you know back out at the very next day one day a week You had like four hours of Preparation time when it was like this is your time to go and like play sports or But during that four hours just make sure you grocery shop You do your laundry you clean your apartment and you get prep for the next week and you're at home So maybe you got 30 minutes to like have me time or like go play some soccer or something like that And it was that way for two years. Oh, yeah, you're you're that was your time to like write your parents back home Because when we're there you could call home two times a year You could call home on Mother's Day and Christmas And so just like so insanely strict and for me just kind of like my personality type Was like if I'm gonna do something I'm gonna do it to the fullest and so if there was a rule I was like following it perfectly and it was very like big on roles So yeah, I went there entirety of two years without like breaking a single rule because that's what it meant to be like a good Missionary. I wanted to be the best and so it was intense And so you guys did that mission together then you end up falling in love after where you know a lot happens How do you go from living in Russia for two years to getting married and traveling the world with your your kids? I I will say like with Garrett like he just mentioned whatever he does he goes in 110% and that and that's why I fell in love with him. I loved how Intense he was and how six successful he was whatever he put his heart into he was very successful at it And so I knew whatever he chose to do in life. He would do very well at and you know For a little bit that was soccer and he played college soccer and then for a little bit It was an app he started in college and he did really well with that and then it evolved into the bikula's family and just from there on out So whatever Garrett does he goes in like 110% so that was one of the things that really attracted me to him initially But I also like it's a double-edged sword because as much as I love his intensity and his drive I am also such like a think in the box type of girl. I'm you know so convinced intentional, just the girl next door who had a dad who worked in nine to five and assumed that my husband would be the same and Garrett is not that way whatsoever. So for me, I feel like it's been a huge pivot of, okay, I thought I would marry this person, and it would be just, you know, like, like, you know, my, he would work at nine to five and go to job, get a job, and then come home and, and very quickly, I realized that wasn't the case. In college, he had, I don't know, five or six like startups that he was just all over the place with, and then finally he had created an app called Scan, and it started to do really well, brought in investors and forced him to focus, but he ended up doing really really well with it. And it was when that sold that so much of it had been like her following me in my entrepreneurial ventures and dreams. So it was like, okay, thank you for doing what I wanted to do. Like, what would you choose for our next chapter? And I think she literally said, I'm not sure I, I think we have a lot to like learn and figure out. So why don't we just do a little bit of traveling and that became like the famous last words of a little bit of traveling because I just translated those moderate words in my head too. So the common theme kind of think our marriage is maybe like my idea or his idea and then him taking it to like, the 10th degree. Thank you to Neutralful for sponsoring this portion of today's episode. I am freshly postpartum. One of the first things I was like, I need to make sure I have this was genuinely my Neutralful around four months. I feel like it was when I was like, wow, there is so much hair on my brush. And there's so not that much hair on my head. And I love how Neutral comes in to support that specific gap. Neutral is the number one dermatologist recommended hair growth supplement brand. And it's the number one hair growth supplement brand personally used by dermatologists because hair health isn't a one-size-fits-all. Neutralful offers different formulas for both men and women at any age or stage of life. Like I mentioned, I love their postpartum one. Right now, the Neutralful Women's Formula has been upgraded to the most advanced version yet. It's 100% vegan, biotin-free, and comes in smaller capsule size to make your daily routine easier. You have all people. You need some extra help with swelling bills. See, thicker, stronger, faster growing hair with less shedding in just three to six months. Right now, Neutralful is offering our listeners $10 off your first month subscription. And free shipping when you visit Neutralful.com and enter promo code UnplannedPod. That's Neutralful.com spelled N-U-T-R-A-F-O-L.com promo code UnplannedPod. So that was 2015 and she wanted to do a little bit of traveling and I'm like, well, I'm not just going to go on like the six month vacation. So what am I going to do during that? And it was, I want to like document these travels. And I want to like do it on Instagram and YouTube. So that's when we created the name of the bug of this family. And it definitely just started off, especially at like 2015 that, you know, influence or a creator was a real thing. And so it was like, I just wanted to document our family travels and share it. And so that's when it was born, the bug of this family. So crazy. So, so crazy. I can totally like relate to you. And like just wanting to do whatever you do 110% because that like that's that's literally yeah, that's how I am to. And how do you how do you deal with it? I can feel that it's the same thing that it's like, you love that passion, you love that work ethic, you love that drive and like the vision and the dreaming that I'm, but I'm just normal like, I don't know. So it's been fun though, I tell them all the time, like in hindsight, like I would not have one in normal, like this is awesome, but it's so funny. I can relate so well because I was like, definitely thought we were going to have like the nine to five situation. And when we, let's see, when you sold his company to Snapchat, we actually moved out here to LA. And I was so excited. I was like, just moving on, we left Utah. I just thought it was like a nine to five situation and he came home and he didn't have his laptop with him. And he was just so present when he was home. And I loved it. But very quickly, I would say after three months, you could see the light just fade. And for him who's such a creative and it's so much about creating new things and doing what he wants to do and what he believes he can do to see that kind of suck from him when it sucked out from him when he had a boss and he realized that he was creating things to impress somebody else. That's what like suck the life out of him. And so me who thought we were going to be an LA for the long hauler, at least for the next five to 10 years, very quickly, I was like, shoot, like we, this isn't going to work. And I know he felt really bad because I had followed him from Utah to San Francisco back to Utah to Hawaii back to Utah and then to LA and then for me to be like, I want to go back to Utah again and finish my senior year of college soccer. And I was like, no way. Like I was not happy about it, but after those couple months of him doing the nine to five. And again, nine to five is for the majority of people. It's probably for me, you know, it's for my dad is a lot of my family, but I could see it wasn't for him. And that's why I'm super super thankful to Jess because she, yeah, she put my happiness first and saved me when I was in a situation where I was like dying inside. So then you end up quitting your job at Snapchat right and then moving you did you then play soccer at in Hawaii? Well, for a minute, okay, then ended up back in Utah, finishing one more season of soccer at BYU, Utah. And then that was the like, that was the compromise. He was like, I just want my last season because he had sold the company right before that. And basically, you know, it was going to forsake that last year of soccer for this company and for his employees. And then when he ended up quitting, he was like, I want to just finish this one last year, you get to choose what we do next. And then I had said a little bit of traveling, but then exploded into 10 years later. I'm actually like really curious because clearly you've had a lot of success on the business front selling your app to Snapchat, working at Snapchat, then traveling the world, but then also being able to grow as a social media influencer. So you're almost a filling thing in your life up to this point, doing all that. Like, where are you like, man, this is where I