Planning Your Family Vacation

One of the hardest parts of planning a trip is deciding where you want to go. Let’s face it, this is a make it or break it decision. Sometimes the “Wouldn’t it be cool…” vacations do not end up being the right fit for your family. Or a vacation that the Smith family loved ends up being the worst possible vacation for yours. With such small amounts of travel time we allow ourselves and the fact that no trees around my house are sprouting money, each vacation has to count.

So you know you want to take a trip and you know you want to take it at a certain time, now where do you even begin to start the planning process?  It’s all in the questions…

For me, planning involves asking myself certain questions and finding the best answers that fit our family. Every question I ask myself lets me narrow down my selections. Here are some questions that go through my brain when choosing where to go (Or rather, these are the questions that keep me up late at night when I’m planning a trip):

Budget wise, what kind of vacation do we want to take?

I break our family travel down into 4 categories: Europe, an island destination, stay somewhere in the US I need to fly to, or somewhere we can drive. Those categories may change as the kids get older but for now that’s where we’re at. We did Portugal one year and Greece two years later and both were amazing memorable vacations but the price tag attached to them are also something we can’t forget. Island vacations can vary greatly on price so it is important to pick the right one for your budget. Depending on where you live in the US may sway your decision, as well as how much you enjoy driving. For me, the thought of being confined to a car as we drive 24 hours to, say, Florida, is about as pleasant as getting a root canal (If you’re reading this…mommy loves you girls!) But some people actually enjoy driving so they have the freedom to make some cool stops along the way.

How much time do we have for the trip?

How much time my husband can travel away from work and the girls’ school schedule will also affect where we go. If he can only commit to 5 nights somewhere then Europe is out. In fact, I personally think if I don’t have at least 10 days then Europe is out. It costs way too much money to fly us all out there to not see enough of the country. If we only have a week, then do we want to drive somewhere or do we fly and use the travel time we’ve saved on extra vacation time.

Who is going on this trip?

If the girls and I are going on vacation without my husband, I feel like I have less destination choices. I like to keep it safe and easy when I travel with them. I don’t want to worry about driving places (again…not a car person), don’t want to lug around a bunch of suitcases, and don’t want to rent a house. Location of where we’re staying also plays a huge part in where we go. If my husband was with us I wouldn’t mind driving to attractions but if it’s just us then I would rather be in a central area close to what we want to do. Also, my girls and I could be happy spending multiple days on a beach where my husband gets antsy after 2 days and needs to go exploring.

Does this destination seem kid friendly?

There are some places that look absolutely amazing but do not scream “Kids Welcome!” Machu Picchu is on my Travel Bucket List but I’m not going to drag my 7 and 9 year-olds through the Amazon forest in the dark to catch the sunrise from the ruins. (But how amazing does that sound??)

After I’ve asked all these questions I usually have some ideas running through my head. I can picture us driving across some European country or see us flying onto some tropical island. Now where do we go from here? Read on in Narrowing Down My Choice to get tips on how to choose the perfect destination.