Couple Things with Shawn and Andrew - 154 | traveling to 100 countries with 3 kids with the bucket list family

Episode Date: March 22, 2023

This week we had the privilege of interviewing The Bucket List Family! We talked about the joys of living an unconventional life, the hardships that come with traveling as a family of five, how they keep their relationship strong on the road and more! It was so much fun to interview them and we’ve loved following along with their travel adventures for years. After talking to them we now feel the urge to travel somewhere awesome as a family and we know you will too! This episode is sponsored by Modern Fertility ▶ Modern Fertility is offering our listeners $30 off the test when you go to https://www.ModernFertility.com/eastfam30. This episode is also sponsored by Better Help ▶ Visit https://www.BetterHelp.com/EASTFAM today to get 10% off your first month! To follow along with The Bucket List Family, check out the links below! Website ▶https://www.thebucketlistfamily.com/ Instagram ▶ https://www.instagram.com/thebucketlistfamily/?hl=en YouTube ▶ https://www.youtube.com/c/thebucketlistfamily Love you guys! Shawn and Andrew Follow My Instagram ▶ https://www.instagram.com/ShawnJohnson Follow My TikTok ▶ https://www.tiktok.com/@shawnjohnson Like the Facebook page! ▶ https://www.facebook.com/ShawnJohnson Follow Andrew’s Instagram ▶ https://www.instagram.com/AndrewDEast Andrew’s Tik Tok ▶ https://www.tiktok.com/@andrewdeast?lang=en Like the Facebook page! ▶ https://www.facebook.com/AndrewDEast Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Long-bendy Twizzlers candy keeps the fun going. What's up, everybody, welcome back to couple things. With Sean and Andrew. A podcast all about couples. And the things they go through. Today we're talking about a couple with their kids traveling all the way around the world and back again, that's Jess and Garrett. Can I be honest?

They're one of my favorite people to follow. I know. They're so fun. Everybody they have is really well done. And it's also incredibly based. They're always in Africa or some magical place. Tonga, Turkey, Maldives. They've gone to,

Zanzibar. They've gone to like 100 countries. Yeah. Been traveling. They went traveling full time for three years. Yep. With their babies. With their three kids.

Yep. And they've documented it all, share it all on social media and YouTube specifically. If you haven't heard of the Buccula's family, go check them out. They do an awesome job. We actually got a chance to work out with Garrett and Jess. Four years ago. Four years ago. Yeah.

Park City, Utah. That's right. It was before babies for us. We were talking about their travels. We were talking about how we were wanting to have kids and we were starting to try. And four years later, we're finally getting to talk to them again. We've had countless trips planned with them. And we're supposed to go to Hawaii this summer.

Yes. We'll let you know. We'd love to meet up with them in person. And at the end of this interview, they tell us the two countries we need to go see this summer. So I'm going to book it. Also, do you remember when we met them in person, him saying that he was a huge fan of you? He had my picture in his locker. What?

We did not talk about that. Garrett. I forgot about that. Honestly, Garrett's background that was really impressive. So he created software. that like scans barcode. Yep. And sold it to Snapchat,

worked for Snapchat for a year, then used whatever money he got from selling that to spark their travels around the world. And now they have a company called Bucketlist Studios where they're developing animation and different types of content that is all in this family lifestyle space that you know we think is so important.

So anyway, if you want to find out more about Jess and Garrett and the Bucket family will link their information down below. Thank you to Jess and Garrett for joining us. We hope you enjoy this show. Let's roll into it. Well, Jess and Garrett, it's been a couple of years since we hung out in person, but thank you for joining us on the show today. How are you, too?

We're great. Yeah, we're doing well. We're just wanting to hang out with you guys. That's all. So if we have to do it on a podcast, then fine. Well, I will try to make it so we end up in Hawaii this summer, working very hard. What's it like to be way cooler than? Most other families, including us, in the world.

What is it like? We can't tell you. Guys, I have so many questions now as parents. So when we ran into you guys, we didn't have either of our babies. No, you were working on it, I think. We were working on it. You guys got to work fast. Already two littles over there.

Geez. Popped them out quick. That's well done. But I have such a different appreciation for what you guys actually. do now, now being parents, I have a million questions. How do you fly with your children? How do you sleep in a hotel room or not in a hotel room? How do you camp with them? What? We just flew from San Diego back to Nashville and our kids almost had a meltdown. I need all of the secrets. They're about to school us up. I mean, here's the thing is we just real quick. I'm going to tell you right now, Jess is about to dumb it down and be like, oh, we're not that. No, Jessica really is

like the pro and full of all of the tips. Don't sad, don't be satisfied with her like half answers. You need to get the like, real expert. Okay. What's good? Here's the thing.

Kids are no matter where they are, right? We just have meltdowns on airplanes and meltdowns, meltdowns in the Serengeti and meltdowns on boats. You know what I mean? Like, we still have them. I think for us, our kids are so, you know, as parents, you're kind of taught and you read all these books about like consistency and like getting your kids in a routine, but our kids routine is non-routine. So, you know, we still,

we try to have our little routine within our inconsistent lifestyle, right? So we still have a nap time and we still have, you know, certain times of the day and bedtime routines, but it's still just kind of within this like, you know, we're in a different hotel room every night or something like that. And, you know, like you guys and most parents have realized, like, oh, if you're going to miss a nap time, you're going to pay for it, right? But the kids kind of learn you nap on the go and you nap in the stroller and you nap on the plane and you just have to give them the benefit of the doubt and know that they're struggling because they're tired or they're hungry is there are there any like i don't say traumatic but traumatic like meltdown

stories that you've tried to just like push out of your head i'll say our kids i'm trying to think of like meltdown stories i don't know if you'd consider this a meltdown it's a different kind of messy story but we were on one flight from china Was it China all the way to L.A.? Where did we fly into? It was a long, it was an Asian. It was like a grand Pacific flight. 12-hour flights.