get joy the most? I've given a lot of thought just recently. When you like find success in certain areas, you'll see like which ones bring you more joy in which ones you like find that like pot at the end of the rainbow. And you're like, oh, that one's kind of empty. That didn't bring me as much joy in life as I thought. And it was definitely like when I was running a successful business and like speaking at conferences and like rubbing shoulders with, you know, the millionaires and billionaires, that taught me very quickly like, oh, that's not my scene. It's just for me personally, that's not for me. I think a big way I've used it is a gauge is like when I'm around people, who am I jealous of like in a good way and healthy way? Who do I want to be like, right? And if I'm around someone who's like way more wealthy than me, that doesn't like instill any jealousy or like, you know, desire to be more like them. Whereas then if I saw somebody who's like very healthy and athletic, like, oh, like that, that feels good to me. If I was around somebody who had just like ultimate freedom in their life, that was really big for me. But the number one thing I would find is that would bring me like the lasting joy and just was like, yep, that's what I want in my life is when I would be around people who had strong family. Strong married, strong relationship, good relationship with their kids. And so that's where I started to like design and create my life, especially when it was the transition from like the tech business world to what we do now as the buckles family. And that's why from the very beginning, we never considered ourselves like influencers. We always consider ourselves family travel journalists because that was my way of like tricking the current state of the world and designing my unique way that I want to live my life. And it was how can I spend as much time together with my family doing things that we love together as a family. And so we like invented family travel journalists. I don't know how well you are 27, 28 when you sold your company to be these, you know, under 30 millionaires and to not need to work the rest of your life. I mean, we had good money, but if we were stupid with it, then it would be gone a second. Like it wasn't endless money that we'd received. And so we had the conversation with one of your co-founders when we of their three co-founders, we all received the exact same payout. And just to have those conversations of what do you do when money isn't the object, right? Like when you don't need to necessarily work and those conversations of health, marriage, family, friendships, those are the only things that really matter. And so when Garrett and I like going into these travels and we set these goals, we have them on our website, it was so intentional of like what we wanted to do. And even in creating the bucket list family, social media influencing wasn't a thing. It was kind of the mommy blogger era. When we left, it just wasn't a thing. So the goal has always been spend time together as a family, experience the world, learn about new cultures, you know, become closer to our friends and family. So we had all these goals that we've tried to achieve and I feel like we've done a really good job over the last 10, almost 10 years now. Are we the biggest? No, are we the most successful? Do we get paid the most? No, no, no. But the time that we spend that's all that matters to us. We have our health. We have I have a good marriage. We have kids that are awesome and we love being around and can handle 36-hour travel days with and we're really happy with where we are at. - That's so inspiring, you guys. Where, well, my wish is like crack. (laughing) Where would you say has been the most fun country to visit with your kids so far? 'Cause you've been to over a hundred countries? - Almost to a hundred. We need to sit down and write a list 'cause we're probably in that like 90 range. - Okay, okay, so over 90. That's wild. - Where's the most kid friendly? - Kid friendly, well, so I just wrote a book with National Geographic and I have it all kind of laid out of best, you know, the six month or the 18 month or the, you know, five to seven and then the older. You guys are at the two and six months, two and one. - Yeah, one year old, two year old. I know it comes in my mind. - Oh, what do you think? - If you guys wanted to like get out and then go to like a far off destination but you wanted to know it was gonna be kid friendly, then first that comes in my mind is Fiji. I'm telling you, you would arrive to Fiji and before you even left the airport, some Fiji and woman would come up to you and take your kids and you would immediately trust her and they would, you would go through security while she like holds your bathe and then like, that would be an entire trip. - Fiji and love children, they love them so much. - And a lot of the resorts, they have, you know, kids clubs or nannies and like, they have like one per kid and they just love your kids. They love you and they love you. - They'll like come take your child at breakfast and like, you guys go enjoy like me time together and then like six hours later they bring back your child and their hair's braided and they're. (laughing) - They got all these flowers and stuff like. - Like it's have the best time. - Wow. - Do you find that like, 'cause I think to the typical American hearing that, like that mom would be like, "Oh my gosh, I would never hand off my baby." Like that is terrifying to me. Do you find that in America we like our culture around babies is so very different? - For sure, for sure. - Around mothering, around nursing, around, you know, safety, all this stuff is super different. And yes, especially these like, Polynesian countries, Tonga, Fiji, Tahiti, like they love children and they're so good and they're just these beautiful little anties that you just see the love around. - And the style, there's like a village style, like a village raises the kids, you know. It's like open door policy, love the villages, don't even have front doors and it's just like a village vibe. It's really special there. - Wow, whereas like I feel like in America, it's kind of viewed as like, it's the mom and dad, but like you're almost made to feel guilty if somebody else is like, your kids and somebody else's care. It's very interesting. - Yeah, when you go to say Fiji, are you staying in a hut? Are you staying on a resort? Like where do you live when you visit all these different places? - It's always been an interesting thing in our travels because we're both just like how we were brought up and how we still are, it's just like very, very frugal. So if we're planning a trip, it'll always be like, okay, what's the most affordable way that we can have this experience? - And when we left, we sold all our belongings. We had our acquisition money, we didn't wanna touch it. So we set that aside and we sold all our stuff, made about $45,000 and from that we were like, okay, this is gonna take us six-ish months and we'll come home and we'll get our new company, we'll go from there. - And we had agreed that we'll only travel as long as that $45,000 from the Yard Cell last. And so that was when it became my motivation to like take the bucket of this family, our YouTube and our Instagram. And like hopefully help it create some money, make some money so that we could extend those travels because we were both surprised how much we loved the like full-time travel lifestyle. And so yeah, I was like, okay, how do we get creative entrepreneurial here and two of those travels? - But I would say that initially our vibe before, you know, all of our family travels in the bucket of this family was probably Airbnb's. Like our first six months of travel was-- - Yeah, finding like your cheap affordable-- - Airbnb's, beer's, home rentals all around the world so we could have, you know, laundry and a kitchen, like that was the plan. And that's what we did. And then about three months in, our social media started to grow very, very slowly. We had maybe 12,000 followers. And I was like, I'm just gonna start reaching out to some places and see if we can take some pictures for people and post to better. - One of the first companies we partnered with was Ritz Carlton and people would die. Oh man, like you guys acted like you were trying to save money but you're selling out working with, or like staying at these Ritz Carlton's is like, no, that's actually the cheapest way for us to travel is to work with partner with Ritz Carlton. - It's the luxury properties that have marketing budgets. So that's where we end up, right? - Yeah. - And cheaper for us to stay at really nice places than to pay our out of our own pocket to like stay at the