Conversations with Faith Prindle

Today we’d like to introduce you to Faith Prindle.

Hi Faith, please kick things off for us with an introduction to yourself and your story.
After having my fourth baby, I was really struggling with the blues & knew something needed to change. My husband ( of 12 years) Jared and I were exhausted. I felt stuck inside and like getting out of the house with 4 young kids was mission impossible. I was in desperate need of fresh air and a mindset change. So one day we decided to start exploring. My husband strapped the toddler to his back and I put the month old baby on mine. We grabbed the bigger kids and some snacks, and decided we’d start exploring our hometown of Kansas City. We Actually started by searching for hikes and waterfalls!

I started documenting the cool places we were finding partly as a family scrapbook & partly because I knew If I grew up in KC and didn’t know about these places then a lot of others must be the same way.

That’s how @explorekc.withme was born. Part survival, part adventure, and driven by the desire to reconnect as a family, start to feel like myself again, get fresh air, and explore KC.

What I didn’t expect was how much there was to KC I never knew! We started stumbling on hidden gem parks, whimsical walking trails, local businesses & creators, and colorful play spaces that made our kids’ eyes light up. They would get so excited about each new park as if I took them to Disney or something. I started sharing all of these places we would find on Instagram not to build a following at first, but simply to document our journey and share with others. (I honestly didn’t even realize other pages were doing the same thing and had been for years… Apparently I was living under a rock!)

But then something clicked.

These outings were doing more than helping us stretch our legs. They were helping us laugh again. Talk more. Connect. So I started dreaming up ways to make each park visit even more meaningful and fun.

That’s when I created our Kansas City PARKS Bucket List Adventure Book: It is a book full of 24 iconic KC parks including a park guide, coloring pages, scavenger hunts we created, photo challenges and more for each park.

We’re really proud of it and have been loving seeing other families out using theirs and having a blast with it too! As of right now the KC Activity book is only available on Amazon.com but should be in some local play cafes and shops soon too which is really exciting!

Now, we are continuing to explore as a family and are making some really great friends along the way too! I share all about kid friendly, family fun, date night and all kinds of hidden KC gems from around the Kansas City area on my Instagram page!

Recently, 3 other creator friends ( @kccoolmom @kc.mom.adventures @kansascitywithemily) and I saw a need for a place for moms to find community so we started “Moms Meet KC”. We had our first event this summer and almost 50 moms + their kids came! It really was incredible. I love being able to help bridge that gap. I’ve been in lonely seasons of motherhood with no friends before.

I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
I definitely go through seasons where I don’t want to go anywhere or do anything still . We are a homeschool family and while I love all of the extra time I have to go find these cool KC gems it can be hard to find family & school balance along with it. I also didn’t realize actually how much work it is! As far as publishing a book.. I definitely learned a lot through that and most of it the hard way. But MAN am I proud of myself! The growth of @explorekc.withme over the last year since starting our adventures makes the things I’ve been learning the hard way worth it.

Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
I started out as a portrait and wedding photographer years ago but after having my children the desire to continue much of that faded. I still do a little bit on the side but I’m now a full time stay at home mom. I homeschool our 4 children and I absolutely love spending so much time with them (but definitely am a better mama and wife when I have breaks too!). @explorekc.withme has allowed us to get to do a lot of amazing things and go to some really fun places that otherwise we wouldn’t be able to do! I’ve always loved arts & crafts since I was little so The PARKS Bucket List Adventure book just kind of made sense. I really had fun creating each of the coloring pages of the parks and the scavenger hunts at each location. My kiddos helped all along the way too which is just so special.

What were you like growing up?
As a little girl I was very quiet and shy. I loved anything artsy, loved the outdoors, and loved Jesus (none of those things have changed!) But its pretty funny looking back now at how shy and insecure I was and now I’m making content in hotdog costumes or doing other silly stuff in front of a camera that 100s of thousands of people are watching. And I don’t care one bit! I really just love having fun and making people laugh. I hope all of this will help my kids with building their confidence. Part of our book includes family connection questions and journaling spots in order to encourage families to really connect and build each other up in that way. I’m working toward my kids being confident in who they were created to be! And of course we include a joke to tell on the way to each park because we really love laughing together too.

Pricing:

• Kansas City Parks Bucket List Adventure Book – $14.99

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/explorekc.withme/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61561675555238
• Other: https://amzn.to/3JgjRds