And our middle child, uh... Who is potty trained? He was potty trained, but he, I was sleeping on, like, our little, like, three-row seat in the middle of the plane. And he was just laying right on top of me. And the middle of the night, I wake up to him... Just peeing. Peeing on me. And I was, oh, my gosh.

That, what a way to wake up, right? Because you always say you're like... Pack an extra set of closing for kids, right? That's a given. But for dad to just be like, he covered. Anyways, yeah. So I didn't have extra clothes, but he did. So I wake up, we get cleaned up, we change his clothes, we go back to sleep because there's

still like six hours left in this flight. I don't know what the kid drank, but like three hours later he peed on me like, yeah. I'm telling you, he hadn't like wet the pants for like year before that. and then on this flight you decided to do it twice both times on me it was yeah that that was quite the traumatic experience but that day I feel like that wasn't like a win like that wasn't like a marital win because you were so mad at me like you just had to take your anger out at somebody do you guys ever like just get so mad at like the kids and you're not going to take your anger out on the kids but you like just take it out on each other I've actually never done that

Jess have you Garrett okay yeah only when I'm pee covered I did feel bad so I kind of was just like fine Bring the anger to me So by the time we got off that flight Not only was I covered in pee But our child was now naked Because he had gone through two cycles of clothes Oh no

I will say we've gotten off Probably a handful of flights With our youngest in just a diaper Or just a diaper and a shirt Oh yeah Or sometimes just like a shirt wrapped around him Or like a blanket wrapped around him Yeah

Yeah Why do you guys do what you do? That's a great question I want to hear your answer. We don't have an answer for you. Just like, oh, my gosh. Why do we do? Why do we do it?

I mean, years ago, it all started as kind of a unique situation in our lives where we Garrett had sold a company and we weren't ready to settle down. We weren't ready to build a house. We didn't know where to be. So we were kind of putting off all grown-up decisions and we're like, let's see what we can learn from the world and then take that into like our future family, you know, with a plan for four months of travel and that four months then turned into three years a full-time travel and here we are i think that's what it was seven years later and like almost a hundred countries later i think that's it though

is when we set out we just wanted to like learn more from the world and we became very addicted to how much we were learning we were taking so much from each of these cultures that we were visiting that yeah we just didn't want to stop learning especially together as a family the fact that we're able to do it together as a family unit. I mean, those were just priceless memories for us and we didn't want it to stop. Well, and I think me personally, I'm like just the quintessential like all-American girl next door, right? Like I had a dad with a, you know, a nine to five. I kind of just always pictured that for me and, you know, having a husband who, I don't know, probably got the college degree somewhere and just like worked that nine to five. That's always what I pictured. And then I

married this guy who is just the king of extreme and whatever he does, he goes. He goes. those like 10,000 percent, always. And so my like moderate lifestyle and personality is just point of moderation, king of extreme. That's what I like to say. And somehow just over the years, after about four months of travel, I was like, actually, I'm enjoying this, like much to my surprise. Like I like living out of a suitcase. I like living a minimalistic lifestyle.

I love sharing these experiences with my family. So I feel like never in a million years, I ever set up, say, I want to travel the world. I was like, yeah, maybe I'd like to go to Italy someday. That was like probably me growing up. But now I'm like, I love it. I love it. So for someone who's so normal, I feel like, to be doing something so outside of the box, it's been a huge lifestyle, which for me specifically. One of my favorite things about Jessica is that she was not cut out for this lifestyle, especially the other half of it.

the social media half of it, the Instagram, the YouTube, all of that. Like, Jess and her personality type, like, had zero desire for any sort of fame and success in that realm. And just so many things about her personality were not cut out for it. And so it's been really fun. It's been really fun to see how she's, like, handled with that. Honestly, I think that's something that you guys do really, really well, that you can tell that your life on camera and your life off camera is very similar and it was the same thing like i jess and i would joke that when our youtube becomes big enough it's gonna and jessica's now like famous mom

world traveler it's going to change her and she's going to start like getting more done up and showered and makeup and dress and more fancy nope none of that and but you know props to jess for always just staying true to who she's always been how do you guys found that like find that within your family of how much do you film? How much do you share? How much of it is just your passion? How much do you film your children? Like, where are your boundaries when it comes to sharing your life with everyone else? And really, maybe to preface that, I'd be curious, like, what sparked the desire to want to document and share all that? I'll start off and just say that Garrett is a huge journal keeper, always has. From the day we started dating, you know, back in 2009,

He wrote in his heel, a little blackberry, and he wrote in it every single day and took really crappy pictures with his blackberry phone. And then the day we got engaged, he gave me a book. We still have it of like literally daily journal entries of our dates and what I was wearing and where we went and what I said. Like the sweetest, most romantic person is this guy. And that was like pre-social media. And so when social media came around and we had Dorothy, we had our first daughter, it was such a natural thing for him to be like, I'm going to take her picture every single day. He created an Instagram for our daughter Dorothy and posted a photo every single day.

