When Alfred and I first booked our plane tickets to Barcelona, we had just found out that Alfred got a job offer in Virginia – we started looking for somewhere to vacation to celebrate, and happened to stumble upon some amazingly priced airfare to Spain! Over the course of a day we decided to book it & enjoy our first international vacation together just the two of us. And then, two weeks later, we found out we were pregnant!

Our dreams of wine tastings by day & crazy adventures by night turned into a babymoon / honeymoon – and I was totally ok that with that! Well, I may have missed the wine a little, but the amazing food definitely made up for it.

We rented a condo through Airbnb (my favorite way of experiencing new cities) in a quiet part of town, and took the Metro all around the city. It was absolutely fabulous! Every morning we would go to a new bakery, where they had almost any kind of coffee you could imagine, and all kinds of delicious croissants and baked goods.

Our first day in the city we took a tapas tour with a local guide, who showed us some amazing little hole in the wall restaurants and really helped us set up ideas for food for our entire visit! And let’s be real, trying all of the local cuisine was basically our number one priority.

Throughout the rest of the week we visited the Picasso Museum (one of my favorite parts of the trip!), walked the Ramblas, visited the Boqueria, walked around Park Guell, visited the Arc de Triomf, and of course did a little shopping. Even though we did a ton of walking, we also hit the beach a few days and tried to relax during our trip.

The last day of our trip, I convinced Alfred to go to the beach for sunrise portraits – and I am so glad we did! We set up a tripod to get couples shots (and we definitely had some audience members watching us run back and forth from the camera), and Alfred took some amazing maternity portraits for me. I can’t believe how much progress he has made as a photographer,

Traveling can be hard; taking time off of work, figuring out where to go and what to do, and of course a big factor is the money. But Alfred and I have promised to make it a priority in our lives to not push off what we want to do or where we want to go, and instead to integrate it into our lives. ‘There will always be time – after work slows down, or after we have kids, or when we retire’ can be so easy to say year after year and guess what – it’s almost never true! There will never be the perfect time. We could have so easily cancelled our trip after we found out I was pregnant, but instead we turned it into a baby moon. So I encourage you, in whatever stage of life you may be in, to just go after what you want. Whether you want to travel more often, start your own business, slow down in work to focus on family, or even do something as simple as taking a mental health day for yourself – just do it. Go after it. You are truly in control of your own life, and every day that you push forward in making your dreams become a reality is a day well spent. There is no one-size-fits-all approach to success, and success looks completely different to all of us. Our trip to Barcelona may have only lasted a week, but it has set up our marriage and our adult lives with a foundation of following through with what we want and exploring the unknown with each other, hand in hand. And I think that is going to last a lifetime.

While we were traveling I had the idea to start a new Travel Guide section on the blog, where I give my top tips & recommendations for cities that I have visited! There will be a whole blog post on Barcelona where I give the details on my favorite restaurants, must-see places, and top travel tips in the city, so if you are ever looking to go there be sure to look out for it!

xo Kirby