Ep. 1164: How to Keep Adventuring with Kids (Or Any Major Responsibility) with Heidi Dusek - Revisited

You're listening to the Adventure Sports Podcast.

Thanks for adventuring with us as we discover what incredible athletes and outdoor enthusiasts

are doing all over the world.

Hello everyone and welcome to the Adventure Sports Podcast.

This is Caleb.

In this revisited episode we have Mason interviewing Heidi Dusek.

Before having kids, Heidi was an avid adventure traveling all around the world.

She loves the outdoor, she loves epic adventures.

And so as you can imagine the prospect of having kids, she was a bit apprehensive about

how it would affect her adventurous lifestyle.

And once she became a mom, she felt like she had to give up a lot of that.

But through this process, Heidi has made it a priority in her life to continue adventuring

with her family and to pass on the love for adventure to her kids.

It's a great episode.

I hope you enjoy it.

Here's Mason.

Hey folks, Mason here.

You might see this title of this episode and think, I'm never going to have kids or I'm

never planning to start a family, so does this episode even apply to me?

And I would say yes it does, even if you don't plan on having kids, there may be a time

where your responsibility gets in the way of your plans to be an adventure or plans to

do big long-term trips, whether that's a job or taking care of someone, maybe an aging

parent or a partner or even animals that you get a pet, for instance.

Personally, I feel like our dogs were more of an adjustment from no dogs to dogs.

They were more of an adjustment to my adventure plans than no kids to kids were because

the dogs, it was like, total freedom, you can go wherever you want, then dogs, it's all

the sudden, oh, you got to think about feeding them, letting them out, you can't be gone

all that long and you can't just throw that responsibility on anyone.

It was actually a really great primer to have in kids.

I'm only two years into being a parent, so I only have pretty limited experience.

But all that to say is there are plenty of other things in life that can get in the

way of adventure plans or, as we're going to talk about with Heidi, not get in the way

of but become an addition to your adventure plans.

So, personally, we've been in parents for two years, have two kids, and I was pretty

apprehensive at first about what this was going to do to my adventure plans.

Now, be honest, it hasn't really changed anything.

There are times I need to think through more planning and think through how I'm going

to be gone and when I'm going to be gone and communicate with my wife really clearly

and make sure the kids are taken care of.

But frankly, I feel like I'm able to do the same things I was always able to do.

It's really the job and there's other things in the way besides kids.

So, it's kind of crazy how it really didn't feel like it's changed all that much and

Heidi's going to tell us more about that.

By the way, she hosts a show called Ordinary Sherpa where she talks to people about how

to do this, how to travel with kids, how to travel on a budget, how to do adventures

as a family, how to make it all happen because if there's anything you've learned from

this show is that yes, it's possible.

If you just choose to start making it happen.

So, without further ado, here is Heidi and again, you can find out more about her at

OrdinarySherpa.com as well as the podcast Ordinary Sherpa.

Heidi, do sick, welcome to the show.

Hi, thank you, yeah, it's exciting to be on the show.

I've listened for a long time and there are days where I'm like, oh, but I'm a parent

now.

So, I can even relate to some of your listeners, too, because there are days where I'm like,

I just want to do the epic things again.

Right, absolutely.

And you say epic things again because you've done tons of epic things.

But before we get started, I always ask this first, where are you coming from and where's

home for you?

Yeah, I live in Northeast Wisconsin about an hour from Green Bay.

I am a mom of three kids.

My husband and I both work full time and we live out in the country, so it's kind of fun

just to play outside.

We do a lot of adventure stuff, but life is a lot different now that I'm a mom and I just

never really wanted to leave adventure behind.

So, we still try to figure out how to do that here.

Okay, and that's awesome.

Now, tell me about where do you live?

Are you, is an adventurous community?

Are you kind of the black sheep of the community or your family?

Are there a lot of adventures in that area?

Not really.

So, you know, Wisconsin's pretty flat.

There's a lot of rolling hills and a lot of farms, but I am in a small town.

So, there's a lot of green space.

I actually live on a fourth-generation farmhouse.

My grandfather bought this when he was actually retiring from another farmer and decided not

to keep it as an aggregate cultural farm, but found that there's a lot of natural springs

on the property.

And so, we actually have a trout farm, which is a little bit different than what most

people have.

In terms of the area, are we black sheep?

No, but it's not like we're in Colorado where there's just adventurous people everywhere.

So, we're kind of these, in part, I'm just like an ordinary person trying to blend

in, but on the same side, I don't really blend into that normal culture, I guess.

I don't know what normal is, but you know, it's a small town.

So, there's not a lot of really, I don't think people know what is even available to them

here.

So, for us, I feel like I'm always having to uncover hidden gems in our area so that

we don't have to travel to adventure.

Actually, I'm living in the house that I was raised in as a child, which is really

weird.

I mean, my grandfather founded or bought this house from a farmer and we've just slowly

having more of us in it, you know, we just keep growing the family and no one can give

it up.

My parents wanted to downsize and I was like, well, you're not selling it.

So, they're like, well, someone needs to take it over, you know, it's not really easy

to age in an old farmhouse.

So, we decided, I were like, okay, I guess we're doing this.

Oh, that's awesome.

Yeah, yeah.

So, I, I'm sorry, I don't remember what your question was, but-

Well, I didn't ask.

I was going to say, you know, growing up in that area, you know, you mentioned now you're

kind of, you know, an adventure, you've done a lot of adventuring.

