We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Krista Landis. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Krista below.
Krista, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Going back to the beginning – how did you come up with the idea in the first place?
For as long as I can remember I’ve loved to travel. The first trip I can recall I was 3 years old and we had flown cross country to visit family. Somehow those memories are seared into my brain and I can still vividly remember the color of my grandmother’s couch, the layout of her house, the beautiful park we would walk to near her home & how cute her little town was. Later, as I got older traveling to visit family & friends across the country & many long road trips became a norm that I looked forward to. When I was 17 I had the opportunity to travel on my first international trip. I flew to England and spent 3 weeks traveling around to multiple cities, 3 days spent in London and an overnight in Toronto Canada. I felt like the world had been placed at my feet and my mind was opened to a whole new appreciation for travel. At 18 & 19 I spent several weeks visiting several destinations in British Columbia & Alberta Canada, and at 19 I flew to Mexico where I spent 3 weeks traveling around Mexico City & surrounding areas. Each of those locations left lasting impressions and opened my eyes to how vast the world really is. One of the most important lessons I learned was that other cultures have so much they can impart and teach me & reveal deep insights into their culture, lifestyle, and their unique way of doing things that I might otherwise have never learned or experienced. Having an inside glimpse into how they think, live, what their daily lives look like, our cultural differences & similarities reminds me that we all have more in common than we probably realize. Especially when we really take the time to understand one another.
As a type A, organizer & natural planner I have loved researching, planning and arranging travel itineraries since I was 19, but I didn’t really get the opportunity to fully take the reigns until I began planning trips with my hubby and kiddos about 13 years ago. What started as wonderful little getaways with my hubby, day trips & extended weekend itineraries or long family road trips & cross country travels as a family eventually branched into extended weekend girls trips/getaways and most recently several longer family trips & girls trips, including several lengthier getaways & multiple international trips. Through these experiences I discovered how much I enjoy creating customized itineraries, hunting for hidden gems and unique locations, researching unknown destinations and places off the beaten path (tucked away from the crowds) and finding the best spots that provide a glimpse into the everyday lifestyle of locals. Those are usually the places that interest me and my travel companions the most, leave lasting impressions and create the best memories.
Over the past decade I’ve been asked countless times for recommendations, my travel lists, destination information and for my insights about locations we’ve visited by friends, family, Instagram pals & numerous strangers who’ve landed on my Instagram or Facebook pages and want the inside scoop. After doing hours and hours of research to provide friends, acquaintences & strangers with travel tips & recommendations it dawned on me that others could benefit from having access to my research & a well thought out travel itinerary too. So, I decided to take a risk and shift the focus of my Instagram page, (that had been primarily about our family homeschool adventures, and switched to being travel & lifestyle focused) and created a website & blog dedicated to my travels, adventures and experiences.
I started the website in February of 2024 as a one stop shop for anyone that wishes to learn more about my travels and for those that wish to inquire about my insights on destinations & locations I’ve visited. Now anyone can find one of my itineraries or check out the blog & read my travel insights, information about my experiences and other travel related information. Currently there are several full itineraries (of the exact trip I planned & went on. These include photos, recommendations, insights and lots of tips!) available for purchase. Dozens more will be added over the next year as I update the site with other itineraries, travel guides, packing lists, travel essential guides and other travel related info etc.. It has been very exciting to rearrange and update old itineraries & create new itineraries to share, compile my essentials lists and travel guides and to share my experiences with everyone. :)
Since begining on this journey only a few months ago, I have had the joy of assisting & lending travel advice to many who were in need of planning assistance/advice and tips for arranging their travels. I recently learned that a trip I researched, helped purchase tickets for, provided travel advice, guides and helped with arrangements for a trip to Uganda (somewhere I’ve never been…haha) went perfectly. The travel party shared that they were so grateful for my help & their trip was successful due to my advice & assistence. I absolutely love to hear that everything went smoothly and that all the insights I gave and time planning/organizing really helped their trip to be a success. :)
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
Hello everyone! I was born and raised in Oregon and have been traveling since I was a baby. As long as I can remember I’ve been traveling cross-country to visit family, exploring the natural wonders and camping around Oregon and Washington & going on long road trips. When I was 10 we spent 6 weeks on a cross-country road trip and I had my first experience with international travel when I was 17 years old. That instilled a love of adventure, exploration and an appreciation for the vast and diverse beauty of our planet. The thrill of discovering something new, finding a hidden gem or a new favorite destination, wandering through small towns or taking a walk in nature have always been so invigorating and exciting for me and I love to share that passion for adventure with others.