First and foremost, always just for us as a journal. And then when we sought out on these travels, it was always going to be just a journal. And kudos to him because he hasn't, you know, really given into a lot of the, you know, especially when it comes like YouTube, you know, we don't follow the YouTube recipe at all. Garrett uses copyrighted music we have 20 minute videos like everything that you're supposed to do with YouTube we do not do but it's because we care so much about our family journal and he's done a really good job at that thank you baby you do a great job at that both of you do a great job at that I do think it's been tough because when we started like Jessica said it was just going to be a family journal and then the whole like

influencer scene and ecosystem like became something. And so we've, we've tried our best, even though in a way, like, we kind of helped create the beast and the monster that is like influencer world, we've tried to be a good example to people out there and being like, hey, first and foremost, this should be like live your life to the fullest and document it in a way that you want to remember it. Don't document it for like likes and subscribers and any other outside peer pressure and yeah so we've tried to stay true to that and just be good examples of that to everyone else and i'll also add that garret and i'd be curious to hear how it is in your relationship he is amazing at holding a camera with like whales passing him by and the kids on his arm and then

living in the moment whereas i like rarely hold the camera you know for me i'm just cameras all over the place it doesn't work but he has got a very incredible skill of like living in a moment and being able to capture it really, really well. I feel like that's different. That's the same with us. Like, Andrew can film anything and live in it. If I'm filming it, I'm not experiencing it. Yeah.

And there will be times where I'll go off on a trip and he's like, make sure you film it. This would be really cute to see. And I'm like, I don't think I am capable. Yeah, to be honest with you, it's like I grew, my dad filmed everything. He brought a camcourt around with him, like the shoulder mounted one. And that's what I grew up, like. that's how we experienced things was always he was filming something and so to me it's never been like a family memories like captured yeah we did have a house fire so all the tapes got

lit on fire but anyway I know but thank goodness for YouTube so that's why that's why it's like so precious for us to be able to put this in the cloud and like it actually is crazy I don't know if you guys have ever done this but like we'll make like compilation videos kind of where we'll say Hey, Sean posted that one the other day of like kind of like motherhood. It was so beautiful. Yeah, that was a good one. Yeah. But now we can actually include our audience in that.

And like I'll tweet out like, hey, can, can anyone find this video of Sean doing like, whatever, the balance beam in 2007? And someone will like, boom. It is crazy. So now it's, we have librarians working with us on the internet. It's kind of cool. Anyway. I love that. That's my story.

It's funny how many different things like you and I have in common. we grew up also like making family home videos and going on trips and doing music videos and everything and then crazy scenario we lost it all all of it yeah mine was in a housefire mine was the evil stepmom oh no no wait everything crazy I am curious though to more of you two like the the guys sometimes I get really caught up in this idea of oh I need to document everything and kind of going to adjust as saying it's really hard for me to live in the moment and document it do you guys ever feel like sometimes you spend too much time do you ever like find that confliction of I'm spending too much time trying to document everything that it could go

away and I won't have those like memories or I don't know if I I feel that way, I'm just, like when you lose those, like, yeah, I get exactly what you're talking about. And that's why I think it's a tricky thing because I do think it comes down to a personality type. And in a weird way, it really is like a skill to be able to enjoy the moment, embrace the moment while also capturing it. And not everyone can do that. At least for me, I've never had a time where I like regretted capturing a moment. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. There's been a half of times where I'm like, oh shoot, I wish I would have had my camera out for that moment and I didn't and I just need to like be okay with it and like remember it in my own heart. But yeah, I've never

really regretted having the camera out and like capturing a moment that was special. I think the only times the camera does get in the way is as our channel's gotten bigger and we've been working with more brands. There's any time it is like fabricated or a big like production, especially especially if we have like a camera crew around us, then that takes away the magic of like a simple family moment. And so we, we greatly try to like be very pick, like picky and choosy about when we do anything,

a big production just because that's the only thing that makes our family feel less like intimate. Yeah, so we just do a few of those each year. I'm such a big fan of you guys. I don't know how I'll say it. I would love to, when we come to Hawaii, have an extended version of this conversation because I really respect how you've navigated this well yourself. But Jess, I've heard you describe Garrett as incredibly ambitious and you mentioning you didn't grow up with traveling or like this, you know, spontaneity as normalcy. How have you guys gotten on the same page with like, hey, he's ambitious?

I'm not, or, you know, I'm not as ambitious. He wants to travel all the time. I would like to, do you guys have goal setting meetings, like touch-based meetings? Is there any routines that you have? No. I don't know. I feel like our whole marriage has been this constant, like, Garrett reached for the stars and me, like, bring them back in.

But it kind of works. Garrett's definitely, you know, steer in the ship. and I'm the motor behind it all. So it's a lot of like give and take, you know, and I never thought I'd be living in a house in Hawaii, not that I don't love my life, but it's just not what I had initially pictured for myself. So it's been this kind of, you know, thing that we've had to work through as a marriage of me ending up, you know, sometimes he's like, well, I feel like you're not grateful.

And I'm like, well, it's not that I'm not grateful. It's just that I'm genuinely happy where I stand. And that could have been, you know, some house in Colorado just on an, normal street or it could have been on Beach House and Hawaii, you know, so it's just kind of been us understanding our personalities a little bit more and him being more forgiving and being like, oh, not everybody wants to take over the world like I do. Some people have to like help me do that. And so it's just been kind of, I feel like these last two years, year and a half, we've really come to like a way better understanding of each other's personalities and, and how to be supportive.

