Kids Ain't Cheap

But They Sure Are Worth It

Simple Ways to Create Memories with Your Kids

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Ways to Create Memories with Your Kids

Sometimes when your kids are little, every day might seem so LONG. The kids have endless needs you have to meet, and they might fuss, cry, or have tantrums. However, smiling older women look at you in the store and compliment your beautiful family and reminisce about their now-grown children. People tell you, “The days are long, but the years are short.” Yet, while you try to enjoy the days, sometimes you struggle. As your kids grow older (and it happens so quickly!), you realize that the time you have with them is fleeting, and you want to create memories with them. Here are some suggestions to do just that.

Simple Ways to Create Memories with Your Kids

Creating memories with your kids doesn’t have to be expensive. You simply need to spend your undivided time with them.

Actively Watch Their Sports

How often have you gone to kids’ sporting events and seen parents not watching the game but instead giving all of their attention to their smartphones? Put the phone aside and watch your kids. They notice, and they’ll appreciate that you spend time on them, not on the internet.

Have a Dedicated Movie Night

One fun family tradition is to have a dedicated movie time. In our family, we watch a movie on Sunday afternoon. This activity may not seem like much, but your kids will likely enjoy this tradition and remember it fondly when looking back on their childhoods.

Play Board Games

Likewise, you can have a family game night. Or, if you can’t play board games with the family that often, make a habit of playing a board game with your child at least once every two weeks. Your kids will enjoy playing the game and the time you gave them.

Read Aloud to Them

Ways to Create Memories with Your Kids

This family tradition is best started when your kids are young, though you can begin any time they’re in elementary school. When my kids were babies, I started reading aloud to them, and we never stopped. My younger kids are now 13 and 12, and I still read aloud to them every day. I’m sure this is one activity they’ll cherish and hopefully repeat with their children.

Have a Yes Day

Too often, we parents say no because it’s more convenient than saying yes. Challenge yourself to say yes one day and see how different the day will be. “Mom, can we go to the park?” Yes. “Can I bake a cake?” Yes. If the activity the children propose isn’t dangerous or out of your budget, try saying yes and see what happens.

Take Them on Vacation

Finally, if you have the means, take your children on vacation. Getting out of your element and exploring new places leads to family bonding, especially when you reminisce about your adventures years later.

Final Thoughts

Kids grow up too quickly. The older women in the stores are right—the days are long, but the years are short. Cherish the time you have by utilizing simple ways to create memories with your kids. You’ll be glad you did.

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Vacation Before Your Kids No Longer Want to Hang with You

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Travel with your kids before they no longer want to hang with you

When I was a teenager, my mom and I traveled together, just the two of us, for one week every year. We both enjoyed these trips. However, teenagers don’t always enjoy traveling with their parents, even when their parents take them on a once-in-a-lifetime trip somewhere like Europe. Often, kids as young as 11 or 12 would rather be with their friends than their parents. Therefore, you may want to have an epic vacation before your kids no longer want to hang with you.

Many Families Struggle Financially in the Early Years

Unfortunately, many families struggle financially in the years when kids are young. Parents have to pay for diapers, formula, and daycare, none of which are cheap. In addition, parents may be younger and starting their careers, so their pay is low.

Once the kids are older, say ten and up, parents are on firmer financial footing and have more money to spend on vacations. Unfortunately, this may coincide with the time kids don’t want to do as much as their parents.

Prioritize Fun in the Younger Years

In his book, Die with Zero, Bill Perkins suggests that you spend most of your money upfront when you’re young enough to do the activities you want to do physically. This allows you to create a rich memory bank to sustain you in your older years when you’re not physically able to do as much.

Likewise, your children have a sweet spot between eight and 13 where they enjoy vacations and traveling with you before they get too involved in their own lives and friendships. That is when you want to prioritize travel with your children, even if it means scrimping in other areas of your life to find the money for travel.

My Experience Traveling with Kids

When our kids were young, we lived in the Midwest. We didn’t have money for travel, but my husband frequently had to attend work-related conferences. For the conferences a day’s drive away, the kids and I could tag along because my husband’s work paid for the hotel room. We’d pack food and try to visit as many free attractions as possible. The kids loved it. We went to Philadelphia, Ohio, North Carolina, Minneapolis, Quebec, and our favorite, Boston.

When the kids were 10, 5, and 4, we moved to Arizona. We couldn’t travel with my husband anymore because conferences were no longer within driving distance.

Now, we recently moved to New York. My husband has a conference in Philadelphia, so we were excited to resume our tradition with the younger two kids, now 13 and 12, and take them with us. To our surprise, the 13-year-old is indifferent to the trip and the 12-year-old is complaining about having to go. So now, our travel window seems to have closed. Of course, we’ll still travel with them, but we miss the excitement they used to have about traveling.

Final Thoughts

If you have younger kids, I recommend you prioritize taking a vacation before your kids no longer want to hang with you. Hopefully, they will always enjoy traveling with you, but if not, your memory bank and theirs will be filled with earlier, fun vacations.

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Planning a Road Trip with a Toddler

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Planning a road trip with a toddler? If so, find out how we beat boredom, take of potty breaks, and plan snacks!This week we will be embarking on our first family road trip with our toddler!

We travelled a bit when she was a baby but now that she’s an active three ear old I suspect things will be a little different. Things like potty breaks and dealing with the ‘’I’m bored’s’’ and ‘’are we there yet’s?’’. Maybe I’m wrong but I’m certainly expecting our trip to take slightly longer with her in tow.

Potty Break Planning

Dealing with the potty breaks shouldn’t been too bad if I make sure she goes before we leave and limit her drinking in the car. I have a pretty good idea of what she can consume before she really has to go. We’re heading to an island that you can get to via bridge or ferry and we’re opting to take the ferry to break the trip up a bit. Take the ferry is also a guaranteed way to break the trip up. We’ll be able to get out of our vehicle and walk around a bit.

Taking a ferry isn’t possible for most road trips, I understand that. I have a friend who, when travelling with her (very active) son breaks up their trips by stopping at WalMart. She jokes that they’re easy to find off any major highway and a guarantee to be able to use the washroom and walk around for a few minutes. It also works with (sometimes necessary) bribes by enticing them with something small if they behave (for her son it’s usually a pack of superman stickers or bandaids). Whatever you need to do to break up your trip, planning your route ahead of time and plotting out all potential stops for emergency bathroom breaks may save your sanity!

Boredom Busters

Dealing with the boredom isn’t such an issue in 2015 with the technology that is available. It’s not unheard of for vehicles to have televisions built right in them! Since we don’t have that luxury, my husband is preloading the family tablet with child appropriate games and videos. Since she doesn’t play on the tablet often it’s usually well received when she does get time with it.

Before we break out the tablet (which is guaranteed to suck her attention) I packed a ‘’car bag’’ full of activities for her to play with. This includes a few books, a notebook for her to color in (along with markers), stickers and a coloring book that’s in a car case for her to be able to color on her lap easily. I suspect this will keep her busy off and on for a while, or until the stickers run out.

Snack Solutions

We also have snacks for the car which I’m sure will be a hit. Snack choice will vary depending on age, for us my biggest thought is mess control. At three, we’ll stick to easy finger food like blueberries, popcorn, cheese strings and crackers. Things like granola bars and yogurt are too messy in the car (at least for my kid) and I’m not interested in dealing with it quite honestly!

With a little extra planning a family road trip with a toddler can be a lot of fun but if you forget to plan for things like potty breaks it can quickly turn into a nightmare!

Any tips for planning a stress free road trip with a toddler?

5 Tips for Planning a Cheap Family Getaway

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family vacationLast weekend I had the luxury of getting out of town with the family, even though we didn’t go very far it was so nice to just get out of our normal routine and boundaries. You don’t have to spend a ton of money to enjoy a family getaway. We managed a weekend away for less than $200 by finding some deals and capitalizing on cost savings, you can too.

Shop Around

We knew we’d need a hotel for the evening but weren’t interesting in spending a ton of money. I also knew we’d likely be spending a decent amount of time in our room given that we have a little on who is asleep fairly early so wanted it to be comfortable and spacious for my husband and I to enjoy while she was sleeping, without being overpriced. The internet makes searching for stuff like hotels a breeze. I found exactly what we needed for below the price we were willing to spend.

Look for Discount Options

We were planning to attend a specific event, if we signed up for notifications from the hosting vendor we would be granted a 25% discount on ticket price. Given that there we a total of seven of us traveling it saved us a decent chunk of money. We also saved on parking at the event itself because they considered us a carpool (more than 4 people), a nice surprise.

Enjoy and Seek Out Perks

I hate paying for parking at hotels, given the rate at which they charge you to sleep in a room I think it’s insane to charge upwards of $40 per day in some cities to park your car on top of room rate. I always look for hotels with free parking before ever paying. I also compare the room rate for breakfast vs. no breakfast included. At our particular hotel not only did we have free parking for only $10 more per night then the other hotel we were looking at, we got hot breakfast included. Our family of three certainly can’t eat (out) for less than $10. The hot breakfast is almost always worth the money to me.

Share Costs

A few family members were traveling with us to go to the same event to we decided to cut one of the cars out and share the cost in our vehicle instead. They save on wear and tear on their vehicle and we shared the cost of gas which was a help to both parties involved. We also shared a hotel room. Paying for the larger room and extra persons charge was still significantly cheaper than us each getting a room and it was nice to have the extra company!

Bring Your Own Snacks

Buying snacks on the road can get expensive. We always pack our collapsible cooler with drinks and light snacks for us and kiddo so we’re not tempted to waste money at gas stations and pit stop locations. We have a child who much prefers to graze throughout the day then eat larger meals so this works especially well for us.

With a little planning it is possible to plan a weekend away with your family and not break the bank. Proper budgeting will insure you can get away without worrying how you’re going to pay for it all when you get back!