Hi again, I’m Meloni. It occurs to me that I haven’t really done much introducing, and that a little back-story might make all this, make more sense.  So here’s the quick and dirty on me and mine.

 On June 1st, 2015 our family of four departed O`ahu, Hawaii after three years in paradise.  My husband’s job was relocated to Seattle and as it often is in the United States Coast Guard, we have found ourselves moving once again. Though Hawaii is now so deeply rooted in us, it was not without its challenges and we were on many levels ready to leave.  I wanted to feel sane again, and somehow those crystal blue waters and the humid thick air leave a lot of people more zombie like than human – myself included. It was strange, beautiful, and strange. Do I miss it? yes. Would I move back? probably not.

 While there, we worked feverishly to build relationships and some of those will last a lifetime. Hawaii is now somewhere we could travel without batting an eyelash – both because we have friends to visit, and also because we owned our life there – getting fully immersed despite a heavy dose of passive aggressive racism and dysfunction.  Though we love so much of Hawaii, there was an audible sigh and calm that came over me when we landed on the Mainland, and I had to digest the fact that I had spent most of the last three years being unhappy – and hiding it. Or so I thought. Our children, devastated to leave Hawaii took a deep sigh with us when we landed here, and for the most part are adapting faster than usual to our new homeland. I suspect this is in no small part because their parental units (especially their mother) are happy again, and that is helpful to everyone. Nobody wants to hear me talk about Hawaii this way, I know, and I am sorry…

Before living in Hawaii we spent six glorious years in Sonoma County, California in a town called Petaluma. That is home. It is not where either my husband or I were born, but that is a place that feels right to us.  Having only spent a few weeks in Washington I can tell you that this too gives me that warm home like feeling. That safe feeling we all want on some level, and some people journey the world looking for. Having done two stints in California, one in Michigan and one in Hawaii, not to mention lots of visiting the lower Midwest, I am going to pay close attention to level of comfort I feel in Seattle. I’m listening to me.

 For all our moving around, my husband I haven’t really put intention into expanding our traveling for fun. We are always so caught up in the day-to-day grind, and we started so young, that it’s been a game of catch up this last 13 years.  Our son, now 12, flew onto the scene 8 weeks premature to two young parents in their early 20’s, who were not quite married yet. We wouldn’t change a thing, and we were certainly old beyond our years back then, but now with two kids and lots of other obligations we need to dig out the thrills we missed a decade ago.  No, we don’t want to get high on the beaches of Jamaica (I mean, well, not really), but we would like to set out and explore our world a LOT more.

 Two kids, a loud adopted parrot, and some exhausted parents – we are planning to take the Seattle area by storm and see what kinds of adventures we can dig up on this side of the Pacific and then beyond! With 13 Adventures to hold me accountable, I plan to land in our new home with a plan to find the real me and honor it.