And him also encouraging me more to like, what do you want to do? And what, you know, what are your goals, you know, so, so we've had a lot more of those conversations over the last little bit, because for a while, it was tough, you know, when we first settled down in Hawaii, I was so thrilled. I was so thrilled to have a home and start having a community. And, and then we would get an email from the Korean Tourism Board being like, come to Korea and we'll pay you. And Garrett's like, yes. And I'm like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, but like, you know, the kids have school. And Garrett's like, but we can get paid to go to Korea as a family, you know, so it's been such like, of push and pull for years and we're still kind of like working through it but i mean it's our

spring break right now and for the first time ever in the last you know seven years garrett was the one who was like we need to be i feel like i'm literally staring in the mirror i know that was everything you just said is us are you oh my yes yeah i i guess it's almost like um i i i want to use the term phomo, but that doesn't really capture it. It's like this gratitude is kind of more what I feel of like, oh my gosh, like, I cannot believe we have the opportunity to do this and like there's no way we're going to miss it. Like, I don't know. It's just a general, I don't know what makes you tick or wake up in the morning. But for me, it's like, dude, oh my gosh, we're doing it. Like, how crazy is this? And I'll be the same one that's like, I don't know if that is worth it to like miss

school and take the kids out of their routine or whatever it is. So we go through the same conversation it's like two different styles of expressing and living with gratitude jessica expresses her gratitude by being okay with what she has whereas for me that would feel like complacent and my way of expressing my gratitude is making the absolute very most of it because i was like blessed and given these opportunities so why not just go go go and yeah so it's both ways of living with gratitude just in very well i think so much of it is being a mom right where you're like Yes. The kids, like, the kids don't want to miss the sleepovers and the holiday performances, you know.

So I feel like I have to be such an advocate for the kids because, you know, I don't know. Our kids live a very weird, very weird life of like how much traveling they do. And, you know, and Dorothy, like, you want to go to this birthday party or like you want to go to the, you know, on safari. Like, do you want to. Safari, yeah. That's insane. Or we can go to the Antarctica. You know, like, it's such a weird lifestyle that most people don't have to, like, deal with.

But, you know, we've had to, like, we've had to give and take. And it's worked out. But, you know, I'm sure you guys have had similar arguments in your home. Do you find that your kids have the travel bug, like giving them that opportunity to say, do you want to go on a safari or go on a sleepover? Do they sometimes, like, pull that way of, I want to go on a safari? Yeah, they just don't even realize, like, to them, world, am I saying this right? The world is such a small place to them because everything is so

accessible. Yeah. So they'll be like, oh, I want to go skiing. Should we go to Switzerland or should we go to Colorado or should we go their first, I'm pretty sure their first skiing ever was in Qatar in Dubai. So, yeah, it's just their, they're like perception of everything. It's just super wacky. Yeah. Manila for Christmas. My middle time for Christmas. He's like, I want to go to the Maldives. And I'm like, Santa's not bringing a trip to the Maldives. Oh, my gosh. No, Jessica literally said, I don't think that's possible. So then he comes to me and goes, dad, if you think Santa will bring me a trip to the Maldives, then I'll just take you.

Like, mom's out. Oh, my gosh. He's going to have magic. She out. You're in, dad. But when I told the kids, I was like, do you guys want to go? We were supposed to go to the Middle East this spring break. And it wasn't really working out for a whole bunch of reasons.

But I had asked my kids, do you want to go to Israel or do you want to stay home? And every single one of my kids in a different situation was like, I just want to be home. So it was interesting to us for them to be like, I want to be here. I want to see friends. I just, I'm tired. I want to relax. So like, you know, also now I feel like we're trying harder and harder to take our kids' opinions into what. what we do and where we go.

What are your kids ages right now? We've got 10, 8, and 5. Oh. When was the first year that you started noticing their preferences of like, oh, I'm tired of this or I'm itching to travel again or that they actually like saw the difference of being home versus on the road? I mean. Honestly, we're just kind of there now.

Like we're just starting to learn. What was the situation? So our oldest is our daughter, Dorothy, and she's maybe my favorite human on this planet. And she had the chance. What was, oh, okay, speaking of spring break, she could either go with her friend on a ski trip or stay at home and surf with me. And I was like, well, that's an easy choice for her. For sure she's going to choose to spend spring break with her dad surfing. and she comes to me and asks if she can go on the ski trip.

She wanted to go on the ski trip with her friend. I've been dealing with that still. I'm not quite over it. I try to ground her, lock her in a tower, whatever it took. I'm not in the big place emotionally right now because of it. But yeah, we'll see. We're currently dealing with that. I will say, though, do I think Dorothy's ready to rage?

Like, she's always kind of ready to go and do stuff. Manila, or to like, sorry, I mean, to stay at home. Like she cares so much about the friends and the community and maybe it's because she's a little bit older But Manila when we left our second he was one like he loves life on the road and he actually frankly he thrives there His personality is at its best on the road but then in an interesting way when we get home he struggles like he can't sleep even in our home He won't sleep in the same bed two nights in a row they'll sleep in his bed one night and then on the couch and then in a different bedroom like that to him is comfortable two nights and the same bed is like weird and uncomfortable for him it's it's a very interesting thing how long have you guys been married 14 years April

I think April will be 14 years well we uh the longer we're we're coming up on seven the longer we're in this thing the more well reach a point where like you're like you're like you're like button heads and then I think just recently I've really appreciated the fact that oh my Gosh, as much as Sean and I have to work through being different, like, thank goodness that she balances me out. Because otherwise, like, we would be so out of whack. Everything would probably, so like, it's really a beautiful team. It really is. I am positive.