Were you encouraged to do that stuff growing up, or did you have to discover it on your

own?

You know, it's interesting.

So, I am on, I'm kind of a Gen X, kind of a millennial, I'm 41, so I'm on that like

weird cusp era.

And I was the only girl in my family.

And so I just felt like so much of my childhood was still this open door policy where I could

go explore.

We were given a lot of freedom as kids.

My parents were both pretty hardcore working class.

So you know, it wasn't like we went around and did all these different things, both come

from really large families, both my parents do.

So we were fortunate that we had exposure to a lot of different people, but we didn't

really have hobbies, like adventure hobbies, like I think about now.

Like we'd never rock climbed as a family.

We would do road trips and visit family around the country.

So most of my adventure was either I was seeing it somewhere else and just curious, or

I would just want to know, I'm like, well, what is this thing?

I didn't know about it.

And once I saw it, it was like, oh, here's an opportunity.

Let me just kind of figure this out.

But at the same time, I wasn't pressured to do all the things either.

I did a lot as a high schooler and in college, but it wasn't like I had to take all the

AP courses and I had to do travel sports.

You know, that wasn't a thing yet.

So I feel in some ways I was blessed because I had this freedom built into the culture of

who I was.

And I didn't have the pressure that we see so much now in younger kids and parents that

it just, it gave me a lot more opportunity, I think.

I didn't have to look for permission to do whatever I wanted to do.

I could just kind of explore it and go, oh, this is interesting.

Let's see where this goes.

So some of that is just baked into who I was and how I grew up.

And I was fortunate too that living in the country, I mean, I can look out my door a mile

away and still not have a neighbor.

You know, we're surrounded by trees and wildlife.

It's almost like we live in a nature preserve.

So I always had something to explore.

I never felt I was bored.

And if I was, we were kind of scolded.

Like you've got all these things around you, you need to just go out and explore.

So from that lens, I felt like I had a pretty privileged childhood in terms of like the

exposure to adventure and opportunities in a way that I don't know that parents have

today, our kids have today.

Gosh, it just everything you're saying so relatable, I feel like we live the same childhood

out on a fourth generation farm out in the country.

Lots of exploration opportunities and I feel like that definitely led to to be in adventurous

while you grew up.

So as you grew up, what were some of those earlier experiences where you were branching out

like beyond the family farm, beyond Wisconsin and exploring the world?

Yeah, I was taking German as a second language.

My grandfather spoke German and I really just wanted to be able to speak to him.

And so I took German as just more again out of a place of curiosity.

And that led me down to, I guess even starting in middle school, there were some opportunities

to start traveling through different, I don't know, just different things that would land

in my lap.

And I learned pretty early, I should give it a little bit of back time.

My dad has family all over the country and he worked for an airline company at one point

so we could get really cheap airfare for like $20 standby a person.

It was really cheap.

Oh, wow.

So we could do that once a year and that started when I was in fourth grade.

So we didn't have a lot of means, but we had this like one trip that we could take.

And that just opened my eyes like how different people were and what the opportunities were.

And, you know, so that was the beginning, I think of travel.

So that started in fourth grade and then in middle school, I had a couple of things through

my church and just through local, Kwanis clubs, there was this exchange program that was

happening.

And then in high school, there was a German exchange student program that I could do.

So we hosted a German exchange student and then I went to Germany and that was fascinating

because it was really the first time I was ever alone, you know, and my parents weren't

with me.

This wasn't like a family trip where we were all traveling together.

And I didn't really speak the language that well.

I mean, I was 15 years old.

I knew a couple of things.

So that just opened my eyes to it.

I was fascinated by this, how big this world is and how many things I didn't know.

And I would say that trend of just curiosity and trying to find the unconscious things.

I'm like, oh, wait, I don't know what that is.

I should learn about that.

That's probably what continued through college.

And I guess my transition from high school out of high school was a little bit interesting.

We don't have to go all the way down that.

But I think what it ended up showing me was that there were a lot of things I didn't know.

And if I really wanted to explore the world, I needed to get out of this small town and

just be open to something completely different.

And I went into teaching and then from there intentionally went to a really large urban setting

on purpose so that I would get a little uncomfortable and try something different just

because I didn't want to stay with my whole life kind of being wrapped up in Wisconsin.

So I did intentionally choose a path towards, so I taught in Chicago Public Schools on purpose

and loved it, by the way.

And that just gave me a different sense of like, oh my gosh, this is what city life is

like.

People sleep with all these sirens and you know, like it was so interesting what showed

up in my life during that time as well.

Not the standard route of adventures that we think of, but adventure us to the definition

of trying new things and being uncomfortable and putting yourself out there.

So from there, going to Chicago, did it encourage you to test that out even further and to

go even more or was that plenty of experience for you?

No, so it was not enough.

I became a teacher and one thing I think that's really fascinating.

When people choose your career, you always are kind of drawn to the positive of it.

And you don't always know what the flip side of that is.

So I went into teaching.

I love kids.

I love making a difference.

You know, I'm actually really good at teaching and educating.

So all of those things that I knew about and I was interested in and I had practice for

those were all great.

What wasn't so great was this structure, the system that I don't know how to describe

it in a really positive light, but it became really stifling.

You know, my my entire calendar was scheduled for me and it might seem like I'm complaining

because teachers have three months off in the summer, but I really didn't.

