Mom With A Map

Name: Mom With A Map
Address: Charlotte, NC, US
Telephone: +17047500475
Price range: Not Applicable

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Mom With A Map

The website, MomWithAMap.com, shares tips and adventures of traveling with family. We promote family I look forward to sharing our journey!

After 8 years of telling the tales and tips of our family travel, I’ve decided to start this website in the hopes of inspiring others to travel with their family. Our adventures have produced laughs, tears, speeding tickets, an entire closet full of suitcases, and above all- amazing memories.

08/18/2026

Lighthouse Retreat 17
Emerald Isle, North Carolina
July 11th - 18th, 2026

Recently I was asked to reflect on our week at Lighthouse and finish the sentence "I Lighthouse because..."

Here is what I shared: "I Lighthouse because having a front row seat to watch God work will always be the highlight of my year. As volunteers we help families create memories that will last a lifetime.

We love big and recklessly. We serve right up to the brink of awkwardness. We dance and laugh tirelessly. And we leave with our own cups overflowing.

At Lighthouse there is a tangible presence of joy, hope and of God Himself."

**For context: Lighthouse serves families living with childhood cancer by providing a week-long seaside respite. Each week provides deep rest, relational connection, great laughter, and palpable kindness. The families never receive a bill and the goal of the week is for families to leave retreats restored with memories that will last a lifetime.

Without a doubt, Lighthouse is our family's favorite week of every year (and this year we're insanely blessed to get to serve on two retreats!) If you'd be interested in learning more, I'd love to chat with you about getting involved. It's hard to believe, but Lighthouse is already planning for the 2027 season!

08/17/2026

First Day of School
August 17th, 2026

Mary Grace: First day at The U
Miller: First day of 8th Grade

08/14/2026

This past week we moved Mary Grace to Coral Gables, Florida to officially begin her time at the University of Miami (AKA "U Miami" or "The U")

Everyone, including my social media algorithms, had me fully prepared to fall apart. But I have to admit, it was so much easier than I expected. There's truly nothing like watching your kiddo step into a life that they've spent so many years praying for, dreaming of and earning!

I am completely confident that Mary Grace's next years will be filled with so much happiness. All week the school administration kept encouraging the kids to say 'yes' to as much as possible over the next few years. Knowing our kid, Brent and I kept looking at her and saying "please say no to some opportunities!" She is 100% likely to overcommit and thrive doing it, but we hope she'll leave some space for fun AND maybe a visit or two home!

A couple of takeaways from our time on campus:
• Miller found the soft serve ice cream machine in the dining hall and now he's ready to go to college.
• If you thought Brent Bowlin was a die-hard Vol...you should hear him cheer for Miami. We truly could not be more proud to be part of the 'Canes family!
• Cruise-ship move in is amazing, in theory. It does require everyone following directions, and I'm not sure that was the case on our move-in day.
• Mary Grace has a water view. My little boat girl felt right at home!

We are praying BIG things for this season of life!

08/13/2026

Happy 19th birthday Mary Grace!
It's been a crazy week celebrating our girl in the midst of moving her to Miami.

We're praying BIG things for this year-
it's going to be the best one yet!

07/28/2026

Right after the 4th of July, for the first (and last) time Mary Grace and Miller actually got to go to church camp together! Our church switched to a FUGE Camp. The younger kids did mostly camp-like activities, while the older HS kids did community service / mission work every day. Apparently it was very physically demanding, hard work in the heat but Mary Grace loved it!

On the other hand, a highlight of camp for Miller was creating a late night candy store with his roommate in the dorms. Their first night was so successful selling some small snacks they'd brought to camp with them (granola bars and Nerd gummy clusters) that they figured out how to stock their store for subsequent nights. The two of them made a lot of money. 🤣🤣

I was horrified hearing how Miller spent his week at church camp...but thankfully I was hearing the story from our paster's wife and her son was the other child involved. Miller also decided to donate all his profits to FUGE before I arrived to pick him up, so it was hard to be mad.

Junk food sales aside, we are SO thankful for our incredible church community and how much they prioritize the different youth programs!

07/27/2026

The last couple of weeks of June are a total blur. We all worked hard and played even harder. Except maybe Miller, who just played a lot. He's testing my limits on exactly how many sports I can handle at one time.

We spent a ton of time on the water including a fun day out on boats with friends; a couple of days at Pink Shell Resort to celebrate Father's Day; several sunset wakeboarding runs; High School friend lake house trip (Sarah); teaching sailing at Edison's Summer Camp (Mary Grace); and being a camper at sailing camp (Miller!)

Not pictured: If we were at home during these weeks, the World Cup was on TV.

07/24/2026

The second week of summer belonged to Miller...at least in pictures!

He spent a few days with his cousins in Georgia at Wakeboard camp and played in his first round of Junior PGA golf of the summer.

Mary Grace has a not-so-secret love of having the house to herself, so she was in heaven this particular week! She reports that she slept in past noon everyday, read an obscene amount of books, went to the beach with friends, and baked a ton!

Brent and I managed to squeeze in a date night which is sort of turning into a joke in this season of life. It's not uncommon for both kids to have plans at night...so by default we find that it's just the two of us at dinner. It's actually more rare these days for all four of us to have dinner together- but we did, at least once, this week (Miller and Brent grilled for us!)

07/23/2026

Miller's trip to the lake coincided with a busy travel week for Brent so Mary Grace and I leaned into the opportunity for a girly week!

We got a jump start on college shopping, took the boat out for several sunset cruises, climbed at the gym a lot, binged a season of Gilmore Girls, got our cars detailed (so Brent would think we did something productive), and ate all of our favorite food. It was truly the perfect way to kick off summer!

07/22/2026

I'm to the point in summer where I would give absolutely anything to rewind and do it all over again. Luckily, although I can't actually get a do-over, I haven't posted much about our summer so I'm going to try to get some recaps done over the next week or two.

Week 1: Miller took his first solo flight, learned how to wakesurf, and spent an epic week with his bestie, Rex. The boys started every morning spearfishing in Lake Burton (?) and did plenty of cannonballs off of the dock roof. Based on the pictures and stories, it was the quintessential summer week at the lake filled with laughter and late nights. Oh, and Miller arrived back in Fort Myers just in time for his friend, Landon's, birthday party!

Big thank you to our friends Cinda and Mark for making it the MOST FUN week for Miller! Rex and Miller cooked this up and we had a lot of logistic to make this happen (including Mark unexpectedly having to navigate Delta lines and security without precheck privileges at the ATL airport)...but I'm so thankful we all said yes and made 2 boys very happy!

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Charlotte, NC

Telephone

+17047500475

Website

http://www.momwithamap.com/

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