day{7}: adventures!

Anything, everything, little or big becomes an adventure when the right person shares it.

-Kathleen Norris

One fabulous and very exciting thing about entering into a lifelong partnership with someone is all of the memories you will make of the adventures you take along the journey of your life together.

I'm so blessed to have married a man who matches my passion for

seeking and {embracing} new experiences.

In our 4 years (in April) of marriage we have shared many great adventures, big and small.

Here are just a few that come to mind:

A handful of camping trips involving long hikes, cliff jumping, swimming, sun burns and rum and cokes in plastic cups at Soda Springs.

Our random last-minute getaways to the Ocean (usually Lincoln City or Rockaway Beach) with Honey in tow, of course. All we need is a big blanket, a football, a good book and a full picnic basket.

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil was (thus far) the trip of our lifetime. We were honored to attend our friends' wedding there, and enjoyed a week of sight-seeing, shopping, swimming, surfing, sunbathing, and of course, parties. This vacation gave me a very strong desire to do more international travel. It was my first trip outside of the country and completely eye-opening. If you never leave your home country, it's easy to shut out the world all around you, because it's "unknown." But there is SO much more to see, and I know I have barely skimmed the suface...I need to keep racking up miles and grow a financial "nest-egg" for travel.

(i'm the blonde haired one falling into the middle...)

White-water rafting trips. It's been FAR too long since we've done this. In fact, the last time we did was when Gary proposed to me (on the banks of the Salmon river in a stuffy tent....fitting, right?!). We both grew up rafting and are definitely going to want to continue the tradition with our children.

Snowboarding trips are almost always an adventure in themselves. If we had better cash flow this winter, we'd be hitting the mountain every dang weekend...LOVE the sound of snow fast under your board and your coat flapping against you in the cool breeze...

Trips to the river in the heavy, dense heat of summer. These would be greatly improved with the purchase of a boat (a WAKEBOARDING boat at that!) but we make the best of them. We swim, hike, cliff jump, play a game of ENDLESS fetch with Honey and sometimes, just float. I'm excited for summer river trips with Kai!

In Seattle, it was always such a treat to ride the Ferry. Gary and I began and ended some of our most memorable date nights with ferry rides. On a sunny cool day, NOTHING beats the Seattle/Sound beauty.
And while I'm on the Seattle subject, we also spent several hours canoeing on Lake Union, which was fun, a good workout, and (sometimes) kind of scary!

And then there are the even smaller adventures, like family walks around the neighborhood, trips to the store, parties with friends, weekends with relatives...nearly everything becomes an adventure with an (almost) 6 month old.

I know I'm leaving some out.

But really, we are only getting started.

I asked Gary to give me his "adventure" bucketlist of sorts, and this is what I got:

• basejumping (skydiving off of a cliff--I have no desire to SKYdive, but I would, however participate a nice scenic basejump.)
• Spend a couple of weeks on a {remote}tropical island--"where we have to catch our own fish, you know and live like they do on Lost."
• Backcountry heli-boarding (Whistler, preferably)
• Go on a week long white-water rafting/camping trip
• Rent an RV and travel down the California coast line and "stop off every so often and ride my dirt bike."

Here's just a {few} of mine:

• Go backpacking all over Europe.
• Visit a tropical island--preferably not an over-commercialized crowded one, but not as remote as "Lost."
• Take that trip down highway 101, but not for dirt-bike riding, for WINE-TASTING!!! (Napa Valley, anyone?!)
• Spend a month exploring the East Coast, from NYC all the way down to Miami.
• And last but not least, go back to Brazil.

As for right now, we can only dream (about the big one's, anyway...)

but mark my words...

we will spend the next {several} years

crossing things off our life list of shared adventures.

After all, the real adventure lies in not WHERE you go,

but WHO you go with....

We don't know where life will take us,

but it's a guaranteed adventure,

because we'll be {together}.