Drum roll please – Versatile Blogger Award Nominations

Great news! We got nominated for the Versatile Blogger Award.

So what does this mean? Well our blogging friends over at Simply Travelled thought we had a snazzy site wanted to give us a shout out. Thanks guys! Kim and Rob were actually the first people to be featured in the bi-montly My Story series and you can read their story here. Kim is from USA and Rob is from Australia, which are two of our favorite countries. They run an awesome site and I’ve been reading it a lot as we are traveling to a lot of the places they have recently been in Southeast Asia.

To go along with the Versatile Blogger Award we are:

• writing this post and thanking our nominator
• sharing 7 things of interest about ourselves
• nominating 5-10 other blogs who are out there working away to acknowledge them and give them a shout out on social media

Alright, I know some of you long timers have been following along with us from the beginning, let’s see if you know these things about us.

1. Chris and I each travel with 3/4 t-shirts. Somehow even after all this time, once we’ve left home and unpack our bag overseas we realize we each have 2 of the 4 shirts of the same color. So then becomes an endless cycle of trying to alter which shirt each wear each day. Sometimes our rule is whoever wakes up first gets to call color they want to wear for the day.
2. Being 6’2 Chris can hike really fast up hills. Being 5’4 Tiff can hike really fast down hills. Chris also had ACL surgery on his knee, so although he can power up a hill and be there ages before Tiff, Tiff can race down a hill should there ever be a need to do that. It’s just one more area where we always feel we are the ying and yang for each other.
3. Tiff and Chris both love reading. When we are living in what we call ‘domestic life,’ ie, living and working somewhere and we have a library card, we always go to the library. Chris is very straightforward and logical in his book reading process. He will pick out 2-3 books at time, read one and then start another. Despite her best efforts, Tiff loses all self-control in the library and grabs so many books she has to make multiple trips to the counter and thus creates a mini tower of books. She will go home and flip through all the pages of the books and then pick different ones up and down, usually finishing about 75% of the books she gets out. She is also notorious for renewing books the maximum amount of time allowed and giving donations to the library to make up for guilty feelings of always returning books late. Shout out to all librarians and particularly Anne who always left me the nicest voice messages ever every time she needed to remind me my books were overdue… again. Support your local library!
4. Tiff used to be a horse trainer. She grew up thinking her life calling would be to be a horse trainer. A trip to Wyoming and getting a slight grasp on how big the world is altered that path. But she still loves horses and when going on long bus journeys, still stares out the window day dreaming that she is galloping on a horse across the country side.
5. Tiff taught Chris how to drive a standard 5-speed car. When they were just a young couple back in college, in a big empty parking lot in Buffalo, NY, they lurched around while Chris figured out how to shift the clutch. It was Tiff’s first car, a maroon Toyota Tercel, 2 door, 5 speed little car that she loved, put leopard pattern car seat covers on and fondly called her car Alberta. Anyone else ever name their car?
6. Whenever we meet people traveling, a fairly common question is if we went to university. Tiff goes on about how she went to school for Art and it was the best thing ever. She feels like she uses her degree every day with creativity and problem solving. Then they look over at Chris who says, “Criminal Justice.” This often causes a laugh out loud response as people are like what the heck did you study criminal justice for?! Then Chris will explain how he thought he wanted to be a state trooper, retire after 20 years and then travel. But after him and Tiff moved out to Arizona together and then to Colorado, that plan changed. We both decided it was better to travel while we’re young and healthy and thus the Vagabond Way was born.
7. Chris is a very big sports fan. Like very big. He can talk and talk and talk and talk about sports all day. When big games are happening we have to plan our travels around finding a place to watch the superbowl or world cup. Tiff on the other hand does not watch sports and just chooses her favorite team based on which mascot she likes best.
   

   Going to Buffalo Bills game with my sister and her husband. That was Tiff’s first game ever.

Our nominees for the Versatile Blogger Award are:

Lisa Bömkes is a 21 year-old girl from Germany behind Travellana. She’s an enthusiastic explorer of our planet but primarily, a student at University of the Ruhr, Bochum, where she studies English and American Studies as well as Media Studies.

Life in Our Van showcases Catherine, Richard, Lottie and Libby traveling across Europe by motervan. Pretty impressive! They’ve got some awesome family adventures in there. Their site is positive and uplifting. Mad props guys!

Kelly and Sean of A Pair of Passports work full time but are on a mission to travel around the UK in 80 weekends – with pup in tow! Just another way to show all the different ways travel is possible.

I go Where you Go is about Katherine who is figuring out how to balance work and travel. She is a millennial blogging about all things travel, work and relationships.

Kat is behind Kat is Traveling and has made the move to Australia. There is some great posts on Australia on her site so have a look.

Jessica from A Southern Traveler has a beautiful site where she shows how she has been traveling for years, loves art and works in marketing.

Blogging is a lot of work and trying to find your way in a busy internet world can feel like an uphill battle some days. Participating in this award led to meeting a lot of other great bloggers out there every day, doing the work. Blogging, whether on the professional level or the hobby level can be a great outlet for creativity and expressing oneself. So if you are looking to get into blogging, go for it! Maybe you’ll be in the next round of the Versatile Blogger Award. 🙂

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[And you know, if you do need help Nomadic Matt runs a great travel blogging course that you can check out!]

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