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I love travel. I don’t just mean vacations, (Who doesn’t love those?) I mean actual travel. I love planes and cars and trains and boats. There isn’t a trip tic I’ve met that I haven’t loved. My favorite part is simply the experience of living somewhere else for a bit. This is evidenced by the fact that I never have too many plans for when I get somewhere. I plan like crazy for the departure. There are packing lists and snack bags, reading and (of course!) music downloaded and outfits and toiletries sorted and packed for five people. During prep time, I am a Ellie Efficient but then I usually just head off and figure out what to do with my days when I get where I’m going. I’ve taught my kids the same thing. Wherever we’ve been, we just are. For however long we stay somewhere we live as natives until it’s time to pack and go home. We’ve never had a trip that we didn’t love, so it must be working so far.
Because I love travel so much, it’s hard to name just one dream vacation. When asked, my first thought is a trip to Italy with my husband but that is mostly because we spend so little time together that the word vacation immediately brings up visions of alone time on a romantic canal sipping red wine. But just as quickly I think of taking my kids to Disney or showing them Spain or experiencing Australia with them and that, I think is really the dream. Then I realize there is a trip that keeps coming up. The Trailer Trip. I have such a burning desire to have my kids meet my cousins’ kids that I have it all worked out. We’ll hop in our rented mobile home in Jersey and warm up with a stop in PA for an Austin and Joe family BBQ. Next we’ll visit Aunt Mimi in Ohio. From there we’ll hit the open road and stop in as many Mel’s Diners as we can on the way to Minnesota for Jannell and Tracy and their crew. We’ll head west to northern California where we’ll hang with the Bakers who either live there or have made the trek from L.A. to join us in a game of pool at Helen’s humble beach palace while Faith and Ava fall in love and share a girl crush on cousin Jacqui. Dan and Griff of course will hang with Jesse and Jack either tearing up the house and yard as only boys can do or maybe even surf a while. After all, they’re- each one- a coastal kid. We’ll visit my mom’s childhood house and and hopefully get some history from Aunt Jan and Uncle Jack.
The leaving is the worst part but leave we must because finally we’ll hit the gas on up through Canada and over to our last stop-the wilds of Wasilla where my three finally get to hang with Roxie’s two. If she can convince her brother to visit we’ll get his four as well. We may rest in Alaska a while. By then the drive might have done me in and who knows, I might just want to see Russia from her house.
I guess it’s clear to me now, my dream family vacation only needs one thing: family. The more that I can get in to one trip the better. It’s the family that makes the vacation a dream.
Don’t forget to enter the “Do What You Love” Sweepstakes, for a chance to win your own ultimate family vacation. I was selected for this sponsorship by the Clever Girls Collective, which endorses Blog With Integrity, as I do.
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