I couldn't take a personal day until there was a holiday and I just didn't have the flexibility

to do what I wanted to do.

And I started to question I was by far the youngest teacher in all of the school districts

that I was teaching in.

Everyone else was at least 15 to 20 years older than me.

And I just found that we were seeing shifts in the educational system at that point.

That's when all the standardized testing started coming around and being enforced.

And I just was like, I don't know that this is what I signed up for.

So that was a hard point in my life where I kind of I called it my year of my best worst

year because at 25, I decided to leave teaching and I had no idea what I was going to do with

my life, but I didn't know really what my options were.

So I called it my year of yes, where I said, okay, I'm just going to look for different

opportunities, not even work wise, but just lifestyle wise.

I was going through a challenging relationship.

So I was like, I don't even know who my friends are.

I don't even know what's out there.

So it was kind of a dark period, but it also ended up being a really enlightening period

because I did everything from, again, I was traveling a lot, but I signed up randomly

for Treppe's lessons and I signed up to run my first marathon and I was allowed to go

rock climbing.

And I went to Warner Brothers on a field trip with, I mean, there were so many things that

were happening and it was like, whoa, I had no idea.

So it forced me then to think about how, you know, all this time I had been thinking about

my life in terms of a career so that it could support my life.

And that year actually flipped it.

And I said, what do I want my life to look like?

And I'll figure out the career to go behind it.

I was a hustler.

I could make it work.

I'd figure out how to make money and I could do that thing.

I figured out after that year of taking off, I didn't actually take off a whole year,

but I took off.

I resigned from my job really without another plan and I know that, you know, might sound

irresponsible, but that really gave me the space to go, okay, now I have to figure this

out.

And that just opened up the world to what was available to me.

And now I don't teach anymore.

I am married to a teacher, but it showed me that there were so many other opportunities

that I hadn't even, I didn't know.

You know, there was just this sense of, you go through life and you think, oh, I'm going

to check these boxes and that's going to get me to college and then college is going

to get me to a career.

And then I'm going to settle down and have kids.

And I, I thought that was the path I had to take and I did.

I did get married and have children.

But at the same time, I flipped it instead of focusing on my career, I switched it to

focus on my life and design my life and then fit everything else to fit the way I wanted

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Wow.

I have to say I'm also married to a teacher and yeah, you get three months off, but you

don't get three months off you get you get holidays, you get weekends, but you don't

at the same time.

It's yeah, it's around the clock.

So you decided to flip that and you were traveling a lot more.

You were seeing a lot of cool things, doing all these really unique experiences for yourself

and tell us about some of the changes that started happening when you when you started

having kids.

How are your kids, by the way?

Yeah.

My kids now are 11, 9 and 5.

Okay.

Okay.

So you went you went through it.

Wow.

Three times.

And I know that a lot of people that listen to the show or in that situation, if they're

not, they will be at some point, potentially.

And one of the biggest concerns for me as well as I know it's for you is like, what is

this going to do to the adventurous side of me, the person that I feel like I identify

with the most, my adventurous self, there was a lot of hesitancy, a lot of apprehension

around that, a lot of fear about what that, what would, what would happen?

How did you process that?

I had very similar feelings where I felt like I was going to have to give up a part of

who I was in order to be a mom.

And that is, I mean, there is a part of that.

You do have to give up some of it, but I didn't want to have to choose between, and even

at that point too, I was having to decide, do I want to be a stay at home mom and give

up my career too?

And all of those things, I was like, wait a minute.

I don't understand why I have to choose like why can't we do this?

Why can't we figure this out?

And so I chose to become a mom, and I chose to maintain my career, and I really chose

to keep adventure in our life.

And so it was, it's a, there's a lot of seasons in being a parent, and your kids will go

through seasons, and some of them are harder than others.

And then just when you think you master it, there's like a new season that comes at you

out of nowhere.

But all of that, all of that really taught us like, what are we afraid of?

So the first adventures we really started doing were just things around our house.

You know, things like going on bike rides and hikes, those were probably the least restrictive

where we could just throw a kid on our back, throw a kid in the bike trailer.

It was really no big deal.

My husband is much more adventurous in that space where he likes mountain biking and more

extreme riding.

And so that would have to wait for a little bit, or we just made a pact.

I don't know if it's, I mean, it's not that formal.

It sounds really formal.

But really, we just created agreements with each other to say, all right, I need some

alone time, and we're going to kind of create that into our system.

So that one parent gets to do the epic adventure time, and the other parent gets that too,

but at a different time.

So we just kind of alternate on and off who gets adventure time, the epic adventure time.

And then the other thing we did was we took everything back like, okay, so if we were

really big into downhill skiing as one example, and my husband was leading a bunch of kids

to go on these cool ski trips up north, and I was like, okay, well, why don't we come

as shaperones?

And we'll just see.

We'll just see what does that look like with the little guy?

All of our kids started skiing at age two.

So that was a good season for us, and there was a lot, you know, it's, I feel like I was

either pregnant or having a baby every, every couple of years there.

So it was like an entire, you know, seven years of one of those things with a very little

gap time in between.

So for us, it was like, well, I'm not willing to give up seven years of skiing.

So what am I comfortable with?

What was kind of our, I guess I would say we looked at it from a risk tolerance perspective.

What was the level of risk I was willing to take with both the kids and myself as a pregnant

mom at that time with a little one?