Garrett would be dead in a gutter without me. How long? If Andrew and I went on a trip together, how long would we last? How long? yeah oh that'd be a scary trip if we come home alive we win i mean it's interesting i mean again we can chat more about this some other time but like hearing about like i feel like we have shared in common um just working with your spouse it's a it's a difficult thing um not only you know all the

travels but then on top of that you know just how someone works and that's been so interesting for us over the last few years and i feel like you've done a way better job but at first it was like you're non-stop garret is non-stop and for me i'm like can we please just like turn off and watch a show or go on a walk or something and that just is so hard for him and it was so hard for him i think to see me like not helping out and not pulling my own way like anyway it's just work with your spouse is too tough but i feel this in my soul yeah this is how we operate I feel like if it weren't, like if I were in the picture, Andrew, we'd be living like on a school bus just like on a constant road trip for the rest of our lives with the children. And probably working 14 hours a day.

Yeah. Yeah. Which. Yeah. Well, that is the, I've gotten experience unbelievable things. that I never imagined and just you mentioned that earlier like this was not the life you thought you'd end up living same with you know Sean and I I stumbled in to dating her and then we got married and it's like wow I was supposed I was going to be building wells in Africa like that's

why I studied civil engineering I was trying to like do that and then now we're doing YouTube and but whether like whether it's career or traveling and like we've been places I never thought we get to go but it is it is kind of cool um to think you can find contentment in whatever situation you're doing whatever career whether you're in maldives or in hawaii in nashville like there is uh that's kind of my main takeaway after experiencing things that i never even knew that i wanted and then like coming back and now having kids and we've we've not traveled as much it's like, hey, I actually can be just as content in the playroom as I can be in the Maldives. And anyway, that's more of a tangent.

But have you guys, have you guys experienced that yourself? Have you? Yeah, we're the same person. Basically answer all my questions for me because he knows my person. I think for us, I think, I think COVID was a huge blessing for Garrett to have to stay put. and we finally made a community here in Hawaii and now he's got this like cute group of little boyfriends that go out and surf every morning

so now he's got this life at home that cute neighbor tough that he loves literally something he would say verbatim I love this conversation right now but yeah so it was such a blessing I think for me now that Garrett is like okay

like I it's it's a hard toss up. Do I want to be here like surfing and hanging and working out with my friends and community and playing soccer or do I want to travel? And both are great options and we're happy in both places. And frankly, when we leave for the summer, we leave the day after school ends and we get back the day before school starts. I kind of feel like we live this Hannah Montana two lives. I completely forget about home. That's a great example. I completely forget about home. I have to or I get really homesick. And for us, those three months of full-time travel is 10 times easier than our spring break trips or our weekend stops, you know, and I pack the

exact same that I do for three months of travel that I do for two weeks on the road, you know, two week spring breaks or something like that. So we really enjoy our summers. It's a very special place for us when we can really get into like this groove on the road. And I mean, I think every family should take take a summer or take a month or something and really feel what it's like to, like, live just with your family unit. It's really special. That's one thing. We would get messages.

We do get emails all the time of people wanting to become, like, full-time traveling families, and we usually try to discourage them just being like, look, there's a lot of risk to it. It's really hard, especially if you're wanting to do social media. You guys know how much, like, you can do all the right things on social media and still just, like, not pop off or get lucky. And so we usually discourage people away from full-time travel, but anytime somebody wants to do like an extended trip, like a gap year or something or go live abroad just for a short period of time, we think that's one of the best decisions, especially young families, can make. So we always encourage that.

When you're looking and you're planning like your summers now, I know when we ran into you guys four years ago, you were explaining how, you know, the year before you would start planning your entire year of time. travel and the research you had put into it now that you're a family of five with kids what's your criteria when you're looking for like the next place and what's like your check off list or do you have one you know now is kind of interesting and I think it was about a year ago that Garrett and I were kind of like how long is this going to go on like how long is the social media thing going to go like I don't know you know like we we are grateful and understand the opportunity that we have so we kind of sat down and we're like what is actually on our bucket list what are things that if Instagram died tomorrow and we wouldn't get paid to travel

anymore we couldn't travel you know for being hosted uh what are those things we want to do we made that list well because uh Jessica and I we both grew up in such like frugal families that a lot of the experiences that we've we've been blessed to have we would never ever shell out like even if we can afford some of these places we've stayed we just wouldn't have it within our frugal spirits to like shell out 20k a night for an experience but then if we get that special invite then obviously we want to go and experience and document and promote it and so that's what this list was was okay what are places that we would only go if we were invited and we would never even as like billionaires like find it within ourselves to be able to shell out for and so a lot of

our upcoming travels are exactly that like that part of our list. some of it like going to antarctica or the arctic is a really good example it's a very long journey a very expensive journey especially if you're going to do it with children and so that's one where we have to do it as the bucculous family while we can because we you know it's kind of the only way for us to do it what does that look like with kids like aren't don't you go from the tip of south america yes you're playing you either i mean usually into like chili or to our just Argentina, and then you jump on a boat there, and then they kind of take you around, like, Cape Horn. It's usually, like, at least, like, a 16-day passage there and back.

And that crazy waters. Yeah. And a lot of the, the majority of the boats won't allow. Some of them are, like, you need to be at least 16. We found a few that, like, you need to be at least, like, 11 years old. And then we found one that was willing to take a five-year-old. So, we go for it. But, you know, that'll be interesting.