cheap Airbnb. And so, yeah, that just became a game of like, who can we work with? We're working with airlines, resorts, tourism boards. - I'm super grateful for all the people that hosted us, especially when we were so young and early on. And when I wrote my book that came out this last year, it was so fun for me to put them in my book. - Wow. - And to be like, you guys believed in us 10 years ago before we traveled. - When we were 10,000 followers. - When we were 10,000. - So before traveling, implementing was a thing. You took a bet on us and we're like, sure, I guess we'll host you for free and, you know, and then to like write down my book. - And now you're in an idea book. - I was really proud of that to email them back 10 years later and be like, hey, just so you know. That was thought to email you to think of that too. - It just meant a lot to me that they had believed in us all those years ago. How cool. - And these are people that you just, like they saw your videos and they're like, stay at my house for free and-- - I mean, it was that, but it was mostly me reaching out to, early on I remember going to Thailand. That's kind of when we first started to see, like if we could make this a thing. And emailing, I don't know, 20 different hotels, maybe 50 even. And all different, you know, I wasn't going for the luxury brands, but very quickly I realized, like I said, it's the nice brands that have marketing budgets. So we weren't hosted in the three or four stars. We were hosted in the five star hotels because, you know, they, before social media, they're used to having media come and writers and journalists and stuff. And so that's the route we took in Garrett's mom, actually. She has a travel television series. So we had traveled with her in the past. And I knew a little bit of that world and how to have a media stay and what that means. And so going into it, that was kind of our example of how to be media at a resort. - Wow. - Walk me through the logistics of, if Abbie and I are right now with our two-year-old and one-year-old are like, all right, we're doing it. We're going to go travel the world for six months. What would we want to pack? What would we need? What should we leave at home? Because we're going to be able to, like, be able to find a bed or a car seat or whatever, like what would be our way of doing that? - And then the quick answer is less. - Less is more. - Or as little as possible. Because the biggest stress or like, what's going to make your experience worse is just whatever causes you stress. And probably the biggest stress is just like, stuff. Like having too much luggage and checking luggage or losing things and having to pack and everything being heavy. Like, that's just all stress. And so one big takeaway from all of our travels is just learning the art of minimalism and how, like, liberating that is, just having less. - I mean, as far as clothes, just everything mixes and matches, right? So, like, I don't have, like, one outfit for one day ever. Everything layers and we've worn the exact same clothes for the last three months in Southeast Asia. I have one little carry-on. Garrett has, like, a half of a carry-on and our kids have a half of a carry-on. So, like, we pack clothing-wise, super minimally. And then when it comes to gear, I mean, I always say reach out to your hotel or your rental home and say, hey, do you have a pack and plane a crib? Because 99% of the time they do. So, for sure, leave that at home. When we first left, we packed a double stroller. And I, like, die laughing about it, picturing us, like, hauling this massive double stroller. It was just so big, but getting a good stroller that pulled up in the overhead bin. Or, you know, and then, of course, one that, like, attaches to your car seat. Or we didn't travel with car seats or we traveled, we would just rent them or- - And that's also, like, the realization that, like, babies are everywhere. So, everywhere you go, you can find diapers. - You can find diapers, you can find lights, you can find everything all over the world. Babies are everywhere. - Babies are everywhere. - Pack with less. - Thank you to Mom Cozy for sponsoring this portion of today's episode. We had been using the Mom Cozy bottle washer and bottle warmer. We did have an incident the other day where I accidentally did not press start on the bottle washer. - You said, I'll just hand wash them. I was like, how dare you? You could not even do hand wash these as good as this bottle washer washes them. And there's a rapid cycle. Their bottle warmer is also a great time saber. It warms up fast and evenly, which is perfect for when your baby wakes up crying and hungry in the middle of the night. Being able to heat up a bottle in just three minutes is such a game changer. And that bottle washer, you guys, it can actually clean eight bottles at once. - Does it all in just one and a half hours? What sets the D8 bottle washer apart from anything else on the market? Are two patented features, target wash, which blast water directly into those nightmare blind spots like straws and nipples and pump 360, which rotates the water streams to completely clean the tricky curves of rest pump flanges. - If you're in the infant stage or know someone who is, you need these Mom Cozy products in your life. And right now you can get 10% off the night pro bottle warmer and 10% when you pre-order the deep clean bottle washer D8 at momcozy.com with code unplanned. So head to momcozy.com and use code unplanned for 10% off my favorite momcozy products. - How do you navigate language barriers? - I feel like that's something to me that has never been an issue. And most people speak English. - Sometimes it's like a fun part of the adventure. - Yeah, it's fine. - Sometimes add some fun and excitement to it, but it's never gotten us into major problems. It's just a fun, I like, I'm gonna go into this grocery store and try to buy things and communicate. I also feel like between my Russian and my Spanish. I grew up speaking Spanish, like you're taking it in school. And so that has gotten me pretty far with any romance languages. So getting around, I can get around pretty well. - See, like my street smarts really suck. And so I feel like, yeah, so I feel like I would screw us if we accidentally stumbled upon some sketchy area and I just didn't know. 'Cause like, I don't know, like when you grow up in a city, like I grew up in St. Louis. And when I say I grew up in St. Louis, people are like, "Oh my gosh, St. Louis, like that's so dangerous." 'Cause I think St. Louis is ranked in one of the number one spots for crime in the United States. But it's because of East St. Louis across the river. - It's a little suburb. - Yeah, I grew up, yeah, 30 minutes out of the city. Like, nothing ever happened where I grew up. Like, it was very, very safe. But, you know, you just like typically know that bad parts of the town and the good parts of town, how do you navigate that when you're traveling the world? - That is a tough part of trying to travel, like, frugal, or especially affordable when you have kids, because you just wanna stay in nicer areas. Just for the safety. - And we did. And I, if I'm booking something, I'm looking at reviews like crazy. And a lot of times I'll filter Airbnb. And I think the RBO have a checkmark where you can say, it needs to be family-friendly. And then you can see it's next to parks. It's next to grocery stores, it's like that. Like I'm always gonna make sure that I'm saying in like a good part of town. - For sure. - It's so interesting traveling. 