Vacation Plans!

I have been in vacation planning mode for 2015 lately. I recently made reservations for one week in the Poconos in early January. Part of that time will be a getaway for Paul and I. Not counting hospital stays, it will be the first time Paul and I have had a night without kids in 6 1/2 years. We love our kids dearly, but we are really looking forward to our getaway! We have been talking about doing something like this since 2011 (for our 10th anniversary), and we actually made reservations once (but had to cancel them due to illness on the part of those who were going to take care of our kids), but hopefully it will really happen this time! We also will take the kids up there for a few days to enjoy the indoor swimming pool and also we're going to spend one day at an indoor water park because I found a deal where we can buy 4 tickets for $79 (Oliver will be free) which is much cheaper than the usual admission prices. We haven't been to that water park since 2009 when I was pregnant with Ian, and Nadia was only 13 months old so she wasn't able to do much that time. We might go skiing one day. We shall see.

For a couple of months I've been looking into different options for our summer vacation. First I was leaning toward southern California, but Paul felt it wasn't a good idea due to #1 Oliver probably wouldn't fare well on that long of a flight and #2 Ian wouldn't adjust well to the 3 hour time change. Then I had settled on a resort in Puerto Rico and had done research on a rain forest and two forts to visit, but Paul said he thought we should just return to Orlando again because that was probably what the kids would like best at this age. Hopefully some day we'll make it to California and Puerto Rico, but for now it seems like we'll be making our fifth trip to Florida in five years. We went to the beach once with my parents when Ian was an infant and have been to Orlando the past three years.

Last night I paid for a week in Orlando at the same resort we went to the past two summers. I looked into several other options, including the resort we stayed at in 2011 with my parents and Wendy's family, but in the end we decided the kids would probably be happiest at the same one. I got a 2 bedroom unit for us and an efficiency for Paul's parents. Ian told me that he wanted to drive down with Grandma and Pop Pop so it looks like Paul and I will have a very easy flight as we'll only have Oliver with us! I am going to use credit card points to buy our three airline tickets so those will be free, and Paul's parents will drive our van down so we won't need to pay for a rental car. We buy groceries once we're down there so that we only need to buy food from a restaurant once a day. Since Paul won't be teaching this summer, we decided to stay down there longer, and so this morning I booked 2 two bedroom units (one for Paul's parents and one for us) on New Smyrna Beach (Daytona Beach area). Before we buy the airline tickets we'll have to decide exactly how long we're going to stay down there, but we could stay up to 14 nights total if we wanted to between the two resorts. I am sure Paul will want to take the kids to the Kennedy Space Center during our beach week. Boy was I shocked when I saw the admission prices to that place!

Part of the reason I made the reservations this week is because this week in December every year they do a special where you get an extra week for "free" when you buy a getaway. Since I bought four getaways this week, it means we received four "free" weeks. The weeks really aren't free, but they cost at the most $30 a night, which is very reasonable! I would like to use one of the weeks to spend a week in Williamsburg, VA. We've been studying Jamestown and Williamsburg and such this year, and I think Nadia and Ian would really enjoy touring those sites. Plus we could spend a day at Virginia Beach or visit some other sights while we were down there in addition to enjoying the swimming pool at the resort. With these "free" weeks you can't make your reservations more than 59 days in advance, but we are thinking we'd probably go in June or August. We'll drive down and buy groceries so we can eat two meals a day in our unit; it will be a very inexpensive vacation! I know some are very critical about time shares, but I absolutely love mine! I also am thinking that to break up our drive down there we could stop and tour Luray Caverns, which would be a very new experience for the kids.

To be honest, I am more excited about that week in Virginia than I am Disney World again, but I know the kids love going to Disney. We went to Sea World in 2011 and 2013, but we didn't go there this past summer so I want to go there again. They are doing some special things this summer to celebrate their 50th anniversary. The first two times we went we used free tickets from credit card points so I am hoping to have enough points to get those tickets again in addition to using the points for the airfare. I don't know a way to get free tickets to Disney though. We haven't been to Epcot or Animal Kingdom yet. In 2011 we only did Sea World. In 2013 we spent a day at Sea World and a day at Magic Kingdom. Last summer we spent a day at Magic Kingdom and Hollywood Studios. The kids are already lobbying to do both of those parks again in 2015. We shall see if I think we adults have the energy to spend three days at amusement parks with a 2, 5, and 6 year old. At least Oliver will still be young enough that we won't have to buy him any tickets!

The first 10 years of marriage Paul and I never vacationed in the same place twice. We went to Mexico, St. Lucia, Aruba, St. Maarten, France, England, China, Spain, Italy, St. Thomas, Antigua, etc. There are SO many places I want to take the kids eventually (Boston, Niagra Falls, Grand Canyon, Petrified Forest, Mexico, Puerto Rico, California, England, Canada, etc.) so it feels strange to keep returning to Florida so many times in a row, but they certainly do love it at this age, and we hopefully will be able to take them to many other different places in the future. Some people have teased me that I should have been a travel agent, and I will say I do enjoy planning vacations! It's also a delight to be able to take vacations with our parents. It gives the kids a lot more time with them than they typically get. We've invited my parents to join us in Williamsburg, if they would like, and Paul's parents are planning on coming to Florida again.