And we just started to test it and realized, wow, this isn't as hard as I thought it was.

I think every single time we imagined it to be worse than what it actually was when we

started testing it, we were like, oh, well, let's just learn from this.

Let's keep what's working and leave behind what's not working.

And that just continued to show up.

And we were like, this, we can do this.

We can keep moving this idea of, and again, I'll keep using the skiing idea of, we can

keep moving this forward.

And now we have three kids, age 11, 9 and 5 and darn it if they aren't all better skiers

than I am because they've been skiing since their two.

They know how to be responsible.

And it's just taught us that we often are preventing them from having an opportunity

because we're too scared.

And I didn't want my decisions to really impact the opportunities that my kids had.

So from that lens, it showed us that adventure was the path that we really needed to lean

into as opposed to kind of the safety, the perfection, the things that people do when

you have kids.

We were like, yeah, I don't think that fits us.

We're going to challenge that mindset and just keep adventuring.

Heidi, there's about 15 things you mentioned that I want to follow up on.

So I don't even know how to, how to bring all this back or what direction to go.

But I love the, I will say this one thing, I love that you mentioned, like, why do I have

to choose between one being adventurous or also being a mom?

It's beautiful in life when you realize that you don't have to choose those things that

no one ever told you, those are the only choices.

You just pick up on the social cues and what everyone else has done.

And there's just such an amazing liberation when you realize, like, I don't have to actually

choose between them.

I can, I can do both.

It's just, it's not that no one's done that.

Yes, it is harder a lot of the times, but it's not, it's not an impossible thing to do.

And you start looking for examples of people who have done both and there's always plenty

out there.

And I just love that you mentioned that.

That's so true.

One thing I did want to follow up on is you choosing between the epic adventures.

I think a lot of people are a little afraid of, you know, am I still going to be able

to do these big adventures?

You know, I'm happy with writing around my neighborhood for the time being, but there

is, there comes a time where I want to do something big.

And you mentioned the strategy in your husband's sick too, which is just allowing each other

that personal time.

What have you been able to do in that sense?

Or do you still feel that need to do those, those real big adventures?

I, I have backed off from them, but I made that choice.

Again, I made everything into a choice.

So I was a marathon runner prior to having children.

And I had run five, I think, by the time I had my first and I've, I've only run three

since then.

And again, that was a choice after about six months after my son, my first son was born.

I ran a half marathon and it was fun.

But I just didn't love, I realized the reason I went into running marathons was for the

camaraderie.

It wasn't always about the, the race day experience anymore.

I had done all of that.

And so I didn't feel like that was still serving me as well.

So I, I tried it three more times.

I did some around the country and, you know, it just was one of those things where I was

like, you know, I think I'm ready to be done with this and move on to another season of

my life.

And that was a good 10 years, you know, of running marathons and, uh, all the training

that goes into that, that's not just something you decide, like, oh, yeah, next weekend,

I'm going to go run a marathon, you, that's a six month commitment, just to get ready

for the marathon.

So that definitely kind of eventually went away.

I did try it and just didn't enjoy it as much as I once did, uh, travel picked up even

with kids.

So I would say the craziest travel we did was, um, we spent, so when my kids were five,

three and six months old, we spent 16 days in California and we started in L.A. and

then went to Yosemite and ended up in San Francisco.

And that was a trying experience where I don't really think, I realized how crazy I was.

You know, for me, I was like, this is just a fun challenge.

This wasn't, is it going to be perfect?

Right.

And there were stages in that where I was like, what the hell am I thinking, you know,

others were, I was like, oh, yeah, we got this.

What, what, what's something that made you say that?

What's an experience?

Yeah.

So climbing.

So there's a lot of climbs in Yosemite and we had been backpackers, not through hikers

where we would hike for days and days and days.

We'd done just a couple camping trips and we would do kind of all day hikes though, you

know, where we would go out and mostly out and backs or loops or things like that.

So we had been a pretty adventurous family that way.

And we kept the kids engaged with us.

Well, we hadn't done it with three plus like packing to take three kids on this all day

hike into Yosemite.

And it was, it was, again, I just wasn't thinking I don't think I packed the, you know, I

packed all the food and then I wasn't quite considering what the kids would need.

And then we didn't take enough breaks and we didn't pack.

So packing was one issue.

I'll just say it.

That was one thing.

I didn't really plan appropriately or I brought way too much stuff for what we needed

of the wrong things.

That was one adventure where you're just like, wow, that was a bad idea.

And then on the track, you know, I realized I'm carrying a six month old.

My daughter couldn't make it at nine months.

You know, she was just like, not into it.

So my husband was trying to carry her and a pack.

That was really hard.

I had a kid on and you know, it's like, why did we think this was a good idea?

And we weren't really in our own neighborhood.

You know, we were in California.

We're from Wisconsin.

So that one, what I think was just like, what the heck, Heidi?

Let's just, you know, recalibrate.

So from there, we just said, okay, we're only going to do adventures like that, either

when they're all can walk on their own or we only have one child that we need to carry.

Not thinking about the three year olds, development abilities and what we would need.

You know, like, let's make sure at least both of them are potty trained or you know, things

like that.

We're just all the things that come up and you're like, oh, it didn't plan for that.

And I think planning can be overwhelming.

So then we just decided we just didn't want to keep doing it to that extreme.

Most of them, my wife always is telling me, in fact, yesterday and today is managing

expectations.