And the kids are used to, you know, being in situations where there's most likely not any other children around you know and we have games and activities and we you know we make it fun for the whole family well have you read the book endurance garrett my two hobbies are ping pong and reading oh shoot there it is that's where you guys are not similar garrar's read two books in his lifetime so i will challenge you a ping pong though guys did you know did you know fun fact jessica wrote a book it's going to be my third book i ever read will be jessica's book is it out right now no it comes out next year oh that's amazing yeah all right we're doing another interview next year put on your calendar next year we're i'm running a book it's like a big like coffee

table 300 page everything you need to know about family travel uh with national geographic so super um yes can i get an advance copy i'm so proud of you guys so she started this book three years ago uh yeah she started it three years ago and she she she made it known from like the get-go she wanted this to be her project garrett just stay out of it and so i did until they showed us like the rough draft of it because they had taken everything she had written and kind of formatted it into the design and everything of this national geographic book when i saw it this like cheer mom stage mom just overcame me and now it's all i talk about and think about is i'm just so freaking proud of this book it's which i was so excited i really

enjoy writing and I I was so excited about the opportunity and I've really enjoyed the whole process. But now that like now that it's kind of about me, I'm like, shoot, what have I done? Like, because with social media and everything, like I always hide behind my kids and Garrett and I've been able to just kind of be this like just, you know, one of five. And now that this thing is about me, I feel really uncomfortable and, you know, promote like I'm not a self-promoting person. So now I'm like a little nervous for this really book release. next year. That's what you have us for.

We'll promote for you guys. I'm going to promote her so hard. She's going to be on like the today show and I'll be right behind the camera being like, you're doing great, baby. Wendy's most important deal of the day has a fresh lineup. Pick any two breakfast items for $4. New four-piece French toast sticks, bacon or sausage wrap, biscuit or English muffin sandwiches, small hot coffee, and more.

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That's awesome. Okay. So, because you're the Bucketless family, what, we're like, such a cliche question. I'm sure you've been asked this a million times. What are your, like, three favorite places you've ever been? And outside of Antarctica, where it's another place that you have yet to check off. My favorite places, I would say, are New Zealand, Rwanda, and Turkey are probably my top three. Wow.

Party. What are yours? Quality. I'll give you guys just my very favorite spot on the entire planet. It's off of the country of Tanzania in Zanzibar, but a very specific kind of heart-shaped island, very small, called Mimba. And the entire island has these 12 little huts on it. And it's the only way to be on the island. Like, you can't set foot on this island unless you're staying in one of these 12 little huts. And if you go to. this island on an odd year. So like, 2023 is an odd year. We're going there this summer. The last time we were there was two years ago, again on an odd year. And if you go there on an odd year, then the beaches will be covered in these baby sea turtles that are hatching and making their way to the ocean. And it's not you and hundreds of other people and it's roped off and all that. It's just you and nature and maybe a few other people that are with you on this island. And

they're making their way down the white sand into crystal clear waters here in Zanzibar. And in the water, there's bottlenose dolphins and humpback whales and whale sharks. It's just nature at its finest with very few humans. Oh, my gosh. I want to go there. I want to go there. And then next on our bucket list, try to think what's next on my bucket list. I want to swim in the wild with killer whales.

One of the best places to do that is in Norway where it's very, very cold and very pricey to go that far. And so I've been researching and trying to find other places to do it in perhaps warmer weather. But we'll see. Either way, that'll happen. Wow. And then I'm ready. You'll kind of notice we love wildlife. So a lot of our travels around wildlife. And I would love to see some panda bears.

so maybe China that would be incredible yeah you want to cuddle a panda bear I want to cuddle a panda bear okay do you guys ever stop and think about how beautiful this this place we live is oh my gosh that's insane we we had a little family church at home yesterday and that's what we talked about just this beautiful earth we've been given and especially when you go on we're going to safari we're doing safari pretty much all summer this year and uh when you see the circle of life at it's like it's it man I'm just so humbled and I get like teary just thinking about how beautiful this earth is this uh this little like home spiritual lesson yesterday on Sunday jessica asked each of the kids like close your eyes I want you to picture that you're somewhere anywhere on the planet it's a beautiful

moment now like open your eyes and explain this moment and our middle child manila was like I'm in the Maldives sitting on the beach eating a crepe and I was like who is this child But it was really sweet because Callie was like, I'm sitting, I'm in Tahiti and I'm in the ocean and I'm snorkeling and it was really cool. And he was explaining the different mantarays and animals they were seeing. You mentioned traveling to learn lessons from cultures around the world. I didn't preface this question. So to the best that you can, what would be three lessons? that you feel like you've gleaned from your travels.

One I think about was like very like right off the bat, right? We were traveling in Tonga and honestly it was like our first like real stop. And we were there. We were seeing the humpback whales. It was just an incredible experience. But every morning the boat leaps pretty early and there was one gym. One gym on the island. You know we like to work out.

So we wake up early, go to this gym and find out that it is locked. It's locked and it just doesn't open on time and it's a dollar a day. It's like the most janky, like, I don't know, like wooden, like, what was it? It was like. You were like pushing wheel barrels and I had like train wheels and just heavy chains. It was cool. It was the only gym on the island. And we went to the guy and we were like, hey, if you can open up later on in the day after we get back from the whales, we'll pay you 20 bucks a day.

Because the hours of this gym were from 9 a.m. until new. Yeah, the hours sucked. And anyway, it was a dollar a day. And the guy was like, no. I was like, dude, I'll give you $20 a day. That's like got to be your year salary. Yeah. No.

It was such like a, and it was like a no brainer to him. And I think right off the bat, we had that American mentality of like, don't you want to make money and don't you want more? Like, this is so easy. You can, you can have all this. If you did, you know, like that was such like a, yeah, an American like more, more, more type of mentality that we brought into it and realizing that this Tongan man was like. I want to go home and be with my family after 12 p.m. So no.

And I was like, wow, tushay, man. That was a good lesson to learn that not everybody thinks the way we think. That's awesome. I always just remember when we traveled to Turkey our first time. And like, I hate to even say it this way, but if you were to, like, go and ask a young American to, like, draw a picture of, like, what they think of when they think of, like, terrorists. When we landed in Turkey, like, that's the type of people that we were surrounded by.

