baby bunching vacation

Traveling with children is always a bit tricky. Traveling with your Baby Bunch--especially early on--involves some serious fancy footwork and may leave you needing a vacation from your "vacation." Certainly there are times grandmas need visiting for extra hugs and people get married or die so it necessitates some kind of travel, but really if you can avoid "vacation" with your little bunch, I'd advise you wait until your youngest is about two years old.

Vacationing/traveling with your younger bunch means strollers, carseats (plural), travel cribs, toys, bottles, and so much more gear than you can possibly imagine. Not to mention sleepless nights and tired kids.

We just returned from our first REAL vacation with our kids since, well, I had both kids. The last vacation we took was a trip to Syria (daring Americans that we are....Alex was 10 months and I was five months pregnant). After that we've done some visiting of relatives here and there and took one weekend away to the mountains. But no real vacation since winter of 2005. (Minus two international moves where family came close to throwing us out of the house.)

Why is it that we've not ventured to Disney or the beach before? Well, it's because of our little 'bunch.' Up until about six months ago no one was willing to sleep in an unfamiliar bed, and we were exhausted from even on overnight trip.

I know a few Baby Bunchers who have braved international trips to Europe and even done the whole African safari gig. Unless it was fully paid for by someone other than me and my parents came with us, I would never try this adventure. Not because I don't want to go, but because I don't want to go with my kids! But more power to those who have done it and succeeded.

The reason for this post was our most recent vacation to the Outer Banks (North Carolina). We went with another family, obviously enough another Baby Bunching mom. Her kids are the same age as mine (16 months apart), but she braved it all by having her third 2 years after the first. So there we all were. It was a great vacation for us. My kids loved the beach and it was by far the easiest trip I could imagine. No muss no fuss. Minus the sand everywhere. But my friend, God love her, had a one- year old to contend with--even an even keeled one. But babies still needed bottles, snacks, naps, bedtime routines, places to roam, (in a not so baby friendly house), stroller, high chair, etc. And she was a GOOD baby!

My idea of vacation, since I had kids, has certainly changed. Once upon a time vacation meant sightseeing until I could see no more, walking/hiking until my legs ached, drinking until I couldn't stand and eating until no more food would fit. Vacation was all about the "anti-everyday." And so it goes. Vacationing with children is a bit different, as you probably know and we've altered our expectations. We do more low-key things that can be quickly abandoned when necessary. We eat at family friendly food facililties like.....places that serve chicken nuggets and have high chairs. Did I really say that? So it's really a balance of break for us/break for the kids. Fun for them/fun for us. Vacationing with a two year old and eight-month old.....not fun for anyone. Please, please let someone contradict! 

Our week-long trip to the beach was wonderful. Would I have done it two years ago with a one year old and a two and a half year old? No way! Vacation time will come. Spending money to travel and stay for two under two is hard. If you don't have to, don't. But I'd love to hear the vacation stories if you have them.

Comments

[Carri]

My children are 19 months apart and we travel quite a bit with them. They each took their first flight before they were 2 months old. Most of our early trips with 2 were to visit family, which were not too bad. We went to California when they were 3yo and 18mo...that was probably our first 'vacation'...and we survived...ha ha. My suggestion is to stay at a timeshare or rent a house. VRBO.com and homeaway.com are great sites for finding places to stay...and it's usually the same or even cheaper than a hotel. This gives you a larger space, separate bedrooms, a full kitchen, laundry, etc. Also, you can call ahead to most hotels and ask them to 'babyproof' your room. This might just be them plugging up the outlets, but it's one less thing to do yourself.

[feener]

we went to Colorado for a family reunion (from NJ) and my girls were ...3 and 1, the nights sucked ass up until the last night and the days we spend a lot of time driving around for naps.

[Cara Fox]

Necessity has forced us to continue to travel throughout our bunching years because our family is scattered all over the country. In addition, we have braved Disney twice (once with grandparents reinforcements) and also the beach a couple of times. Also, last summer we embarked on a grand adventure where we lived in California for half the summer due to my husband's work and then spent a week in Mexico, followed by a trip to Houston to see my parents. My kids travel pretty well (not to say that we haven't had our moments!) We did, however, put a travel moratorium on holidays - people came to us for a for years because traveling with a baby and a toddler at Thanksgiving and Christmas was just too hard. We have actually found that if we have to travel with our bunch, we prefer to drive if possible. Not only is it cheaper, we have better control over our schedules (can take breaks we we need to and also avoid delays due to external circumstances). Plus we can pack everything we need to make our lives easier, rather than try to cram basic necessities into two suitcases.

Having said all that, we have definitely changed the WAY we vacation. No more international trips (with the exception of Mexico that one time). No more stays at resorts unless they are SUPER kid friendly. No more wandering aimlessly exploring the city, leisurely shopping, long dinners, late night bar hopping, etc. etc. To do all that, we have to plan a getaway without the kids. Which we have managed to do only once in our Baby Bunching years. We are hoping to do it again this spring...

[Casey]

I can totally relate to this. Our kids are almost sixteen months (they're four months and twenty months). We are pretty strict with our scheduling and our kids won't sleep in unfamiliar beds either. My family lives locally but they get mad when we skip get togethers because of the kid's schedules. We've unintentionally waged war with my husband's family for refusing to travel across country until they're a little older.

It's nice to see that there's hope in the future for going somewhere as a family. I don't want my kids to grow up too fast, but I'll also enjoy it when we can actually leave the house for more than a two hour window!

[Ellen]

I think a realistic expectation is important to have when going on vacation that some scheduling will be different than home. However, knowing how being off routine disrupts the lives of our little people and therefore our lives as well, then a cognizant effort to maintain the skeleton of the schedul is important.
I have gone on vaca with my not yet 2 and not yet 1 year old and experienced kids who slept through every night and took their naps. My kids are well regimented in their sleeping schedule thanks to the book, "Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child." Dr. Weissbluth is the author and rocks.

[AmyS]

Since both sets of parents live no more than an hour from us and we go to the beach with my family every year, we have been fortunate that we haven't had to travel a lot. Two years ago when my boys were 10 mo. and 2 1/2, my husband got assigned a client in Deep Creek Lake, Maryland. He was going to be gone for one week at the beginning of the summer and two weeks at the tail end. I was dreading it. At the last minute, I decided that the boys and I would go. We would have to pay practically nothing to upgrade to a bigger room. The car ride there (roughly 4 hours with a stop at the in-laws to drop off the dog) was uneventful. It was dark when we got there ,but the boys managed to go to sleep right away. One in the Thomas inflata-bed and the other in the pack and play. The room was a loft with a very narrow, skinny, spiral staircase leading to the "bedroom". Even though we brough baby gates, the boys figured out how to climb up "the death trap" as my husband and I called it. we had a great view of the lake and the place where we were staying at had a small, manageable beach. While my husband was at his client, I packed up the double stroller with all our gear and headed to the lake. My oldest, who the year before had loved the sand, refused to get out of the stroller and screamed, kicked, when I tried to put him in the sand. My youngest loved every part of it and was content sitting and playing. Needless to say, my fantasies of passing the time away on this little beach only lasted about an hour. In Deep Creek Lake, there isn't a whole lot to do for the toddler/preschool set. Back in the room, my oldest still was unbelievably crabby and then I felt his head--HOT! I took his temp and it was mildly high. I began to freak out, called my husband, and he agreed to meet us at the local health center. The diagnosis--ear infections for both boys. Got the drugs and everything seemed fine. Thank goodness the room had cable, a luxury that was cut out when we decided that I would stay home. Several hours later, my oldest, E, still felt hot. Took his temp again--105+. Called the doctor back, he said to go straight to the ER. Fortunately, the hospital in Garret County is my husband's client so he again, met us there. E ended up being fine (ah, the power of children's motrin) and we spent the rest of days in Deep Creek watching endless hours of cartoons with very few outings. But, if your kids are going to be sick while on vacation, let it be in a place where there is maid service!!! Now when my husband has to go to Deep Creek we make it a yearly getaway (3 days)for the two of us. It's truly a wonderful place to get away from it all. I know we will take our boys, and our soon-to-be daughter, back there when they are old enough to enjoy the wonders of the lake, but for now it is all about mommy and daddy time.