You know, I'll say, hey, let's go to the beach and do this thing.

You know, snorkel or go play in the water or go down to the Marina near our house and

just kind of look at the boats.

And that's fine.

But that doesn't mean our two year old is agreeing to all that and we'll go and he'll

want to play in the sand or want to play in the parking lot literally in an empty spot

with his cars.

And I'll get all frustrated because I'm like, this is not what we said we're going to

go do.

Like we're missing out what we wanted to do.

And really what it comes out to is what I wanted to do because the two year olds fine

do it playing on the curb, you know what I mean?

Or sit on the bench and just having a good time.

And my wife is so good about saying, you know, let's manage our expectations when we go

out with the two year old.

And a great way to reframe that for me would have been like, let's just go out and explore

and see what we can see in a new setting without setting all these expectations.

Yeah, exactly.

I like to, I think you learn this.

This isn't something that they give you a manual on, but learning your kids cues of what's

too much adventure, what's not enough adventure, where can we push them?

Where do we need to pull back?

I think that's just a learn trait.

You know, you learn in relationships where you can push your partner.

It's true with kids too.

I think it's genuinely, most kids are curious and they'll, they'll join you for part of

it. But when they're done, they're done.

And you can't just keep pushing them or asking them to keep going in some cases.

So having an out available is, is usually one of our best options.

There's a lot of times where my husband and I split up with, because we have three,

I think a lot of us, we decided, we're like, okay, this one's done.

Does that mean we're all done?

Or does that mean one of us has to go back and who's going to choose the short

straw this time?

So when it comes to, you know, setting a lifestyle up or planning for adventures together

with kids, what kind of things do y'all set for each other?

Have in mind, because a lot of people on this show, they'll hear a story about a six-month

bite tour around Africa or, you know, through hiking the Pacific Crest Trail or something

like that.

And they're like, oh my gosh, that sounds awesome.

But what we don't always realize is that that's a decade-long planning process for people.

Or at least, getting their lives set up to where they can make that possible.

Do y'all have any goals like that off in the future?

And how do you talk about it?

How are you planning for it?

Yeah, I would, so when we first started this life, my, there's a lot of, I'll tell, I'll

get to where we are right now, because again, my kids are older, so I want to walk our

journey with you is, we scaled all the way back and said, okay, almost like a matrix.

If this is the epic thing that we used to do, what would be like a normal day of this?

And then what's the minimum viable?

Like what could we just do with that would get us out, that would get us to, to get a

flavor of this?

And I called those little micro-experiences.

How could we just kind of get a flavor of this thing?

And again, it could be pretty much whatever it was.

So if it was initially, I mentioned skiing before, if skiing was the thing and we weren't

quite ready for that, what could we do in our backyard?

Could we, we bought our kids some used skis and we would just create little hills in

the backyard?

It's an ideal for me as the parent, but at least it gives my son a little bit of exposure.

And if that wasn't possible, could we go down play outside in the snow and just kind

of like create the idea of what a ski environment would look like?

So we started to work through all of these.

If it was biking, what were those things?

And some tools.

I mean, we started to learn what tools could help us bike easier so that everyone could

be a participant.

My youngest, we got him a strider and I don't know if everyone knows what that is.

I think it's a name brand, but it's a bike that doesn't have pedals.

And so my kids never use training wheels.

They just use these balance bikes.

And he was the bad side of that is I forgot that he didn't have brakes a couple of times,

you know, and he's just like trailing along with us and we're like, oh crap, this is

a hill, you know, like you kind of lose the safety features when you allow those things

happen.

So there were times where it was like, yeah, we kind of screwed up there, but it allowed

him to really keep up with us because he didn't want to be in the trailer anymore.

He had be gotten, he had gotten so independent that he was like, I want to ride.

I don't want to be in the trailer and we didn't have the bike that attaches to ours.

I can't remember what they're called.

We didn't have one of those at the moment.

So we're like, well, let's just go right into a strider and he can figure out how to ride

and so we started to have these like phases of adventure.

And sometimes it just meant we're just going to change a location for a new, I don't

know, new scenery, or it might mean that we'd kind of experiment like I wonder if we

could do this or I'd wonder if, again, keeping your expectations low.

So the first time we went biking as a family, I was like, okay, we're only going to plan

for like a mile, right?

Of just to see what people can manage or the first time we all went hiking.

What was the backup plan?

Who were we willing to carry?

How far were we willing to go?

And you just kind of keep pushing those boundaries.

We have just gotten into this habit now where you say, yes, we're going to do this.

First of all, that's kind of our mantra as we say, yes, when an opportunity presents

itself, we're like, okay, yes, how could we figure this out?

What's the minimum viable option for us?

And if that works, what's the next step, you know, so that we are kind of continuing to

progress?

And for that, it's given us enough of a mindset where we have learned how to create the

conditions for adventure to show up.

We made it easier.

We've made things a little more go ready.

You know, so if we want to go to the beach one day, it's not work to get everything ready

to go to the beach.

Now we're like, okay, we need goggles.

We need swimsuits.

We need beach bags.

We need snacks.

We need floaties.

Do we have all those things?

And are they all ready to go?

You know, so it's just you start to create some systems to really make your life a little

bit more go ready.

So when a gorgeous day presents itself and you don't have anything planned, we can say

yes.

And we wanted our lives to be open enough, have enough white space in our calendar so

that we could say yes to those opportunities.

So it has been a progression and you learn what works and what doesn't work and try to

leave behind the things that aren't working and get curious about the things that are and

say, what's the next step?

If I could be really honest for a second, you know, I think when we think of adventure,

the icon is like a mountain or less like massive thing.

But really an adventure is a new kind of risky, uncomfortable experience.

So when we started to even frame what is adventure to us, we had to let go of what we thought

it was and just start to lean in like, what could it be with kids?

You know, what could adventure be for a two year old instead of a 35 year old?

That also was really helpful and just kind of setting the stage as well.

The word adventure defined in the dictionary is literally an exciting or very unusual experience.

Something, you know, exciting to be undertaking a risk or hazardous experience.

But so it literally is something out of your ordinary.

That's all it is.

It doesn't mean, like you said, climbing Kilimanjaro with your family or something way

out in the middle of the wilderness.

I can speak to my own experience, the most exciting, my favorite stories from my adventures.

Oftentimes, don't have to do with that stuff.

It has to do with some random person I met at a grocery store or just, you know, some

small experience in some city, park somewhere.

This interaction with somebody or some animal or something.

It's not necessarily way out there.

It's a lot more accessible than that.

So for you, tell us what's been one of the most rewarding experiences adventures you and

your family have been able to go on bigger, small.

Well, we're embarking on one right now, which is going to be a test of our patients.

But we are thinking about a year off.

And I am 41.

My husband is 40.

Our kids, I just mentioned their ages are 11, 9 and 5.

And you know, that doesn't seem traditional in most senses of the word.

We have decided they are at the prime ages that, you know, kids, I don't want to say kids

have an expiration date, that sounds wrong.

But there's a period, there's a season, there's a season we're in where the kids are an

independent enough that they can do a lot of these fun, adventurous things that they're

not going to probably want to do in five years.

And in 10 years, they'll be off on their own.

And so we realized we need to cut back on all of the other life expectations where we

were renovating a forced generation far most.

And we kind of have just said, you know, is that really where we want to put our energy

right now, our time and our money?

And we've just added a scale back that a little bit.

And we also are talking about scaling back at work.

You know, we're both still working full time.

So we're talking about what does that look like?

And do we have enough of a runway in our savings that we've made that we can cover a

year or what other revenue could we use?

So that's a big adventure for us.

In that space, both my son and daughters, both my sons and daughter have their own goals

of things they love doing.

My oldest, if he could choose his tap three adventures, he would be surfing, skiing and

mountain biking every weekend.

My daughter would be reading rock climbing and riding horses every day that she could.

And my youngest would probably be fishing, biking and I'm not sure what the third thing

might be.

But we've decided like, okay, what if we designed a year based on all of our goals and just

explored the country and not really know what that life is going to be like or not have

to feel like we have to plan every ounce of every detail, but have enough of a, you know,

the boundary set to say, this is okay, it's okay if we're uncomfortable for a little

bit.

And yeah, and I think that's within probably a year or two that will be at that.

Like, okay, we're leaving.

Bye.

It's been great.

You know, that's, that's really uncomfortable place right now that I'm trying to lean into.

Have you ever gone through all the hassles of getting on the plane, security, luggage,

long waits at the airport, all that kind of stuff?

And then when you finally arrive at your destination, not only are you worn out, but you also

might feel a little bit disconnected.

I know that I do when I hop scotch around the planet on a plane.

That's one of the reasons why I love the great American road trips where you get to drive

from one place to another and connect all of those dots.

You get to experience the changes in the terrain and the weather and the people and the

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So interesting.

It's like the common ground between all of you right now.

You got to take advantage of that opportunity, because if everyone was left to do what they

wanted to, it sounds like some very different, everyone would be on a very different path.

Your daughter would be on a horse, one of your friends would be on a kayak, the other

someone would be on a mountain by somewhere.

It wouldn't work.

It wouldn't work if anybody did exactly the thing they wanted to do right now.

But this is the common ground y'all share.

So what is this gap you're going to look like for y'all?

Is it going to be, you know, living abroad, or you're going to be in an RV, what will

it look like?

Yeah.

I think it'll be traveling the United States or at least North America in an RV is what

I'm envisioning at this point.

So awesome.

That's going to be cool.

We've talked to some families doing that.

And as you know, travel, especially where every location is kind of new, every experience,

all the people you meet new, that one year is going to feel like so much longer than a

year.

It's going to feel like such a bigger part of your life than just, you know, actually

one year.

So what a great way to spend a year.

Good gracious.

Was your family unforgettable?

Yeah.

Well, and to be quite honest, that is, it's hard for us to even consider.

One of the things we've had to think about right now is one of our, one of my core values

is connection.

So we've even said like, how are we going to connect with peers along the way?

How do we build a network of just people we could meet up with or, you know, so that

what doesn't feel so lonely on the road?

Because that, and you might start to sense this too, is when you're not the normal, and

I hate that word normal, but when you're not doing things the traditional way, you're

kind of the outcast, you're a little weird.

It can be really lonely.

And I know that we're going to be a little off the beaten pass.

So now it's, when the prep work for us is like, who's our tribe?

Who do we want to meet up with?

Who's got kids?

Who adventures?

And we've been fortunate that a lot of our friends, most of my friends, you know, all those

adventurous friends, a lot of them chose not to have kids.

And so we were kind of faced with this idea of like, well, how do you feel about us bringing

our kids?

Are you okay with that?

