Finding Our Way Through the Wild
It all begins with an idea.
My daughter was born in the spring of 2020, in a world that had suddenly closed in on itself. Every moment of early parenthood felt both tender and heavy with the weight of the unknown. Like so many others navigating motherhood during that time, I was searching for something steady, something to ground us when everything else felt uncertain.
For me, that was the forest.
Nature had always been my refuge growing up—a place where I could breathe deeply, where the world felt stabilizing instead of overwhelming. So when life became a series of unknowns, it only made sense to return to what I knew. Eleven days after she was born, we packed her up and hit the trail for the first time. It was a short hike, a slow one, but it was a beginning. And from there, we just kept going.
Her first year wasn’t marked by monthly milestone blankets or posed photoshoots. Instead, we saw her grow in the rhythm of the forest—the trails beneath us, the trees overhead, the quiet sense of time moving forward. She was always snug against her dad in the carrier, taking it all in as we hiked together.
Some days, the hikes were about adventure. Other days, they were about survival. A way to step outside of the stress, the exhaustion, the isolation that came with raising a baby in a world that felt like it had stopped spinning. The trees were steady when I felt unsteady. The open air gave us space when the walls at home felt confining. The rhythm of walking—one foot in front of the other—became its own kind of meditation, a reminder that forward motion, no matter how slow, was still movement.
Looking back at those early months, I see now that what we were really doing was laying a foundation—for all of us. For a childhood spent outdoors, for a connection to nature that would grow alongside her. And for us, as new parents finding our way, those hikes were proof that even in the hardest seasons, something as simple as being outside can give you exactly what you need to keep going.
Now, five years later, the forest is still where we return. It’s where she runs ahead on the trail, where she collects acorns and spots birds, where she reminds me to slow down and notice the little things. It’s where we find our rhythm as a family.
And it all started with that first step, eleven days in.