by EMILY ORTON

Between writing, pitching, and marketing, Erik and I have been working to bring the stories in Seven at Sea to you for two years.  I’m not sure which was harder, living on a sailboat as a family or co-writing the book about it.

One day, I noticed an unusual chart my sister-in-law had taped to her refrigerator.  It was a grid of squares.  Each square was coded with different colored stripes.  She told me, “Each square represents a year of my life.  These squares are the years before I had children.  These squares are the years my children will be home full time.  These squares show school days.  These squares show the kids moving out.”

Brilliant!  If you were enjoying parenting one day, you could see at a glance how short and precious your time together was.  If not…well, you knew when it would end. There were decades before and several decades after in which to make all kinds of other choices. I made my own grid not knowing precisely what life would bring, but knowing that it would surely come to an end

by EMILY Orton

Erik and I were listening to this podcast on our way from Germany to France. We learned that the ancient Greeks measured time in two different ways and used two different words—chronos and kairos.  Chronos is time measured in seconds, minutes and days.  Kairos is time measured in meaningful experiences—moments that shift our paradigm, open our eyes, touch our hearts, and deepen our relationships. 

by EMILY ORTON

Erik worked with a musical called, Children of Eden, and in one of the most poignant songs Father says this about his children, “the hardest part of love is the letting go.” That’s true.

by EMILY ORTON

Pompeii –You Don’t Know, What You Don’t Know 

Since grade school I’ve heard about how Mt. Vesuvius covered nearby Pompeii in ash and rubble, killing the inhabitants and preserving the city as a time capsule of average Roman life circa 79 A.D.  The question I had, but never raised my hand to ask was, “What did they expect, living at the base of a volcano?”   

by EMILY ORTON

THINGS RARELY GO ACCORDING TO PLAN.  

We left Helsinki for Athens thinking we’d be sailing the Greek Isles by morning.  Instead we got to spend nine days near Athens while our friend’s boat, Wicked, got some electrical upgrade love.

We’re traveling with digital nomads, John and Michelle, and their four kids, one dog and one cat.  We met when both our families were sailing in the Caribbean. 

Note - Everyone has different family travel highlights. Eli’s would be that day I surprised him with a bottle of Mountain Dew. These are some of mine.