My website/blog & Instagram accounts aim to highlight the unique activities I find and destinations I visit in hopes to inspire you’re own adventures. My goal is to create easy to use travel guides & itineraries to help minimize your stress while planning for a getaway. Each of my itineraries are created with the mindset that they’re a road map to adventure, with moveable pieces that are not set in stone. With plenty of choices and interchangeable options available that anyone can use as a guide (or starting point) and customize based on their preferences. Other services I provide are personal travel planning & consultations, full or partial itinerary planning and organization, arranging a portion of your trip or complete travel planning from start to finish. My goal is to reduce your stress & anxiety associated with travel planning/prep, to help you gain back your valuable time and make your perfect dream trip a (affordable) reality!
We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.
Not long into my first year of marriage (with my ex husband) I learned that I had been deceived by his charm and lies. The mask that he had hid behind came off and his true nature was revealed. I had been manipulated by a master manipulator. Just a year into our marriage I discovered I was pregnant with my first child and tried desperately to hold it all together but he began revealing his true colors. Deep down I knew something wasn’t right about him and an acute awareness stirred within me that something was wrong with him and the way he treated me. Especially after my daughter was born. However, because I was raised with the belief that marriage is forever and my ex was a master at manipulation, coercion and mind games, I stayed. For years I endured verbal, emotional, social, financial and psychological abuse, neglect and other types of abuse and control. By the time my son was born 3 years later he (my ex) was using everything in his power to control me, he used coercion & gaslighting tactics to make me believe that I was imagining things and feel like I was crazy, and he always twisted the truth and used smear campaigns to paint the picture that he wanted others to believe about me. For over a decade I lived in silence about the continual physical, emotional, psychological, verbal, financial, social and spiritual abuse that I endured. He had also been physically, emotionally and verbally abusing my children for years, but sadly I didn’t know the extent of it (until after the kids and I fled).
After months of planning & only a short window of time to escape, my children and I were able to flee and finally leave our abuser. We fled to another city and lived in hiding for almost 2 years. During that time my divorce was finalized, the fog & clouds of chaos we’d been living under lifted and I realized I had lived through hell for 11 years of my life. When I escaped I was a shell of my former self and completely petrified. I had no idea how I was going to handle being both mother and father to my children, how I would afford childcare for them & where I would find a job. At the time we fled I was a full time SAHM & full time college student. Prior to leaving I’d basically been raising the kids on my own while my ex would disappear for multiple days weekly when he was out partying, drinking or feeding his drug addiction. When we left I had no idea how I would raise the kids now that I truly was by myself. No clue where to begin to pick up the pieces of our shattered lives. Life as we knew it had been ripped out from under us and I had no idea what lied ahead of us. The only thing I was certain of was that the horrendous life and traumas we had just escaped from was not going to dictate our future. I clung to the hope of a life filled with joy & adventure and even though I didn’t know what the future held I believed that I had been given an opportunity to reshape and create a life filled with joy, peace, love and happy memories & I wasn’t going to waste a moment of it.
Life has thrown me all sorts of curve balls, major unexpected twists and turns over the past 2 decades and through it all I’ve learned I am way more capable & resilient than I ever imagined I’d need to be. While I was married to my ex he drug me through a short sale of our home (and later I would end up having my name tied to a foreclosure of another home, even after our divorce….). Due to his alcohol and drug addictions I lived in near poverty for a time because he stole money out of my accounts. He destroyed my credit by wracking up huge bills and living by the philosophy that it was perfectly normal to have the mindset that “robbing Peter to pay Paul” is a healthy way to view money & debt. Because he controlled the finances, had so many addictions, made horrible money choices and took zero accountability for them I wound up stuck with a bankruptcy that destroyed my credit (and took 7 years to recover from!). At the time it was so demoralizing and embarrassing, but I survived and can honestly look back in hindsight knowing that each of those traumas were entirely due to my exes abuse, manipulations and control of all the finances. I thank God that wasn’t the end of my story and that God had a redemption plan far greater than I could have imagined.
Shortly after the kids and I escaped we began the long journey of healing from the traumas we had endured. During this time I was reacquainted with a long time family friend and what began as a friendship turned into a beautiful love story. One filled with redemption, hope, joy and so many amazing adventures! Brad and I were married 11+ years ago and he immediately stepped into the role as husband & father and raised my children as his own. Together we’ve walked through many trials (literally…so many court battles with my ex and other obstacles), horrendous court custody battles for my children, devastating betrayals by fake friends and immediate family (who’ve chosen to support & side with our abuser), deaths of loved ones, illnesses etc. but through it all we’ve grown closer, stronger and more in love than ever.
When I think about the past it often feels like a story that belongs to someone else instead of being a portion of my own. I’m so thankful that I never gave up and trusted God to lead me during the chaos & storms or when things were difficult. God guided me out of the rubble and turned it into something beautiful. My life now is full of things I enjoy, people I dearly love and plenty of adventure. Just as I always hoped it would be!
Have you ever had to pivot?
