does your family vacation?

[TheGreenBee]

I take the kids to the lake every year for a week and then just before Christmas we go to Mexico as a family. We love it. We ate hoping to do Disney sometime soon too. Probably not this year but maybe in 2013. This year it looks like there is a possibility that DH and I may take our first vacation without kids this year. It happens to be our tenth wedding anniversary and we have friends getting married on the Mayan Riviera in November just 6 weeks after our anniversary. Coincidentally we took our honeymoon 6 weeks after we were married to attend the wedding of one of my BFFs (I was in the wedding) so it would be kind of a nice way to spend our tenth anniversary. The only major thing is we do our family trip the first or second week of December so we would get home and literally do laundry and turn around and head back to Mexico.......not that I'm complaining. LOL.

[TheGreenBee]

Oh and I want to add, because the OP mentions memories. As a child I got to do some pretty fantastic vacations, but my best best best memories were of camping trips, summers at the lake, weekends camping in the back yard. The ones that were focused on just being together.

The Mexico vacations are really more for the husband and I. I honestly do t expect the kids to remember them as the best vacations they had. It is a yearly fun vacation sure, but the best ones are picking rocks, roasting marshmallows by the fire while wrapped in a blanket. Nights at the drive in, watching fireworks while sitting in a lawn chair in the back of the truck, hiking up waterfalls and looking at plants and picking berries, digging through fossil beds looking for signs of like from a million years ago, standing under the spray or a waterfall, riding gondolas up a mountain, feeding the tame prairie dogs in the national park. Clam digging during low tide on the beach, walking the beach and throwing back starfish and sand dollars to make a difference.

Anyway, I could go on for days but THOSE are the memories that stand out most. Some happened on summer vacations, some happened on impromptu weekend trips, some happened a thousand miles from home, some in my own backyard.

It isn't about where you go, you can make memories anywhere.

[harmoni247]

Of course you can make memories anywhere, but picking up and going somewhere beyond your backyard will still expose you to new people and environments and expand your view of the world a little more. We don't plan fancy vacations by any means, we camp EVERYWHERE we go, I'm not saying vacations have to cost a lot to make memories, but I do think getting outside of your hometown adds something new and exciting to the memory, does that make sense?

FWIW, I never had vacations as a kid (I stayed in the state and visited family if that counts). But I do feel like I missed out. I had only seen 4 states up until I was 17 (IL, MO, WI, IN). Only on of those trips was a vacation (camping). At 17, I went on my own vacations (with school and church) to completely different areas. It was a completely different experience than just doing fun things in the neighborhood. I don't know why, but it was different. Perhaps I am biased because I didn't get the typical family road trip vacations as a kid?

[redsonja]

Vacations are very important to us. We try to find things in the off season, to save money. Like we went to Mallorca in the off season for hardly anything and it was an awesome vacation because we were just together playing.

[alinatmom]

We usually try to do something and usually do it for free with our cc rewards(yea boo but we have never carried a balance and have done a cruise and Disney for free) since we moved away from family other then those 2 trips the rest of our vacation time is spent seeing them which is not a vacation. We spent the last 4 yes in Maine which was like an extended vacation since we were so close to the coast. So any of you mamas who are thinking of going there it is beautiful ( just go in the summer or early fall)

[OurAllenBaby]

We do some big and some small vacations. Our goal is to do a big one every couple years.

One year we did a week in myrtle beach (college...fun times!). Then our honeymoon we went to a resort in the Dominican Republic. Last year we went to the Biltmore Estate in Asheville, NC which was a 3 day mini vacation since it is almost local to us. We also did a week on the Outerbanks last year. Most years don't get 2 vacations.....most get none!

We often pay for our vacation and it's spending money with our tax refund.

[TheGreenBee]

Originally Posted by OurAllenBaby We do some big and some small vacations. Our goal is to do a big one every couple years. One year we did a week in myrtle beach (college...fun times!). Then our honeymoon we went to a resort in the Dominican Republic. Last year we went to the Biltmore Estate in Asheville, NC which was a 3 day mini vacation since it is almost local to us. We also did a week on the Outerbanks last year. Most years don't get 2 vacations.....most get none! We often pay for our vacation and it's spending money with our tax refund.

The Biltmore is on my bucket list.

[Brooke789]

Originally Posted by TheGreenBee The Biltmore is on my bucket list.

We have a season pass this year!