'Cause, you know, we have our mutual friends, Karen and Nate. Like, the way that they can travel, like they can stay in a hostel if they want. Like, you're not gonna do that with kids. - Right. - And then also, there's just like certain things where like, okay, let's say you didn't have kids, and you're going to Paris, you're gonna wanna head up this museum and this museum and this Eiffel Tower. With kids, it's like, they just wanna go to a playground. They just wanna go to a park. They just wanna go like meet kids and play with friends. Like, so traveling is very different with kids. But, I would say, I like how to argue, it's better. Like, you have such a new aspect of how you immerse yourself into a culture when you do it as a family. - And people tend to be more welcoming, I think, you know, you see a little kid and it completely breaks down barriers. - Yeah. - It's also the cheat code when you're in airport. Go up with your little kids. Look extra stress for that five minute thing. Go up to any line and say, is there a family line? Oftentimes, there's a family line and if there's not, they're just, hey, you look very much like you need help. - That's right, that's so funny. They're the cheat codes. - Talk to me to about like finding community when you're on the road because, I don't know, I feel like I would maybe get lonely, not being around family or your close friends. Like, do you just meet new friends everywhere you go and then say goodbye forever? - So we traveled full time for three years. And if you asked us, what was the hardest? - That was 100% the hardest part. - And number one thing. - 100% and yeah, you do get lonely and you, and so over those three years, I would say maybe every other month or something, we would have friends come and meet us. We had friends join us in Iceland. We had friend join us in Italy. We had friends join us in New Zealand. So we tried to have people come and join us. So, and that really helped take away a lot of the homesickness. - And that did a good job of like maintaining all of our friendships, but community, like family, friends, and community all are in the same bucket. But like, community is its own thing. And that's almost like the more of the story for us. Like at the end of the day, what did we learn after traveling the entire world? We got to experience different cultures. In other words, we got to experience different communities. And it made us realize like, that's what we want in our lives. And so as in 2018, we decided to settle down. We chose Hawaii and we chose Hawaii in large part because the community that that would put us into, and yeah, that became everything for us. - It's funny you bring that up just because yeah, we used to live there. I used to, I actually learned to surf while we were out there. I've noticed a lot of your videos, like half some sort of element of surfing in them, especially like, I think there was one where it's like, my kid surfing and then saw a shark. Or like, I've seen the videos of like, our son, like, swims at the shark. How do you, does that not like freak you out? When it's like, my kid's in the water with a freaking shark. - Yeah, I mean, it's you know, it's like, it's a part of surfing that there's just like, that part of risk. But then there's like, the logical side of like, what's the percentage chance? Like, I'm nervous every time we're in a car, you know, like, I'm petrified of like car accidents. And I just know like, the likelihood of that over like, a shark attack. And so there's just that. - As we grew, as we grew in the rainforest, deep like, proper rainforest. It was pouring rain. And there, we had to wear these leech socks and everyone was freaked out about leeches. And we were freaked out about leeches. - I'm not scared of sharks. I'm scared of leeches. - So scared. And like, they're these things called tiger leeches that kind of hang on to like a plant kind of like that. And they just like, reach onto anybody. Anyway. - They'll hang off the very end. So they're like reaching out in case you hike by it and they can grab onto your skin, clothes, whatever. - Oh God. - But they're, like, they can sense heat so strongly that they would be kind of relaxed. And I would put my hand anywhere within like a foot and also they would start going crazy. - Oh my God. - Cause they could like, sense your heat. - We were freaking out. But our guides and everybody who lived there, we're just kind of like, eh, like it's okay. Like yeah, it's annoying. And I don't want to compare leeches to sharks, but I just wanted to make the point that like, when you're around something and spending a lot of time in the ocean, it's just you're in the shark's home and they don't want to eat you. And you understand and you get informed on it. - Like if we're out surfing and we see a shark, we'll like paddle towards it and like get excited and like jump off our board. So like look at it and see what shark it is. And so because the kids are like used to it and abandon it. - You'll go try to swim next to the shark. - Well, I mean, we're talking reef sharks, right? - Okay, okay, not a great white. - Not a great white. - Tigers and great whites and stuff, right? - Got it. - But yeah, we spend a lot of time on leeches. - We spend a lot of time on leeches. - We spend a lot of time on the ocean. I'm sure, have we asked these Malaysians to come get the ocean with us? They would have been freaked out about sharks. But sharks don't scare us anymore. Like they probably used to. And maybe we'd eventually get used to the leeches. - Well, I mean like someone just died, though, from a shark attack in Hawaii this year. - Yeah, they did, like a really good surfer. - Yeah, that was really sad. It's really sad. - But I guess like, yeah, like you mentioned car accidents, that happens like people dying car accidents, right? - I mean, you're more likely to die in Hawaii by being hit in the head with a coconut than you are. - Crazy, that's crazy. Well, I also know too, like the ocean is so, it can't be so dangerous. The water itself could like suck you under. - Oh, wow, that's what you should be scared about. Yeah, just surfer in general. That's scary. - I'd rather be taken out by a coconut than by a shark. - Yeah, if you get taken out by a coconut, that's just God being like you, it's your time. - Yeah. - I'll tell you what I'm like really afraid of now, is crocodiles. - Really? - And we have spent a lot of time around crocodiles, especially this summer. And literally, I don't know, it was like five days ago, we were going down this river in the rain forest, and Geralt was-- - Oh my gosh. - I need to show you this footage, it's funny. - We had been looking for crocodiles. - We had been looking for crocodiles, and they are going through, like there's crocodiles everywhere. - Yeah, I hadn't seen any crocodiles. And the guys were like, there's crocodiles everywhere. We're like, show, prove it. And we're kind of cruising through this river, and Geralt's leaning out. He starts like taking a little video of the kids, and he goes, oh, Dorothy, let me know if there's a crocodile behind me. - As I, like, lean out over the water. - And just then, we see this, probably 16 foot crocodile, on the surface. And you know, wish, living in Hawaii, you've like learned about sharks. Like sharks genuinely don't want to eat people. You know what I mean? Like sometimes they're curious, if you give it, it's just because they're curious, right? Or there's some sort of wrong situation. - If you're splashing around in crock waters. - A crock wants to eat you, and they will just, they will eat anything. And Garrett, our guy that kind of slams on the brakes, you almost fell in on top of this crocodile. - I thought the kids were kidding because, again, I'm like leaning out just to try to get like proper focus. So I'm taking a video and I'm like, hey, Dorothy, let me know if there's a crock behind me and her face just lights up, and she's like, crocodile! - I thought she was kidding. So I don't like whip around the camera at first, and then I hear like a whip of the town and it turned around just in time to see it. Like, how are you falling in? - Connor. - I mean, we scared the crocodile. The crocodile was like freaked out. But yeah, that would have been better. - We asked our guy, like as soon as we got on the boat, like as a joke, like, hey, would you swim from like here just across the river? And he's like, no, you wouldn't make it. The crock would get you. - Wow, lots of stuff. - You guys are hardcore. - You're hardcore, you're taking your kids too. - I was gonna say, the bonus of all this, our kids are very, very obedient. Like, we wouldn't advise that like any parents or kids just like go on these type of experiences, but like, our kids have been on enough. Like, they're very, very obedient. Even the place we were staying, we put us in our own tent, and our kids are in their separate tent, and they're not allowed out. Like, they know they cannot leave, because Python's lions, like, depending where we are, like, they know they cannot leave. - Well, it's gonna stop a lion though from attacking the tent. - They want to go into the tent. I mean, it's like locked indoors, you know what I mean? - They don't do zippers. - Yeah, you're normally there's zippers, and sometimes even like locks on it. Like, they can't get in. Like, an elephant could theoretically just like plow through anything if they want to do, but they don't. You know, like, we've learned that lions, or not lions, elephants really like shore footing. So, they're not just gonna start like climbing rocks and climbing through it. Like, they don't do that. - We just heard of a lady a couple months ago who, she was on a safari in her safari vehicle, got, like, charged by a rhino, and now she's paralyzing. - Yeah, I'm crazy. - So, like, I know stuff does happen. - It's crazy to hear what, like, we, you know, we always have these guides in Africa to hear what they're afraid of. And it's never lions and leopards. It's always the elephants or the water buffalo. - Yeah. - Thank you to cash out for sponsoring this portion of today's episode. 