Because we also want to respect your decision to not have kids.

And we don't want to, you know, thrust them on you, so to speak.

So it's been a lot of really great conversations.

But now the kids also are like, but we want to play with other kids too.

So how do we find other kids that we can play with?

And that's, that's the hard part for us is how do we find our tribe in all of this?

And figure out where we're going to be able to meet up with other families.

We just had a really unique experience.

We're coming off of three weeks in Hawaii, which is the longest we've ever been together

as a family in kind of one place.

And part of our stay in Hawaii was at a homestay.

So it was like a host family where they host other families who have kids.

And it was designed to be so that we would interact.

And that we found was one of the most nourishing experiences for all of us.

Because I got to connect with another parent who has a similar philosophy to parenting.

My kids did really adventurous things and could play with other kids.

So there's opportunities out there.

We just need to find them.

That's, I think that's my mission right now too, is how do I bring all of those things

that are just not known to us to a place where I can explore them

and connect with other people that are also interested in things like this?

I think that's, it's important to know you're not crazy and you're not alone.

It's great to be kind of, you know, that person doing things differently.

But it's also, it's also good to know you're not the only one out there doing things different.

There's a whole network of folks doing, doing this or thinking this way at least.

Well, I'd love to also ask, you talk about traveling to Hawaii for three weeks.

That's incredible.

That sounds like just, you know, a bucket list.

I'm for a lot of people out there with families.

But you also do it on quite a budget.

Can you talk about how you and your family of five have been able to travel on $2,500 yearly budget?

I don't know if Hawaii really blew that out of the water.

But I just love to hear like, what does that look like?

What does that $2,500 look like and how do you make that happen?

Yeah, thank you for that.

That is true that our budget is $2,500.

And just for the record, Hawaii ended up being all in $3,500.

So we did blow it out of the water a little bit,

but we still were able to look at things differently.

I'm going to take you through a little bit of a growth trajectory on this one too,

because it wasn't always this way,

how I funded Hawaii is very different than what we were doing 10 years ago.

My husband was not a traveler.

In fact, before he met me, he had never been on an airplane.

And so I knew that I couldn't just be all in on travel because I was like,

oh, boy, this is going to be tough.

So for the very early couple of years of our marriage,

he had a motorcycle.

And so all of our travel was done on a motorcycle,

which does not require a lot of gas.

It meant we were packing a tent on the back of the motorcycle.

And if we were lucky, we'd stay at some trashy hotel for the night

on our way to the next place.

So early on, $2,500 was nothing.

And we probably traveled for less than $1,000 in some of those early days.

As we had kids, they don't fit on motorcycles very well.

And we had to change our framework.

So we did start doing more airline travel with the kids.

All of our kids were on an airplane within,

gosh, probably three months of age.

And that I've just always let,

this is just like the budget side of me.

I've always let the fair sales decide our destination.

So I don't keep a bucket list, so to say, of where I want to go.

We do have some target areas.

My daughter wants to collect all the national parks

and my son wants to hit all the Major League Baseball Stadium.

So we have enough options out there

that when a fair sale would come up, I'll be honest.

One of my favorite places was Cleveland, Ohio.

And people look at me and they're like, what?

I'm like, it was so cool.

We spent just four days.

Our fairs were $59 round trips.

So we just found some really cheap ways to travel.

We don't stay in hotels most often.

So we've either camped or we've done Airbnb's.

And we do have some family that will sometimes stay with.

So, you know, looking at your lodging differently,

we will often only eat out once if possible on that trip,

partially because, partially,

it's just because my kids don't eat very good food

and it always feels like it's always some money.

But my husband and I love really good local food.

So we always try to find something local,

a good local flavor or a local dish or something

that we can try.

So we just, we've learned little tricks along the way.

And I would say starting maybe in 2018,

we did using travel rewards.

So that's probably another whole topic for another day.

But in large part, the last three to four years,

we've been traveling using a lot of travel rewards.

So we're able to fly as a family of five

for minimal expenses.

And that's really using credit card signups

and you get these bonus points.

And then, I mean, there's a system behind it.

It's a little bit more sophisticated.

But that is how we've really started to expand

our budget without really having financial implications

on our budget.

Learning the tricks of the trade.

That's definitely part of it.

Part of it's the inspiration and just going for it.

And the other is getting educated on stuff like that.

I absolutely love that.

I love your kind of your rules around traveling too.

Just looking at things a little differently,

you can often find some really great deals

or experience some of those places on such a so much cheaper.

You mentioned Ohio, that's so funny.

We did a cross-country bike ride last year,

bike from coast to coast.

And I'd have to say, my absolute favorite experience

was all of Ohio.

And that's going from essentially Connecticut

all the way to San Diego.

I mean, seeing the most incredible places,

some incredible scenery.

But something about the people and just the combination

of my expectations and the experiences

and the stories Ohio stands out to me.

That was so funny you mentioned.

I've been telling people that for a year

that my favorite state was Ohio.

It had zero expectations going on and on.

But I think that has to do something with how great it was.

So it's cool to hear that it's not an anomaly.

Someone else out there had a great time in Ohio too.

Yeah.

Well, and there is something about the Midwest.

There's something about the culture of the Midwest

who I just find people are easy going.

And I don't know.

There's something it's easy to fit.

I don't want to say fit in.

But it's easy to enjoy the experience

without having the pressure of expectations or something.

I don't know.

