The First Family Vacation

I thought I was prepared for our first family vacation with two young children in tow. We planned well - short (only 3 days), kid-oriented activities (no shopping, no lounging by the pool with a book), and a kid-friendly hotel (complete with mini golf on site). But I never counted on how exhausting it would be! (Fun, yes, but very, very tiring.)

My pre-child ideas of vacation usually involved a beach and lots of unstructured time. But unstructured time with two young ones tends to equal mass chaos - and, at least with my daughter, a level of hypered frenzy that's guaranteed to drive even the most even-keeled person bonkers.

We nixed the idea of a scenic route in favor of a shorter trip. My daughter is, and always has been, a great car kid - she entertains herself with made up songs or with toys that she's brought along. My son, on the other hand, believes his car seat is a torture chamber, and often emits loud shrieks just to make sure everyone knows how miserable he is. So, no adventurous side roads that might wind through the countryside. Just a straight shot from our house to the hotel.

We were very thankful for "Jill" (the name of our GPS navigation voice) in helping us find the shortest distance between any two points. Even my daughter came to appreciate Jill. At one point when we were looking for a restaurant for dinner, she asked where Jill was. My husband replied that he had left the GPS at the hotel. My daughter then sighed loudly and said, "Oh, no, we'll never be able to get back." (Thankfully, she was wrong!)

The first night we chose a spot for dinner that billed itself as "a family restaurant." They clearly were thinking of families in which the children are adults - or at the very least, well behaved teenagers. The atmosphere was more accurately described as "quiet and intimate." At 1 and 4, my children are not the ideal guests for a quiet and intimate dinner setting.

We made a better choice the next night. The waiter immediately offered to bring crayons and paper for our daughter who was starting to fidget. We found an even better choice for lunch the next day with a restaurant with a loud, pub-type atmosphere. Trust me, when you have a one-year-old whose vocabulary includes a wide range of shrieks and a four-year-old whose energy level could power an entire city, loud restaurants are the way to go.

The "big event" of our trip was a day at Storyland, a New Hampshire amusement park that caters to young children. (Even my 1-year-old is able to ride most rides there.) I'm not a big fan of rides that spin a lot. Those, of course, were exactly the ones my daughter chose. After many different versions of "spin till you're so dizzy you don't know which way is which" rides, I'm still not sure I'd say I love those rides, but my daughter's giggles have certainly given me a new appreciation for them.

In true 4-year-old fashion, our daughter was as enamored with the miniature golf course on site at our hotel as she was with the amusement park. When she and I ventured down to play, I didn't realize I would get a lesson on how to have fun without worrying about the rules or what others think. My daughter's strategy for miniature golf is to move the ball when it's in an awkward place. And she has the perfect solution to those times that you've hit the ball too many times and it still hasn't made it in the hole. She simply puts the ball on the very edge of the hole and then gently knocks it in.

When I told her that she had to leave the ball where it was, she looked at me and very matter-of-factly said, "But, Mommy, I can't hit it from here." After trying to explain the rules a few times, I gave up on enforcing "the rules" and agreed to play my daughter's way. After all, we weren't on the PGA circuit, and it was just the two of us. It was definitely a more fun way to play miniature golf. (I even felt competent at it!)

My ideas of vacation have definitely changed. But I suspect that one day when the kids are older and our vacation plans once again include a sunny beach and a more relaxed schedule, some part of me will miss the more hectic vacation with easily excited young children who find as much joy in miniature golf as in the amusement park. (Of course, another part of me is also going to enjoy a long, lazy afternoon reading followed by dinner at a restaurant with a quiet, intimate setting.)