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That's the whole idea real experience real guidance a smart setup that grows with kids Who are ready to start learning and keeps working as they become adults download cash app today and open a managed account for your child Visit our link in bio cash app is a financial services platform not a bank. Banking services provided by cash apps bank partners pre paid debit cards issued by Sutton bank member FDIC cash app visa debit flex cards issued by Sutton bank member FDIC and the bank or bank and a pursuant Civil license from visa USA C terms and conditions for the Sutton pre-paid card Sutton debit flex card and bank or debit flex card Savings and offers provided by cash app a blocking brand parents and legal guardians can open a managed account for kids six to 12 Visit cash.app slash legal slash podcast for full disclosures. I feel like a big theme in your content is like And your approach to parenting seems to be like teaching them to be smart but also to be fearless. It seems like you instill a lot of Confidence in your children. Yeah kind of talk more about like that approach to parenting whereas I feel like a lot of social media parenting seems to be fear driven Yeah, and like your seems to be very counter to that so totally and like I it's funny probably sitting here listening to as we like I'm not crocodiles and snakes and all this you know like we're so used to that but I don't want people to think that I'm just this like I don't care Mom like I have every single fear right if you hear me in the boats or where we are I'm like put your hand and get you know Like this way like I'm like I'm scared and I have every single rational fear that a mom does But at the same time like I'm not gonna Shelter my kids from seeing the world and we're gonna do it together and we're very safe and we are very Conscious is about everything that we're doing and where we're at and what we're doing it's one of my joys of like being the man behind the camera is filming her and witnessing her be like a Regular mom but in like extraordinary situations when my favorites is when we took the kids Cage diving with great white sharks and the gaps in this cage were big enough and our child was small enough That was like definitely the ability for them just to like float out and to see her just like Grabbing our child and pulling him back and then he felt like he was floating like an astronaut in his words So he's just kept jumping off the bottom and then that kind of floating out the cage and she would grab him back and like she's like Mothering our child but within this cage surrounded by great white sharks like those type of scenarios to me are so funny because again We'd consider ourselves like regular parents, but these situations are pretty crazy. I would say there was a TV show Maybe like two years ago that I watched it was not like ABC. I don't know if you saw I can't remember the name of it, but basically they took Maybe 16 different types of parenting, and they kind of pigeon-holed every pair Did you see that? Yes, what's called the pair? Oh, I don't remember It's like a parent experiment. Yeah, yeah, but they like gave every parent like a name and I realized that you can't pigeon-hole Every time they get to like the gentle parenting. Yeah, free range. I was so interested. It was very interesting I'm not sure you showed, but I would say that If Garrett if I was to say what are like parenting style is it's high expectations like We expect a lot out of our kids. We expect them to behave on airplanes and behave You know sitting at a restaurant and to be sitting in the other room quietly for an hour or so while we do this podcast And they do you know like they're very well-behaved and they have had some extraordinary experiences because of it And we're able to do these wonderful things as a family and and it's because we you know expected out of them And I know a lot of parents wouldn't agree with that style. I think the The more popular style these days is just to be more gentle and to be more accommodating to children and Garrett and I when we had kids We looked at each other and we said we're not gonna stop our lives because we have kids We're gonna bring them along in the journey and we're gonna do it together and that's always been really important to us I think that's a big part of it too is like when we bring them along for the adventure we treat them like they're very capable we treat them like they're very smart and And we just like hold them to that level and that standard and they live up to it I think that's a big part of it and then to even answer your question of like, but why like the Fearlessness or like the courage and being brave for us. It's always been like If you raise a child to be like too soft or gentle or whatever word you want to put on it It's not so much about like oh, we want them to be like a daredevil. It's it's no. It's it's when It really matters which it's not gonna be like oh Jumping off this waterfall or doing this daredevil thing. It's gonna be like That person is lonely and they need a friend are you gonna be brave enough to go do the right thing and befriend that person or You're gonna have a bad choice and a right choice and it's gonna be scary and it maybe is gonna go against your friends in the peer pressure to do the right thing Are you gonna be brave and courageous enough to do the right thing like if we can Put them in those situations and like all facets of life on a daily basis then when it really matters We hope that they'll make the right decision I really admire that a lot because I mean that would be one of my goals And I think it's easier for me right now to coddle them But like I know that I've seen I've we've watched other parents some parents who are really close to when we first got married And before we got married we were like we love the way you raise your kids like your kids are so confident It was speaking with other adults. They like take initiative. They they're tough like yeah when they're faced with a challenge They rise up to it and I feel like that they had that similar approach and that's something we both been like That's something we want to do, but like it's easy as a mom just be like It's such a balance and it's so hard because when you see your kid crying or scared or You're gonna come from no matter what but I think it's also in the way, you know, I know your kids are young But now when you have a little bit older kids, you can you can have conversations with them And that's like when it's really nice to be able to say like, you know explain things to them and why it's okay to try this or why you know They can they can you know be happy and not worried about this or whatever Yeah, so I think it gets a little bit easier as they get older and can just have more conversations because when they're younger than Yeah, you don't want to put in any sort of difficult situation your kids are in school now And I've seen like they're involved in like community activities and stuff But they've lived up to this point like very different lives from the kids are like their classmates and the kids that they're doing plays with and stuff What difference do you know? I'm not like asking you to like brag on your kids, but you can kind of I'm curious like what difference do you notice in your kids compared to like their peers because of How their childhood has looked? I think it's different for each kid and kind of what their strengths are I feel like my Youngest especially he's so inquisitive and asked such good questions and and loves learning like he's the one sitting next to a guide and saying You know tell me about the mom orangutans and tell me about this tree and why is there that you know like he is always asking questions And I love that and and I think he can take that into school and into just normal life and be inquisitive about like everything and then and then my son Manila he is he's just easygoing and he's always been easy going and honestly I think it's because of the travels. He's had to be easy going So him in life he he just goes with the flow. We could send him off to like a three-week sleepaway camp and he wouldn't like blink and I had it Yeah, he's just so used to like life on the road. Yeah, and then our daughter. I think she's just mature. She's seen a lot of things and she You know for good and forget bad. I do think she's more mature than other girls her age You know sometimes I'm like just be a little girl, you know But she she has seen a lot in her life