After
- selling our Big California House and then
- moving to the beach (a 1-year beach house rental…we did not buy in the area…just moved for fun!)
…we called an audible when Matt’s job went 100% remote and decided to seize the window of opportunity!
(We loved living at the beach but there was a series of events that led us to decide to delay another house purchase. I wrote about those in more detail in this post: “Why We’re Going to Travel & Live Abroad With Kids for Another 2 Years!”)
LIVING ABROAD WITH KIDS
Move #1: Europe!
We started out by moving to The Azores, an autonomous Portuguese archipelago in the middle of the Atlantic.
Matt’s client meetings were still on U.S. time zones so western Europe was the best spot for the time difference for all the calls he had to be on. (So he didn’t have to wake up at 3am.)
As much as we loved living there, the world felt like our oyster and my heart still wanted to have my girls experience living in Spain like I had (we have some good Spanish blood in us), so we
- moved to the Canary Islands…
- …but not without stopping in Madeira for 3 weeks…
- …and taking a holiday to Morocco…
- …before eventually “settling” in Seville in Andalucia (southern Spain) where I had lived.
Soon, we were moving to the Highlands of Scotland for 3 months.
We then moved to a 300-year-old chalet on the side of a then-green mountain in Austria for the summer, via northern Italy.
A visit to dear friends in Norway was an incredible experience, and we were unofficially adopted by a retired couple in another area of Norway as we lived on their apple farm on the side of a fjord.
With some vacation time, we spent it visiting spots around the Baltic, from
- Copenhagen to
- Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia
- to Finland & Sweden
- finishing up in Belgium & Luxembourg.
We then had the unexpected opportunity to
completely change continents!
And we headed deep into Africa for starters…
Living Abroad with kids
Next Phase: Africa for 3 Months!
We’d hoped to visit some areas of Africa while we were “homeless,” but — with Matt’s work calls back on U.S. time — it had been impossible.
Until now.
His projects suddenly ended a bit early so that we could book a flight from Brussels to Kigali and visit one of “our kids” in Rwanda. (I wrote about that HERE and it’s a MUST-READ!)
After Rwanda, we traveled to
- Tanzania
- Zimbabwe, Zambia & Botswana
- South Africa (where we rented a house on the beach for a good long spell!)
- Namibia
- Madagascar
…before ending our several months in Africa hopping to Mauritius & Reunion Island on our way to Asia!
circumnavigating the globe with kids
Hopping Through Asia Because…Why Not? 🙂
Originally, we thought we’d have to return to Europe after our time in Africa…
…but we were able to move even further East due to Matt’s schedule opening up even more with timing! What a gift it was!
So from Mauritius, we flew to India (best surprise destination we hadn’t expected to be able to see)!
We then had a bit of extra time before needing to be in Bangkok, so we added a week swimming with turtles every day in stunning Sri Lanka!
Next was a flight to Bangkok, Thailand. We caught a boat that took us from Bangkok to Vietnam, as well as northern Bali, southern Bali, & Lombok (all different parts of Indonesia).
Ending in Singapore, we then caught a flight to what felt like our reward after months in Africa & Asia (which were beautiful but also took a lot of energy!)…
Traveling the world
New Zealand & The South Pacific!
If you just met us, you may not yet know that we used to live in New Zealand. (The story of how we quit our high-paying jobs and moved to NZ years ago is HERE.)
So as we were looking at ways to take our girls to New Zealand (their first time, except for my oldest who I was pretty pregnant with when we left), we found the perfect flight from Singapore to Auckland that would get us there right in time for a good Kiwi summer!
After several months living in New Zealand again, visiting friends and renting homes in some of our old favorite spots, it was time to head back to Los Angeles as Matt’s client work needed him in person for a bit…
We decided to island hop our way back. Although we’d honeymooned in the South Pacific and visited a variety of different islands over the years, we hadn’t been to Samoa yet…and so there we hopped for two weeks!
From lovely Samoa, it was a flight to Oahu followed by Kauai for a few more weeks before catching our final flight back to LAX — exactly where we’d started out on our first flight to the Azores three “calendar years” prior!
Living Abroad
FAQS
“Did you really NOT plan to go all the way around the world?”
Nope, we never meant to circumnavigate the globe — we just meant to live in some remote places around Europe for a bit (like the Azores and Canary Islands) while working remotely with that time difference still working for us — but above you can see how the whole thing happened over the years step-by-step!😆
“What was your favorite place?“
My daughters roll their eyes each time someone asks them that so I’m trying to train it out of them because it’s a natural question for the average person.
While we understand it’s a natural question, to each of us it feels like an awfully impossible one to answer. I told them to pick 3-5 favorite places for different reasons and say that. The average person just wants a few names. 🙂
So for example, one daughter answers, “India for the food. Scotland for the beauty. Norway and New Zealand for the friends.” The other daughter says, “New Zealand because it’s just so beautiful and so nice. And Africa.” (I’m with her on that one. I really, really liked Africa…)
But she then proceeds to list almost every single place so…you’ll need a couple hours to listen to her on that one…😅
“Where are you going to end up?”
Do we really ever “end up” anywhere on earth? 🙂 I hope not! We tend to be a Tribe On the Move… 😉
(Which I sometimes laugh at because we run a home-focused businesses, but I think it’s the best of both worlds! Home & Away indeed!)
For now, we bought a new house outside of Santa Barbara, but we’ll share more about our plans for that Casita in the coming weeks! 😉
Next…
EVERY SINGLE ONE of our travel posts (organized by destination) are on THIS 1 PAGE for you!
Or if you’re just here for Design Design Design :), you can see all our interior & exterior design projects by clicking HERE!👈💛
