We had our first kiss as teenagers on the Field of Dreams, the land Marni grew up on, and have been dreaming about a future here together ever since.

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Marni's parents dreamed of owning land where her mom, Gwyn could own and ride horses and her dad, Rick could live out all his crazy dreams. They found and purchased the perfect piece of land and Gwyn enjoyed teaching Marni and her sister how to ride while Rick was coming up with far fetched plans for a water slide, zip-line, squash court and tree farm.

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Our relationship began in middle school at a community hall dance. We were lovers, best friends and then for a few years we went our separate ways, doing our own thing... Marni travelled around India and Nepal and Kevin embraced the young and free University life in Lethbridge.

But like magnets, we were drawn back together again. We rekindled our relationship as pen pals, once again dreaming of what we could create together.

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As a new couple we knew we worked well together. We started our own side hustle during University doing general labour jobs like painting, window cleaning, landscaping and even bouncing a high school party (which we were not so great at since the house almost burnt down under our supervision!). We loved working together every day. At the ripe age of 21 we moved into a Group Home for a year to parent (yes, we said parent!) 6 behaviourally challenging kids. If we could do that and still come out more in love, we felt we could do anything!

 

To say we deserved a break after the Group Home would be an understatement. We sold all our things, packed a backpack with essentials and took off travelling the word for a full year where we backpacked through 26 different countries. This trip had no end date and we didn't rule out the possibility of settling down in a foreign country. However family and The Field of Dreams called us back. We knew it was our home.

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What we had discovered over the year of travelling was how little we truly needed to be happy. Owning less made us experience more! We were on a mission to maintain that minimalistic lifestyle so when we returned home, we built a 290 square foot tiny-house on the Field of Dreams.

We were home!

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The Yurt has been an evolving idea ever since we were kids. 

It had many faces... a children's adventure camp, a beach front property in Thailand, a teepee, a bricks and mortar space in the heart of Cochrane, a big red barn and finally The Yurt!

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We bought and built The Yurt during Covid, an odd time to be spending all your money on a space for people to gather, right? However we knew that if it wasn't now, it would never happen. We followed our intuition, ready for our next adventure.

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We are so blessed to live on this land with Marni's mother, Gwyn and now share it with others. We have always had an open door policy, which was a philosophy of Gwyn's that was entrenched in Marni from a young age.

 

We know that now, more than ever our community needs to connect.

We cannot wait to create opportunities to gather, heal and grow together. 

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Much love,

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Marni and Kevin