And so I think she's able to go into school and to other like pure situations and and know what's She doesn't go with the flow. She doesn't do what's popular. She doesn't you know She knows exactly who she is and what she wants to do and what she wants to be and so she's She's very mature I think for her age and okay being as different and she is okay being different and knowing She's different and I was the same way in high school. I think I thrived being a little bit more different and that was kind of my persona And she's the same way That's really sweet. When you say seen a lot. Do you mean like has there has there been something challenging that you had to go through as a family through the travels that Have matured. Well, I mean even just the thing that first came to my mind is The summer in Southeast Asia, you know, Dorothy is part of the surf writer club at school and it's all about you know recycling and Cleaning up ocean conservation conservation. It's really cool and we go around Southeast Asia and I would say I was Blown away how dirty it was blown away just a lot of ocean and there was one day where we Were paddle boarding and we took it to this kind of private beach and we'd go up onto the beach and it was beautiful white sandy beach And then all of a sudden we look behind kind of the the greenery back up to the sand and it was like Mountain of plastic bottles like it blew my mind. It looked like a recycling center. And the situation in this beach looked like it should have been like human had never set foot on it. Like it was out in the middle of nowhere. And yeah, trash had just accumulated onto it. And for door fee to see that, you know, and to be like, I'm over here, you know, and Hawaii's very, tries very hard to like keep things clean and to, you know, not use single use plastics and all that stuff. And so to see Dorothy's like mind blown, like not only mine, but she was like heartbroken to see that, you know, and I think that's going to be profound thing for her and her life to take forward and to, you know, continue wanting to be an advocate for the ocean and conservation and all that stuff. So it's those sorts of moments that we've experienced as a family even just recently where you're seeing, you know, the other, how other people live and seeing, you know, getting out of suburbia, I grew up in this, we both grew up in kind of that upper middle class American, all American lifestyle. So to get out and see some of the things that the kids have seen. Well, that's what I think is a big part of it. Speaking of like parenting and like, when to be gentle and when to like push them outside their comfort zone, is like, if America is good at one thing, it's comfort and convenience. I mean, it's so easy to have just like a perfectly cushy life. And that's like where the trend is going. But there's so much to gain from like hardships and just hard work and like think like how your parents live their lives and how their parents live their lives and like what it meant to be like a farmer compared to like how we're living now. And so as a parent, it's not like, you know, knowing how much my two years in Russia shaped me, but I'm not going to just send my kid off to Vladivostok Russia. And so I think it's almost like on a daily basis of like, how can I make my kids life difficult today in a controlled environment? Right? Like, I don't want them to just be too comfortable on a daily basis. But as a parent, you're not going to just purposely like throw hardships at them. So I'm constantly throwing like challenges at them. But it's me trying to like push them outside their comfort zone again in a controlled environment. Support for today's episode comes from Square, the business platform that helps sellers become neighborhood favorites. Whether you're gearing up for a busy season or just trying to keep up with everyday demand, Square keeps your business running smoothly from payments and POS to online orders inventory, staff and more all in one place so you can focus on your customers, not your to-do list. Did you know that I've been thinking about using Square with our kids? That's a great idea. Because we have been talking for weeks now about doing a lemonade stand. We need some sort of payment processing system for our lemonade stand with the boys. We certainly should. So I think if we just have the Square, people can pay with their credit card, their debit card. That will make their business a mega success. And Square turns real time data into useful insights that help businesses make smart decisions. Their hardware and software are designed to be easy to use, so day-to-day operations feel simpler. Square shows up when it matters most. You'll always know where they're headed and that they're building for you. Square helps you run your business more smoothly, bringing payments, operations and insights together in one place so you're ready for whatever's next. Right now listeners can get up to $200 off square hardware when you sign up at square.com/go/unplanned. That's squ-a-r-e.com/go/unplanned. Get started with Square and build a setup that works the way you do. Yeah, I've noticed that speaking like building on that also to how you're talking about cleaning up in Southeast Asia, the oceans, there's definitely a service element and pretty much all of your travels that you've shared. That's really cool. Is that inspired by what we started our conversation with with your missions? Is that that posture of service, something that you carry out in your travels because of that? I think a lot of it comes from that, but I would give a lot of the credit just to Jessica and like who she is as a person, just naturally when she goes somewhere. That's how she wants to spend her time. Is that getting to know the people and serving the people, especially because when you serve people you just gain so much love and appreciation for them and that comes very naturally to Jessica and initially not naturally to me, to be honest about it, but she's taught me the better way is and taught me the joy and love of service. And so most every place we go where we're looking for service opportunities bigger small. What's the most unique service opportunity you've had in a different country? We did one early on. We worked with a nonprofit called Effect.org and they took us to Nepal. Where we spent a week learning about human trafficking and they took us kind of along the whole journey of how traffickers would come into these poor villages and take these girls and they took us kind of through the whole process and at the end of the week, it was actually with a bunch of people from Silicon Valley. So they brought out employees from Google and other companies and at the end of the week they were like, okay, now we're going to make a change and basically have a two-day hackathon and like create something to make a change. So it was really cool so at the end of that week. Anyway, so we go and we learn about all this stuff and the team there was so wonderful, but it was so heavy. It was really hard for us. We really struggled with that. It was still heavy on us and I think there was like the, what do they call it? Like the steps of coping or like how to like get over something and then the first step is anger and Garrett and I like never got hurt. We just stayed in anger. That was one of the first times that we had really been confronted with just the dark evils of the world and what can happen out there. And you know, at the time I think Dorothy was, I don't know, she's maybe five, four, and you know, learning that they were, that people were going and taking these eight, nine-year-old girls and setting a mantra. It was just the heaviest, hardest thing we've ever done. And this was when our social media following was very, I mean, smaller at the time. I think we were under a hundred thousand followers on Instagram. And with those followers, we raised $75,000. We built a school in India because they say that the best prevention human trafficking is just education. So we open up a school right outside of Delhi with our audience. And that was just one of the first times I feel like we did something as a family. We did something with our audience. Like it was just like this is what this is about. This is why we're doing this. Like we're here sharing these stories and making a positive change. It was a really beautiful experience. And then it wasn't until maybe three or four years later, we were able to go to India and the school actually ended up being built in India. Going to India, visiting the school, seeing the children and seeing, you know, the difference that we made. It was really, really special. I think that was probably one of the most profound service opportunities we've