Today marks the fifth year anniversary of the day we began our trip around the world.

On March 4th, 2005, we stepped off a plane in Buenos Aires, Argentina with one-way tickets in our hands. We were brand new to traveling, and in many ways it felt like we were brand new to living. We had no way of knowing what adventures, joys, and challenges our traveling life would bring us. Hell, we didn't even know that we'd end up traveling for 18 months instead of the intended 12 months.

We always share our experiences from traveling, both during our round-the-world trip and our travels since then. But we haven't shared as much about how our life has changed otherwise in these past five years.

We've discovered we're no longer city people. Now we live on the shores of Cape Cod, in a tiny cottage that was once a fishing shack. We're slowly sloughing off our city-tendencies and we're no longer as suspicious when someone we meet in our town makes conversation by asking whereabouts we live in the village.

We adopted our dog from an elephant sanctuary in Thailand. We volunteer dozens of hours each week for the same elephant sanctuary. I tutor English at the library while trying to write the next great American novel. Tim telecommutes to his job in Philadelphia. We explore the sandy lanes and secret beaches of Cape Cod just as we would in another land.

We try to live our lives with intent, being thankful for each day, and aware of our choices. We walk down to the water every day to say goodnight. We see shooting stars weekly.

We love cooking together. We've discovered some of our best ideas come while cooking and wearing our aprons from Laos, usually covered in flour from a never-ending battle with making our own dough. Summer means barbecues while sitting outside on the deck and winter brings homemade soups made while cozy inside.

Now that we live in a little cottage with a yard, we enjoy gardening in the spring and summer. We have killed remarkably few plants thus far. In the summer, we wake up near sunrise so we can have cups of tea outside before starting our work days.

We try to remember to not take our families and our friends for granted, particularly because we live so far away from most everyone. We're thrilled when friends visit us, and we're making an effort to visit them more often too.

We're getting better at remembering everyone's birthdays and anniversaries. Thanksgiving is spent with Tim's family and Christmas is spent with mine. We even managed to mail a few holiday cards last year.

We're still thrifty, like we had to be before our trip, preferring to cook at home instead of going out to eat. We don't own a television or cell phones. But we're remembering that every now and again going to the movies in your own country can be fun too.

We got married just the way we always wanted. Just the two of us with a Justice of the Peace, on a deserted beach with the waves lapping at our feet.

And we're happy. So incredibly happy. To the point that when friends ask how we are doing, we'll sometimes downplay how happy we actually are.

So much can change over five years. So many dreams can be dreamt and realized. So many goals can be set and accomplished. So much love and happiness can be given and received.

When we stepped off that plane in the Buenos Aires airport we had no idea how our lives would change, how travel would change us. We had no idea the experiences we would have, the friendships we would make, and the memories we would create during our trip. We had no idea how much a hold traveling would take over us, how it would become our passion.

And we had no idea that traveling would help us become the people we were always meant to be.