And both of our moms on the flight to Turkey called us being like, we don't feel good about you being over there. We're really nervous. It was during, like, the coup over there. And there was just a lot of, like, bad stuff being said in the American news about Turkey. But fortunately, by this time, we had traveled to enough places that we realized most of the stereotypes you have going into a place are very wrong. And once you get to know the people there, they're just kind, wonderful people.

So we decided to do the same when we landed in Turkey. Let's give it at least 24 hours, feel it out, even though both of our moms back home are freaking out. And sure enough, Turkey, if we were to like make a list of just the sweetest, kindness, people that we've crossed around the entire world, Turkey would be at the very top of that list just the sweetest most kind people which just you know was a lesson for us forever not to judge any people by their reputation not to judge any book by its cover and um it also just put it turkey in a very special place in our hearts be knowing that they do have kind of this negative

reputation that entire part of the world and they just live with it you know and and they have to rise above it and be very forgiving the people who come with that stereotype and just be kind and welcoming until people can learn better. Dang. Those are two phenomenal lessons. My gosh. That's what I was saying, though, as we started to, like, see that the influence

that these travels were having on us and our kids, us together as a family, that as parents became very addicting, and we just wanted more and more of that for our family. Have you ever had, like, negative, like, hey, they stole our bags Or my grandpa went to Egypt and asked a guy to take a picture of him on a camel. And he took a picture and stole the camera and, you know, wanted however much money for it.

Oh, wow. Anyway, does that happen often? I think back to that same Tonga trip and we got on the plane and we arrived to Tonga. And they were like, oh, the plane was too heavy. So we took off clearly tourist luggage. and so I was like, you know, didn't have a bag for like three or four days or something like that. You know, like stuff like that, it just, it just happens. And unfortunately, America now has a really bad reputation.

And sometimes I'll admit, I'll tell people, I'm from Canada. Everybody likes comedians. So people will be like, where are you from? And I'm like, Canada. And they're like, I'm like, I'm like, yeah. But, yeah, so we've had to learn how. And actually, we love hearing how we're perceived, Americans are perceived, you know, and trying to hopefully be a good example of what, you know, Americans are all about and how, how, how, you know, the American dream and what we believe it, it means to us. So we've tried to be good examples and stewards of, of the American people.

It is pretty cool. Obviously, internet is complicated and there's pros and cons to it. But like, the fact that. we can see similarities and connect through similarities through Facebook groups or, you know, whatever it is with someone in Turkey and Africa and all over the place. It's like, it's pretty powerful to the, I just think what when I think of an Italian person, I don't like necessarily have stereotypes that are pre-populated. It's like, oh, I don't know. There's probably people over there that are interested. pasta as well as American football as well as, you know, it's just a guy who has different interests

like me, you know? Anyway, but did you like that? You do. It was okay. Okay. I want to hear about Buckalist Studios. Oh, man. All right. So Bucket Studios is our attempt in a way to, like, transition our family from a life of very heavily social media into something that might hopefully become more like long term and sustainable and not live and die based on social media and a lot of that is just and live and die on us and the kids you know a lot of it was like do I want my kids in the spotlight you know how and I'm sure you guys have had some other questions like

how is this going to affect my children there's just too many examples in Hollywood of like what happens to a young person when they have too much fame, too much success, too early. And so just with all those things considered, we came up with the idea to take our, but at the same time, we didn't want to take the Bucculus family that we've worked so hard to build as like a positive brand and message and just turn it off. And so the question was, how do we take that positive message that we want to share with the entire world and have it live beyond us? and the idea was to create a cartoon.

And so currently we have hired a team of 10, and we also did a really cool thing where we invited our bucketless community and audience around the world to chip in and be investors that will put in money for actual owners. We are proud of that party, remember? Yeah, and it was such an incredible thing. We had $10 million total from 30,000,

30,000 different investors around the world. Like you said, yourself is included, and it's 50 different countries are represented within that investor pool around the world. That's awesome. It's such a cool thing, right? And so now, now that puts the pressure and responsibility heavily on myself to create this into something truly special. I'm completely new to the world of entertainment and cartoon creation.

our team is now 10 that we've hired. And I'll tell you this, I've learned that there's a quick way that I could have done it. I could have outsourced to the right people and the cartoon could have been completed like a year ago. But it would be very surface level quality and just not very timeless. And if I had a commitment to one thing to our investors and people who believe in us, it would be that I'm going to do my very best to take the heart and soul that people have connected with the bucketless brand

and slow cook and bake that into this cartoon that'll be much more than just like a childish cartoon. What we don't want is somebody to just like put an iPad in front of their child and say zone out and just kind of binge on this Netflix. Instead, we want this to be like full family entertainment where people very mindfully like gather together, the family and friends, and watch this show that is life-changing messages, timeless, beautiful art, and really powerful music, all packed into one.

In order for me, especially as a rookie in this industry, to do that, it's just been a long, slow process. So there's a lot of people. I'll get messages every day of people being like, hey, I give you my money, and now, like, I see nothing of it. It's already been three years. and if they only knew that I'm just cranking away behind the scenes, like, tirelessly. But I just have to, like, know what I'm working on.