had. Wow. That's really cool. The kids have gotten good too at seeing like small opportunities, just seeing like somebody in need or just like a small, small opportunity along the way, especially in the cities that we visited this summer, just like a small act of kindness. Your family just seems so close. And I think it's really neat that your kids are literally just back in one of the veterans of this house right now just all hanging out. You can tell they're so, yeah, tightly knit. They love each other. What's your secret to having such a healthy family where everyone just gets along? Yeah, it gets along. I don't know. I think we're just used to it. I think there hasn't really been any other choice, you know, and they're the people who are around the most or the people we should have the best relationships with. And I mean, I honestly think the kids start school next week. And it's going to be tough. It's going to be hard for us to not be spending 24 hours together all the time. We spend all day, every day together. And we love it. That's how we prepare. I live my life currently as a father in a very selfish way where if you would ask, like, what is it that you love so much about travel? Why do you not want to just stay home? Why do you want to travel? Because when I'm home, I'm sharing my kids with soccer practice and friends and school. When we're traveling, like, I get to spend all day, every day with them. And selfishly as a parent, that's how I want to spend my time. And so that's like, yeah, that's how I prefer. And we keep talking about this thing. We're calling the pocket. Garrett, we were at a soccer game and Garrett was speaking to our goalie and the goalie was like, how do your kids? And Garrett told me he was like, you're in the pocket. Garrett was like, what's the pocket? He's like, you're out of diapers. You're not teenagers yet. Like, you're in this golden pocket. And I think there's different pockets throughout parenting and stuff. You're in such a special space right now. When I look at you with your little kids, like, just the best memories. But I also feel like we're in such a special place where our kids are just so easy. And I mean, that literally 36 hours of travel and we're here. And it's fine. Like, we love being together. We have the best summer together. We're holding on to these moments. And I know Garrett especially is pretty bitter at life right now with how quickly our kids are going up. Our kids are growing up quickly. Yeah. It's going by fast. And we're just like clinging to it. You know, I think it's a big part of it though, is going back to what you said about high expectations, is we expect our kids to get along. We expect them to be best friends. I'm really tight. I'm one of six kids and I'm really, really tight with my siblings now. But our, it was a war zone growing up. Like, how much me and my brother fought, how much me and my little sister fought, like, was non-stop. And I'm like, man, like, what were my parents doing throughout all this? Because when my kids started to fight, I'm like, I put a stop to her immediately. I'm like, you guys can either be best friends or you can be enemies, either way, you're stuck with each other. So which one would you rather have? Yeah. You'd rather be friends. And so like, stop this fighting and be friends. And it's been that high expectation, like, their entire lives. Do your kids still think you're really cool? Because I know like, at a certain point, I remember the age where I was like, my parents aren't cool, but I do have memory of being like really little and loving my parents and just wanting to be with them. They do think we're cool and they think Garrett is like I Mean the boys look up to you so much and Dorothy's always asking I think our kids looked up look up to us, and they're not too cool for school yet Which is really nice and Dorothy's probably on the verge You don't talk like that. She's not You got many more you definitely they definitely think we're cool still I dread that day because I mean you guys know This is like too, but just like when when you walk in the door and your kids just like so like you could have been gone for 15 minutes, but then you like they see you 15 minutes later, and they're Beaming they're so happy to see you and they start laughing Like you guys are gonna go home today, and your kids are gonna be so am to see you. Yeah, it's the best I love it. I love it. I dread the day that our kids don't like start laughing when they see us because I know it'll come I know it'll happen which sucks. Do you get to surface your boys a lot like is that something that you just do with your kids a lot? Yeah, I probably get to surf with them twice a week If it were up to me, I'd be surfing with them every single day, but yeah, it probably is like twice a week with each of them Individually when I used to surf I didn't have the most friends that like to surf to so I'd go by myself a lot And it was like a dream of mine to one day take the boys out with me and just have that memory together You know how cuz you and I were talking about this that for somebody who's like got a lot going on in their brain and constantly on a phone and stuff When you surf, it's just the best way for us to like completely disconnect. Yeah, be fully present The same goes with surfing with the child that you like parenting is at its best right when both of you are fully present You just have each other's focus. Yeah, unfortunately like that's becoming less and less than just today's world Yes, you go surfing and there's no such thing as phones or screens or tours or responsibilities and The nature of surfing because it's dangerous and scary like Their full attention is on you and you are full attention on them like it's just my favorite What a cool way to form a bond with your kid to just like be out in the water That's I yeah, I miss it man like I used to be out in the water and just like look up and there's a rainbow and like I'm like, oh, what is that? There's a sea turtle swimming underneath my board and oh I miss it so much the best but the one thing I love in life better than surfing is Surfing with my family. Yes, I'm actually very impressed because Garrett loves surfing so much now He's I would say addicted But I'm impressed when we go out as a family. You don't catch a single wave. Oh, I'm just having them into a rather I'll be out there with you pushing you in a ways and like I don't even care to catch a wave I'm like that's impressive dude. Thank you. I'm I'm flattered man I look up to you. I think I see the stuff that you're doing that you have done and I'm just like so inspired by you guys and inspired by your family and Yeah, I don't know I just I just think what you guys are doing is is really neat and I noticed you even had a book I know you mentioned this before but with National Geographic like working working with National Geographic. That is a really big deal Can we talk a little bit more about that? Yeah, it was I remember it was 2020 it was summer 2020 and we actually had a friend we had a friend's lake house And he was like who's your dream brand to work with is your dream company? We're like National Geographic and then I kid you not it was a day later We're driving from his house to the airport. We're driving. Yeah, and I got an email from Alison and National Geographic and she was like have you ever considered writing a book and we had actually been reached out Too quite a bit about you know from publishers and Gerd and I don't consume a lot of books We're like podcasters. We would listen to podcasts if we're wanting to learn something and so we have our bucketless friends We have that sort of podcast webinar that we do and that's how we've shared our information and then she was like would you consider writing a book with us? And I was like or have you considered writing a book and I said yes, I've considered it I wasn't interested but with National Geographic 100% I would love to do that and she you know She kind of pitched me on the idea of a big coffee table book very visual and Initially, she said it would be half our photos half their photos and it ended up being 95% Garrett's photos like they started going through our images and they were like these are perfect These are so good and so the first half of the book is Anything and everything you know about traveling with kids budgeting packing kind of some of the things We just talked about here today and then 50 bucket list Destinations in places to take your kids a full-eye tanner is like here's 50 places you should go and here's the tenor is that you should consider But it was a for me it was I had to I told Garrett on that car ride I like looked at him and I was like I want this project like this and she had asked us to write the book and I Basically kicked him out. It was like you do the YouTube you do that You know like we've we've he's been the person that I've just followed along and I really love writing and so to me I was like this one's gonna be mine and all mine and I was really happy with it It was a really fun experience. I really enjoyed the whole process and those who know Jess know There's not like a selfish bone in her body and so when she wanted to make this hers like it made me so happy And I was like yes, like go for it and you it took you three years to write it Yeah, and I mean it's it's like the pride and joy of our family right now Yeah, you did such a good job with it for years like it's massive. Yeah, yeah, it's the longest book. I've ever read Really well. I'm really proud of it. I would say the hardest part though then was turning and having to promote it I felt like she hates his father. I hate it and I do find in situations like this or with a kid you know I mean like I felt I kept saying I felt like I was going all just in Timberlake and leaving the boy band Yeah, you know going Beyoncé and going solo So that was really hard for me when we I did the book tour and had to be all like self-promoting felt very weird What is like from the book? I know people should definitely go get a copy read the book But is there something in there that like you I don't know you're really proud of or that you'd like to share a little Sneak peak of I mean, I think for me a lot of it was just sharing my personal journey of being this very inside the box conventional, you know comfort life driven human and for that girl to be living this lifestyle and Thriving in it is just kind of what I was trying to get across you know is Just getting outside of your comfort zone and trying new things in my family in particular like we were a Disney World family Don't get me wrong. I love Disney World. I'll go Disney all day But that's all that's really the only other places we went. I went to Europe one time when I was a kid And I think most Americans they have their place like I don't know if your families were like that They're like a Powell family or like a like a why family or you know like a lot of families go to the same place over and over My family was the same way But now just realizing there's so much more out there So much more out there and to try anything so I think my goal with it was to show people Get outside of your comfort zone go somewhere new take your kids out of the country There's so much to learn and gain from all that and that was my goal with the book It's been really cool to see As people receive the book and like you know have it setting on their table I How much kids gravitate to the book because it's not written for kids or towards kids Um, we're actually working with National Geographic to create a kid's book collection But for Jessica's book it wasn't geared towards kids and how often people will send us videos of their kids going over the coffee table Book flipping it over and then just going through the photos, and you know to be able to see a family We met we met the timber lakes the other day No way I love sitting down with my kids and reading your book. I was like What she's like it's sitting on my coffee table and I was freaking out because just big room The timber likes go back crazy, you know So for kids to get to see photos real life photos of kids swimming with wells are going on this epic hike or doing You know this adventure. Um, it's cool to see how much kids really enjoy her book. That's so cool What's uh, what is a country that's a hidden gem because you mentioned you've mentioned some different places, you know, Mexico and I don't know like typical places that people in the US travel to what's a country that Americans should go check out What place that I suggest a lot I think it especially for people who haven't traveled out of the country very much That I think is a good starting point is is the belief is like a Belize Belize takes the US dollar. They speak English. They have the jungle and they have the beach I think it's a great starting point. There's direct flights from a bunch of US cities. Bermuda would be a good one for that region as well But I think Costa Rica as well. I think a lot of those central America places that have great tourism And a lot of Americans that come through but it's it's not just your like Beach side resort in Cabo. Like I think there's so much more That I would try to encourage people to go and do Rather than just go and sit in it like for me to fix me out My dad used to tell me spooky stories. And I was a kid of the big Triangle so like when you said from you down like oh, that's be so dangerous there. I feel like people go missing. I don't know Like getting the sense of how much we have in common and like the yes man that lives inside you I'm excited just to like send you invites and see which ones do Take us out on now that we're really connected We're gonna start sending you some invites. Oh Let's do it. Let's send the kids. I just need to know that it's okay to say no Because there will be a lot of them and so you don't need to feel the pressure And a lot of them are super last minute like hey, do you want to go to Tonga next week? Oh, we're ready. That's how we know that's how we get really bad perfect. Yeah, good to know Hey, we drive our family crazy. We're like oh tomorrow Well, and my daughter would be so she's done. We're not we're done having kids But she's dying for a little baby. So she would be And it would be the best built-in babysitter for you guys So you guys always tells me we can't have more because of traveling With when you're down person Instead you can't do man-on-man anymore But you have three. Oh no, it's do you think more than three would have made it a whole lot different Yeah, you think three is the I This is personal opinion is like when you're just married couple. It's just you guys right as soon as you have baby number one Like obviously that's a huge change for you as a couple. But I kind of feel like it's still like you're this like young married couple and you have like it's almost like you're like playing house like you have just one baby. I thought the big change was like when we had number two was like oh now we're like growing into this like proper family. Number three wasn't as big as adjustment as I thought. I think when people say like oh now you're outnumbered like it didn't feel that way. We also waited. Dorothy Manila or 22 months apart. I'm Manila and Cali are three and a half years. So that three and a half years I think it made all the difference because to be able to tell my toddler hey I can't help you I got to nurse the baby. He was like okay whereas had we had the boys two years apart it would have been very difficult. It would have been too far. So yeah I think it is a little when you have a lot a little ones it is pretty difficult. Yeah because I think about just a standard rental car. If you were to have a fourth totally it would be well and even now we can we can cram into a taxi. You know like we'll put I'll sit up front and Garrett and the three kids will sit in the back and that works okay but I mean when they get older I don't know if we're gonna have to start like getting two taxis or you just have to get a van like a van taxi. It's kind of wild that you guys do taxis now I think about it because I feel like we've never been in some place where we can't Uber. Yeah with our podcast we like I'll get the Uber and I'll be like crap like we have like because we were just Nashville and we lived there for a month and so we had all of our regular travel stuff but then we had three suitcases full of our podcast gear. So then I was like we need to get a Uber XXL or whatever it's called like we need to the biggest do we get just to fit all of our luggage. Just to fit all this back. Yeah now I was telling her just yesterday I'm like it's funny the effect that being in Southeast Asia has had on us because she like grabs our kids she's like pick up Callie and we're like booking across this like eight lane like busy freeway and just like Jay walking across and like making her I'm like wow we've been in Asia long enough that we're like going for it. I love that though like crazy mayhem waving down the taxis everything. Well you guys go follow the bucket list family on social media I know you guys are on YouTube and Instagram we're all can people find you and follow and yeah just search in the bucket list family you'll find us and and Jess's book is the title literally the bucket list family bucket list family travel. Thank you for being on the show and let's go travel let's go I'd love to do some travel to destination we'll find out. Awesome.