That's funny that you had that experience too.

Well, I tell you what,

you've been sharing some incredible stuff.

And I'd love to just ask a few more questions

before we wrap up.

But we hear a lot of people say,

I want to stay adventurous as I have kids.

And it's a real pressure to still be really cool

and adventurous and athletic even as you have kids.

What are some resources you use

to help just keep that motivation alive

or help find ways to stay active with kids?

Yeah, honestly, I had to create a lot of these

because when I first started out 10 years ago,

I wasn't finding what I was looking for.

Certainly Pinterest wasn't what it is today.

And I felt like it was exhausting.

So I found a couple people that I follow on Instagram

just in the areas that I'm curious about.

I've had a lot of really good luck.

Once you start looking for things in your realm,

so right now I'm in RV.

So RV family life is what I'm exploring.

So those are probably most top of mind.

But we also started, I would find ideas

to like 100 things you could do in your own backyard

or every location around the country has,

I don't want to say every location,

but a lot of places have,

I always just Google search, you know,

free things to do with or biking resources with kids.

Or, you know, any time I would travel,

I would usually start to look just to a Google search initially

and then start to connect with the locals.

And even here in Wisconsin, it's amazing in 2020

when we were kind of forced to stay home.

There were so many things in our own backyard

that we just didn't even know existed.

So I would say, you know, just starting to search

in the area, like geographic area,

and then in the thing, the activity

that you're most interested in,

and either do free or add with kids,

and that has helped us kind of hone in on some of those people

that are ahead of us on the journey.

I would also say not to put a plug in,

but I would also say this is part of the reason

and the motivation behind the brand Ordinary Sherpa.

I didn't want families to feel like they had to choose

between adventure and all of those other things.

I was starting to feel the pull

that my kids were being pulled in a hundred different directions.

So Ordinary Sherpa as a brand can also be a resource to people,

whether it's just, you know, adventures in your own backyard

or it's traveling differently

or even designing your life around adventure.

There's resources, and we're relatively young,

but there's definitely resources and people

that are attracted to the brand,

and mostly people are age.

You know, I think that's the other thing.

People are age are really realizing that this doesn't exist.

This isn't how our parents did it,

and so our thirsty and it's just been great.

I had someone post today in our Facebook group

of like, I'm going to Traverse City, Michigan,

and I think there's like 15 responses already of like,

oh, you should try this or you should try this

or here's what we did with our kids.

It's a really nurturing environment,

and I would say that's another option for people as well.

That's awesome.

Well, tell us about Ordinary Sherpa.

Just what kind of things do you like to learn

or can folks expect to learn on there

and expect to get out of that?

Yeah, I wanted adventure to be simple enough

that you could take the first step.

So people who may not have been the epic adventures

that are just, or people who are trying to get their spouses

on board that may not have been epic adventures,

those types of things.

How do I take that next first step towards an adventurous life?

There's a lot of things just to kind of get out the door.

Tools and resources, I interview a lot of parents

who have been adventurous and share their stories.

So there's a lot of just different inspiration.

You can also find things to travel differently.

I mentioned our little travel rewards.

We have a couple episodes on that,

but then also some content to help people

with what I call unturism.

It's really traveling differently,

connecting with locals,

not always going to the touristy destinations.

But I would say those are kind of,

I would say authenticity, simplicity,

and then the Sherpa concept is to really help people,

other families reach their summits.

If you know anything about mountain climbing,

in Everest, in particular,

the Sherpa tribe is extremely monumental

for mountain climbers to actually reach the summit.

There's something about the Sherpas,

and I could go into another whole topic around that.

So we kind of embrace that Sherpa philosophy,

that you're also contributing

to help other people reach their summit.

So it is genuinely a community designed

to help other people connect

and to help families connect both together

and with other families.

Absolutely, love it.

What you're doing, the work you're doing,

helping families stay adventurous

or start being adventurous

and providing some resources on how to do that

and living by example, of course.

Is there anything else you wanted to share

on the Adventure Sports podcast?

I just really appreciate that all that you've done,

and I want to say thank you,

because I have been a listener to your podcast

for I don't know, years, years.

I've listened to some of the rewinds the first time,

and I just appreciate as much as we can't always

do the epic things, it does keep these

in the back of my mind of what's possible,

and it keeps reminding me that anything is really possible.

I just have to figure out how to do it now

and when to do it next.

So I just thank you, I would say for creating this space too,

and supporting others to even dream

and be exposing me to Adventure in different ways.

That's been a really helpful way.

My son is fascinated with your coast to coast trip.

So I just, I probably need to take that conversation offline

and learn like where to start,

but I think the space that has been created

around Adventure is because of communities like yours

and like mine that are really trying to nurture

and support families and knowing that it's okay

to take the first step, even if you don't know where to start.

You know, just do something, it'll be okay.

You know, I think we're a society that's afraid of failure

and always wanting the epic thing,

but that next first step is gonna be the best step for you.

First of all, thank you so much for listening.

It means the world to us that you choose to listen to this show.

If you'd like to help us further,

you can leave a review on iTunes,

share us with your friends, your family.

It goes a long way to grow in the show.

You can also support us financially through patreon.com,

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And also, if you have an idea of who could be a good guest

for the show, we're always looking for people

to tell their story about the outdoors or adventure.

So if you know someone, please reach out,

email us at info at adventure sportspodcast.com.

And until then, get out there and have some fun.