Teenagers alone in NYC!

How did Avalon and Largo become so close?

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What made our kids best friends?

This past weekend our teens, Avalon and Largo were in NYC together without us for 4 days. They took over the WorldTowning Instagram feed with their adventures (I made a highlight on IG so you can still see it) and as a result, many of you commented or reached out via email or PM. The consistent theme from your responses was “wow, she is 18 and he is 15 and they have such a tight bond. How did you do this?” The second most consistent theme was, “how are they capable of navigating NYC alone at such a young age?” These were mostly from our new community members as the rest of you have seen the progression of our life and can deduce how this came to be. But many who live a stationary life are amazed that Avalon and Largo are in NYC alone and without fear from them or us. Today I am going to share how this all came to be. Happy to have you here. 

Let’s begin with why they were in NYC. You have heard us talk about how we don’t do gifts for holidays, instead, we opt for making memories over buying stuff. We started this when we lived a stationary life just before we took off for our WorldTowning full-time travel life and it was a GREAT decision. Steal it! You won’t regret it. Usually, the gift involves a family adventure. Some past gifts have been sailing lessons in Malta, a hot air balloon ride in Portugal, sleeping in a treehouse in the USA, a night in the Ice Hotel in Sweden, Gondolier lessons in Italy, and much more. This year in Colombia we were going to ride a boat down the Amazon for 4 days, but both teens were exhausted from a tough semester and it was clear they needed recharge time at home (aka the boat) so we skipped it. Will and I had to scramble a bit to figure out how we could make a family adventure happen in a short time. We ultimately settled on a weekend in NYC just the two of them.

Were we concerned about them navigating NYC without adult supervision? There is definitely a whole newsletter that needs to be dedicated to the education, trust, and confidence we place in our children, but the short version I will share today. They have been practicing life, travel, and independence with our light supervision from a very young age. They have also been to NYC with us numerous times so they have a good bag of street smarts. “Smell that, that is a weed, don’t take it from anyone.” “Don’t stand close to the platform in the subway.” “Don’t walk down empty streets after dark.” We started all these conversations as young as age 5, yes, even the weed recognition. As for their ability to plan their itinerary, check into a hotel, budget, etc. Again, we have been practicing this with them for over a decade. We let them plan many adventures and had frank conversations about budget and how we can’t do it all…so one must choose, how to take advantage of discounts, proper hotel etiquette, etc. Will and I felt they now had the skill set required for NYC so we set them free.

Were we scared they were in NYC alone? Absolutely not, not even a little. I was in France/Spain during their visit with limited wifi, slept like a baby, hung with friends, built a new trip (coming soon) and caught most of their actions on the IG stories because I refused to micromanage or parent. They are capable and they needed to know we believed in them. Will feels exactly the same way, never a worry at all.

Now that you have all the backstory and fears put aside let’s talk about their bond. Many of you were surprised that they would want to be on spring break together in NYC, especially now that Avalon is an 18-year-old university student. Well, they are tight, best friends and they have missed each other a lot. So how did this happen? I am not going to take credit for their relationship, they have worked on it, but I will tell you what Will and I did to set the stage and how they ran with it.

In no particular order, the following are part of our family culture which we believe contributed to their deep friendship.

Family first
When we lived a stationary life we always stated family first, but it was hard to follow through with all of us being ships passing in the night. There were sleepovers, playdates, activities, social obligations, and much more, we did our best but we knew we had room for growth once we started full-time travel. During our first year of travel we had very few friends (thanks Heather) as a result of our need to survive, but also to create the foundation of the family bond before we added friends (the roof). In homeschooling you are supposed to deschool for a month for each year your kid was in a traditional setting, basically shedding that skin and preparing yourself for the next chapter. We did our own version of de-life(ing) in that we put all of our energy into us, the travel life, and deepening our family bond. Once we moved to Ecuador we started cultivating friends, but even to this day, our family comes before anything else.

Open Communication
This is big, huge, the key to it all. We talk about our feelings, A LOT! It has made all the difference in our relationships. We share if someone in the family has hurt our feelings, we share if we are upset, and we share if we are happy. And we all listen. We resolve conflict, say we are sorry, and rinse and repeat going on 8+ years now. It worked! We are not perfect and we just went through a spell where we had some buried emotions, but we have the toolbox to fix communication issues now, it is our secret sauce and something we have placed great importance on with the kids for current and future relationships.

No seeking out of peer groups or hubs
Their social has always been focused on being around good people they like. We have never encouraged or placed any importance on being around people of the same gender, age, and/or nationality. As a result of our travel life, there is never “well, he is your little brother, does he need to come” which often manifests when we age, gender or nationality separate. However, if someone is the same gender or age and there is a friend connection, we do not dismiss it, it is just not what we actively seek out in online peer groups.