Stay patient while cranking away. I'll say this. It's going really well and it's going to be incredible. I'm going to make sure of it. But I honestly don't know if it'll come out in two years, three years, ten years. Like, I'm just going to keep working on it until it's perfect. That's one thing that we learned. from our travels that the world has greatly changed is you can go, say, into the mountains in

Switzerland, and you can see these towns that were so carefully designed and slowly built one stone at a time. And because of that effort up front, they get more beautiful with time, as opposed to, I mean, I grew up in Utah. And the place where I grew up in the mountains, when I grew up, there was like no homes. It was just us and our farmhouse. And now you go, and it's just hundreds and hundreds of homes, but they were built all over the last, like, few years. And I'm telling you, I don't want this to be the case, and I hope I'm wrong.

But my prediction is, because it was built so frivolously, it's going to fall just as fast. And that area of Utah won't be very valuable years down the road because of how quickly it was built. So what I'm trying to say is, with this cartoon, I'm trying to have that, like, Swiss builder's mindset and build it brick by brick so that it can last forever. Well, I'm willing to wait because I have full faith and confidence in you, Garrett.

So very excited to see how that turns out. Take your time with it, man. Don't rush a good thing. And also, in regards to, well, one, with the Dorothy issue of her choosing the ski trip. It is, it is, this is the, I guess the great conundrum of parenting where the goal is to raise a responsible, independent person

but that hurts so bad when all you want them to do is just be completely like it's endearing when my kid needs me, right? But dang. Yo, have you seen there's a movie, it's a popular movie, but I saw it for my first time on a flight the other day. Have you seen the movie Father of the Bride?

it's been a while dude been a while now that you have a daughter watch it and we can just cry together it is it's you so bad dude Garrett literally installed a basketball hoop in our driveway like right after you saw that movie

I was taking Drew to school today and she was just like I glanced back at her and she shot me the sweetest smile and I smiled back and I said what you're thinking about girl And she said, oh, I'm just thinking about God. And I was like, wow, really? She's like, yeah, I'm just talking to him.

And I was like, oh, my gosh, you are my favorite person on planet Earth. Oh, that's so sweet. Wait, so how old is she? She's only three. Yeah. Yeah. I don't think anyone's ever said that to her either, which was beautiful. But it's really special.

To close the loop on the kids in the spotlight, like, I would much rather have parents like you influencing culture and having family, like sharing your family experience and all these horrible stories, right? Like we've had conversations at length, still having conversations on a weekly basis about like how to navigate this. But like I think of the Spider-Man quote, with great power comes great responsibility. So it's like, you know, it's more of an onus on us to step up to the plate and raise responsible, you know, ethical, God-fearing children, I think, and have that be the priority. And for us to make our choices on a daily basis to be in line with that, so hopefully they can glean from experience as well as, like, explicit lessons. Well, and I think that's where both of our families really, I think have done an incredible job when it comes to,

social media like I always say I think you can put out good bad or nothing um and probably the normal person me would put out nothing but after like you said to who much is given much is required you know uh you it's better to put out good you know so to have two families one in Tennessee and one in Hawaii just putting out family and marriage yeah and love and kindness and you know adventure and service all the things you know like it's just I I feel like we're doing what we're meant to do right now. I think you guys just the same quote. He used the Spider-Man version.

You use the Bible version. Thank you. I don't know why I said Spider-Man for sure. It's the same quote. She just used the Bible version. You use the Spider-Man version. I connected with your version. Yeah, Spider-Man.

Yeah. He's spot on. Word for word. He got it right. The Spider-Man. Oh, gosh. Thanks, G. Well, truly.

We love you guys. We're so impressed. We just want to learn from you guys and hopefully make it to Hawaii to see you guys in person. Likewise. We're just nothing but supportive and admiration for everything you guys are putting out there.

So if you ever need anything from us, you let us know for sure. Yeah, no matter where... I do have one question. Oh, one more question. Yeah, hit us. We're just one question. Off the top of your head.

If we were to, like, if you say it, if we were to go, this summer somewhere and take our babies Maldives Manila let them answer I'll get my bad my bad I know anywhere in the world we'll do it How old your little boy Three and one

He'll be two in July I may answer but you gotta go first No you go I don't know I got think All right I'm gonna suggest that you guys go to Belize because it's outside the country You're getting a new culture Except everyone there speaks English They accept the dollar the drinking

water is clean, it's very kid-friendly, and then you're going to have like crystal clear water with cool wildlife, a bunch of sharks and turtles and everything. So you're getting like so much of the goodness, but you don't need to go like around the world to the Maldives or Bali for it. Okay, but if you do, my vote's going to be if you are ready to take a bigger step. Belize is a great one if you want to stay like, I mean, it's probably like a three or four hour flight for you guys. And the time zone is probably pretty close to you guys. If you do want to like go big, I would say Fiji. I think Fiji is hands down the most. family friendly place you'll go almost every place you'll go they literally have a nanny per child

so they'll like come to the dinner table and be like oh i'll take him and you can take her and uh no literally as soon as breakfast they'll come take your children and they love your children so much you can just see the way they hold them they will love them and then you know you can do as much with your kids or without your kids um water's beautiful ocean's beautiful and the people are just lovely. That was a good one. Yeah. I changed my house. You guys are such pros. Okay, we're doing both. Okay, I did both. Andrew, have you tried surfing before? I know how to surf. Not well. Sorry. Excuse me. I got up on a wakeboard my first time trying. I got up on like a wake surf. All the, I'm like like skiing even my first try water skiing. Surfing. Surfing took

so long. Dude, I'm telling you, I grew up doing all those board sports my entire life. Surfing is, I think that's why I'm addicted to it currently. It's the hardest thing I've ever done in my entire life. I love it, though. Nothing like a nice morning in the water. I want to just sit here for the next 10 hours, but we'll let you guys go. We have lots to talk about and catch up on. So, thanks for the time. Yeah, of course, guys.