The visions for this blog came together over time, but seemed to always have the most clarity when we were traveling together as a family. Trips we take with our kids- whether close by or far away, just for the weekend or for a full week- inevitably became our favorite memories from each year.
These trips led to one of the early visions for this blog, which was figuring out a way to give other families those same opportunities to travel together. The more we thought about how this could work, the more excited we got about the possibilities.
This brings me to our first big vision for this blog: Gifting travel to other families.
To make this work, Matt and I will be reaching out to hotels and resorts that we want to visit as a family, asking them to partner with the Making Home Here community and gift our same trip to another family. In return, we’ll do what we do anyways, and share all of our pictures and adventures from our stay and communicate through this blog and our social media channels everything there is to love about the hotel or resort.
This is largely affected by our size (bigger numbers = more exposure for the brands we work with), but we are already working to incorporate travel-related gifts on a smaller scale, as well as reaching out to hotels asking that they “take a risk” on working with us while we are still small. What I can promise these brands and our readers is that this vision is so important to us, and that we will be working hard to give positive exposure to brands who work with us now and will continue to work hard to grow to a point where hotels and resorts can’t wait to be the next location we visit. 🙂
The second vision we have for the Making Home Here community is sharing and creating opportunities for families to serve together. We will be partnering with charity organizations that we have vetted and will be offering opportunities for the Making Home Here community to give on top of what we are giving as a family. We want to take the stigma away from giving to charities and show not only how much FUN it is to give and get your kids behind a greater cause, but also to see how a family choosing to give their time, money and resources can positively impact others.
The organization we will be working with in 2019 was chosen four months ago and we are SO, so excited to share more about the work that this charity is doing to change lives and create safer living environments for families around the world. More on this in the coming weeks.
The third vision for Making Home Here is creating a community that encourages one another. I know blogging and influencing through social media is often viewed through a one-way lens where one person or family is elevated as the cool ones to follow, and that they seemingly have everything together because their feeds are flawless and their kids are always smiling. Sound familiar?! 😉
Well, while we understand that their is a science to growth and creating content that is relevant and appealing to the eye, we also want to be clear from the beginning that we are simply the face behind the Making Home Here name, and we want people to connect through the platforms we’ve created. If there are questions about parenting, marriage, faith, etc., we want to offer a place for those questions to be opened up to others. We’d love to use our channels to promote community and discussion, so along with hosting Q&A panels on the blog, we’ll also be opening up our Instagram and FB page to address common questions we all share. Because while there are plenty of things I enjoy writing about, I for sure do not have all the answers to all the questions.
So that’s it! That’s our vision for Making Home Here in a nutshell. You could say we’re a lifestyle blog with a focus on prioritizing family through travel, community and service. And if you’re here, you’re a part of the community. So, welcome! We hope you stick around and let us know who you are. We’ve love to connect with you! Leave a comment below and let us know how you found us.