Over the course of the past 11+ years my husband Brad and I have had the goal to do everything we can to make up for lost time (from the traumatic years) before we were a family. To spend as much time as possible adventuring and exploring together & making a lifetime worth of memories. To fill our love tanks with endless happy memories, time with loved ones and out in nature, hiking, visiting new cities & states, and traveling as much as we’re able. Due to a long drawn out (and very expensive) court custody case we had to be creative with our travels. However, I was determined to rewrite our story. I would not allow my ex to steal any more time or opportunities from us.
Brad and I decided that I would homeschool the kids in 2014. That summer we planned a lengthy cross country trip to the East Coast where we spent 2 weeks (15 days) visiting family and sightseeing in several states. I worked hard to find unique budget friendly destinations and researched wonderful locations easily acessible as well as free activites & sights. What began as a fun family trip easily became a unique opportunity for hands on learning. While we were in Washington DC & Williamsburg Virginia we visited multiple historical locations, and the kids were able to have first hand accounts of all the locations and things they would be studying about that year in history and I was able to witness their delight and enjoyment of seeing destinations they had previously read about. It was the perfect way to glide into our homeschooling life. We referred back to our travels often during the first year, especially the significant historical destinations we visited. It was so neat to see the sparkle in my childrens eyes when they recalled interesting facts, details and special memories of our time in many of those places. That is just one of many reasons we have loved our homeschooling journey.
Other adventures took us exploring around our home state, Oregon, up north to our neighboring state of Washington or south to California. Some of our travels were very short weekend getaways or quick day trips. Other times we were blessed to take the kids on long road trips and other cross-country travels to visit family and see some of the beautiful locations in our amazing country. Our most recent family adventure was a 16 day cross-country road trip where we flew from Oregon to Florida and road tripped our way up to Boston, Massachusetts before flying back home to Oregon. It was an epic adventure and we’re so thankful we were able to make those memories together.
This school year (2024-2025) will mark a decade of homeschooling for our family (daughter graduated in 2022 and son will graduate in 2025) and then I will officially be done. It’s so hard to believe the time has passed so quickly! Homeschooling has been a Godsend for our family as it allowed us to create so many incredible opportunities as a family to take our studies outside of a “traditional” classroom, and make everyday activities & adventures part of the learning process. We’ve loved the freedom and flexibility that homeschooling has provided that’s enabled us to travel frequently throughout a typical school year and bypass the typical “school break” busier travel times. Having the freedom to travel whenever we want has really enabled us to get out more often and benefited us in so many ways such as saving a ton & visiting popular destinations without crowds because we’re able to avoid the busy travel seasons.
During the beginning of 2020 I had purchased an incredible 2 week trip for the 4 of us to Maui for less than $400! We had booked our flights, an amazing 3 bedroom condo on the beach and our rental car for $396 total! Unfortunately the c-19 virus squashed all those plans and we were unable to make that trip work. Thankfully our flights were reimbursed so we were able to plan a few other trips instead. In June of 2020 we took the kids on a 12 day road trip from Oregon to Idaho, Montana & Wyoming. We visited some family, went to Glacier National Park, Yellowstone & Grand Teton National Parks, visited tons of natural history sites, majestic mountains and waterfalls, saw lots of wildlife and enjoyed wonderful time together making priceless memories. In the fall we spent a week visiting Seattle, Mount Rainier National Park & Mount St. Helens National Monument along with other sites. While we were there huge wildfires spread across the West Coast and rendered the air toxic and unsafe. One afternoon we found ourselves stuck in our hotel room trying to avoid the smoke. We were disappointed that our day exploring Mount St. Helens had been foiled but we were trying to make the best of it. I decided while we were sitting there watching “Rocky” re-runs that I would start a new Instagram page to track our travels, adventures and homeschool life. I had no idea how long things would last through the pandemic but I wanted somewhere to document it. During this time so many people reached out with questions about homeschooling and what a typical day looked like and what kinds of activities could be counted as enrichment, how did we travel as a homeschooling family etc. So, initially I created my page to be a place where I could answer those questions, document some of our travels & typical homeschool days, show some of the benefits of homeschooling and spread some encouragement and hope.
It was September of 2020 when I created my Instagram page to showcase our family travels, adventures and homeschool life since so many families were begining to homeschool for the first time due to C-19. Over the years I’ve enjoyed sharing our homeschool journey, our adventures, time exploring out in nature and our daily lives. However, in the past 2 years (as my kids have aged, one graduated and the other will in 2025) my page has shifted from being primarily homeschool focused to more travel & adventure content. I love to share my passion for adventure, our family outings, hikes, days out in nature, unique hidden gems around Oregon, fascinating discoveries & beautiful dreamy destinations with my audience. I’m so thankful to have a platform where I’m able to share my experiences, travels & special memories and hopefully inspire others to get out and create some of their own <3
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.stampsinmypassport.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stampsinmypassport1/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/stampsinmypassport1/
- Other: Email: [email protected]
Image Credits
*Cover Photo & Green dress (I’m holding my passport)- Photo credits: Erica Miller owner of https://www.ericamiller.photography/