We also don’t do hubs or co-working/living/educating communities with other families, but we do travel with friends that are made through other avenues. These hubs and co-living spaces do bring value to families for a variety of reasons and if it works for you then by all means continue. We are not attracted to them because they separate into close age groups, families only, and often people from a very similar income range, plus they inadvertently omit the local community as a place for new friends and cultural learning because they are already grouped off. Once we start separating by adults, kids, westerners, middle class, etc we find ourselves back in the group atmosphere from our traditional life and all the negatives associated with it which in turn affects the sibling relationship.

Team AvaLar
As they got older, we embraced the “us against them” culture. I know it sounds weird but hear me out. It was important to us they had their own things that were just for the two of them and not us. They had a secret language that we did not understand, French. They had adventures out in the cities we passed through, first, it was just dinner and a movie and then they graduated to 15-hour days alone in Paris. They had airplane trips they took together, and we stayed behind. We gave them problems to solve that we refused to help with where they could only depend on each other. And the big “team AvaLar” move we made was that we stopped treating them like kids very early on in their life. They could rely on each other which gave us peace when they ventured out into the world, but also strengthened their bond. There was no curfew if they were together as long as we had regular check-ins. Not only did this make them closer, but it also taught them the value of teamwork.

Sharing
We made them share even when it was not necessary. If we had two cookies, they split one. If we had one ticket for an event, one watched the first half and the other the second. Up until we moved on to the boat they even shared a bedroom and bathroom. There were many situations where we could afford to buy them both their “own” something, but we chose to make them share. Not only did this teach them about money, but it taught them about the value of sharing and caring about each other.

Fighting
Up until about 5 months before Avalon left for university they were still fighting when doing the dishes. If we were in a marina this would be the time Will and I would take our nightly walk. When they were little we taught them how to fight fair and honor each other’s emotions, once they got older we just left them to resolve their own issues together. In turn, it made them understand each other’s emotions, triggers, etc and created a stronger bond between them. I am going to guess there was probably not one fight on their NYC trip, but a lot of negotiating terms.

Tech restrictions
We restricted tech considerably. It was a bit of a different world even 8 years ago when we started, but the tech was still prominent. I will do a whole post on why we restricted tech and how we think it was one of our best parenting decisions. Don’t worry, we have some bad decisions too, maybe another post when I want to go down regret lane. We basically focused on human connect over the cyber connection until around age 14/15. As teenagers, we have dropped the reigns as they need to learn to navigate life in a social media world, but until then we were strict: no pads, no phones, no social platforms, only 1 movie a week (not network tv), and more. As a result, it allowed them to form a deep connection with each other and with other kids, we met along the way. Tech and the abuse of it is one of my soapbox platforms. Hold off as long as you can and then hold off longer. You will be grateful.

Life of extremes
We live a very extreme life and they often needed to be able to depend on each other because their lives (and often ours) depended on it. You can’t cross an ocean with a family of fragmented relationships, or you might end up with a person overboard or making stupid mistakes because of emotional turmoil. We have not always been on the boat, but we have been stuck in a ravine in Turkey, robbed in Belgium and in an RV fire in Spain. Each of these incidents and many more resulted in them stepping up to the plate to help, but also being there for each other emotionally which in turn strengthened their bond.

They did it
I have shared some of the parenting decisions we think contributed to their bond, but the most important point is that they have put in the time for the relationship and our lifestyle choice has contributed to them having the luxury of that time. They fight like any other siblings, but they know how to resolve with kindness and honor each other to go on and have a healthy relationship. I am amazed at their emotional intelligence within their relationship with each other, friends beyond the family and us. We never set out to hone emotional intelligence, but it has become prominent in our home in the last 5 years and I am grateful we were able to work on this with the kids before they launched.

I don’t think there is a crystal ball or a checkbox list to parenting and creating strong bonds between your kids. Every family is different with their unique set of needs and personalities. However, making them work together on physically hard things, intellectually hard things, and emotions will surely be a step in the right direction. I hope what has worked for us brings value to your family. My best suggestion would be to start today, no matter how young your children are, it is never too early to nurture that family bond.

Thank you for joining us this week. What have you done in your parenting that has strengthened your kids relationship? Please share. We can learn so much from each other.

xoxo,
Jessica

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Goodbye Morocco. I bit bitter sweet if you read this newsletter. I am already missing this majestic place and our AMAZING group of travelers! Wow, were they fabulous. This is our final Morocco group trip vlog, it is time to get back to the boat and our life on the water. We hope you enjoy a virtual trip to the Sahara with us. Spoiler, the camel could not fit in the van.

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Where are we now?

In a hotel in Panama City waiting for Largo to get back from his NYC adventure with Avalon. The boat is in a marina on the other side of the country and we’ll be back tonight. We leave on Friday for the next big adventure! Eeek!

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To learn more about us, our mission, and our business you can visit us at WorldTowning. To view our most recent group trip offerings head on over to WorldTowningvoyages.com. If you are interested in booking a coaching session to realize your travel dream, schedule it here. If you want to follow the travels of our WorldTowning family, you can find us on YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok