Family Vacations

Tis the season for VACATIONS! Think about it, some of the very best memories are made when you spend time with your family on a vacation. You spend the entire trip together, in the car, on the plane, in the hotel room and eating every meal together. You are together through the ups and downs of each day, on each adventure, experiencing new sights and enjoying a break from the normal routine of life. No one knows you better than your family, but when you have family vacations you get to know each other in a deeper way than ever before. There's something about the 24/7 living together, while experiencing new things, that bonds you like never before.

I have amazing memories of the family vacations I took while growing up in my family of 5. They always began with my brother Blake always calling "RIFLE" (a.ka. the backseat of the blue mini van we took on trips, "Shotgun" was the front passenger seat always reserved for mom, then "Pistol" was the 2 captain seats in the middle of the van, followed by the most popular seat for the trip, "Rifle" - which just so happened to be the longest, perfect for sleeping, and somehow Blake always ended up with it :) ). Many card games on top of pillows, spelling games using the billboards on the road, and I'll never forget, our trip to South Dakota while driving to Mount Rushmore, my dad promised a Pepsi to the first person who saw the faces...of course Blake won that too! I love staying in hotels and swimming in hotel pools and going to bed each night anxiously awaiting the fun, new activities the next day.

Not much has changed, I still love road trips (although with a 10 month old, a plane ride will be much more enjoyable than a car ride this year :) ), staying in hotels is still a highlight of the trip for me, and now being the wife/mom on the trip, I'm experiencing a whole new element of FUN, the planning and preparing!

I love vacations, and it's super important for me to help make our home a sweet home by going on as many vacations as we can as a family. I want to experience as much as I can with my family, going to different places and seeing new sights. Our 1st trip as a family was on our honeymoon to Mexico, and now 4 1/2 years later, with our baby boy, we are getting to experience Maine!

I researched the area of Maine we wanted to go to and from that point started checking Expedia for flights and hotels, entering in a several different dates, times and areas. We debated flying in to Boston and even staying in Boston and just driving to maine for a couple days. But as it turns out, we found a cheap hotel (average of $82 a night) in Maine, and we will just visit Boston for a day. The other decision was what airport would be cheapest to fly into, as it turns out, when you fly on a Tuesday, you get significantly cheaper flight tickets, so we are flying into and out of Portland, Maine.

My mom had the great idea of contacting all the Chamber offices of the towns we are wanting to visit and have them send information on restaurants, shopping, activities and attractions in the area. I did that and got great information from all those places, helping us see what all there is to do and start making plans!

Some of the things we are looking forward to:

-Yummy fresh Lobster!

-Beautiful scenery (lots of lighthouses along the coast too!)

-Beaches (for swimming, or walking along)

-Trails for hiking

-Bike rides through the towns, on trails and along the coast

-Quaint towns with shopping and restaurants

-Time to relax!

-A day in Boston a the Aquarium and a historic downtown area

-Swimming at the hotel

-Experiencing a new part of the country we've never seen!

We can't wait for our family vacation to Maine!! We leave bright and early Tuesday morning, I will try to blog every night of our trip and let you know all about the trip!

Check out the forecast for the area we are staying in for the next week:

			High / Low (°F)	Precip. %
Tonight Jun 05		Partly Cloudy	52°	20 %
Mon Jun 06		Partly Cloudy	75°/53°	20 %
Tue Jun 07		Isolated T-Storms	79°/58°	30 %
Wed Jun 08		Partly Cloudy	80°/64°	10 %
Thu Jun 09		Partly Cloudy	94°/67°	10 %
Fri Jun 10		Isolated T-Storms	80°/53°	30 %
Sat Jun 11		Mostly Sunny	69°/53°	10 %
Sun Jun 12		Partly Cloudy	71°/58°	0 %
Mon Jun 13		Showers	74°/58°	60 %
Tue Jun 14		Showers	70°/61°	30 %