How to Survive — and Thrive during — a Family Vacation

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Economical and creative travel was an essential part of our family’s homeschool experience. It is a joy for Ray and me to continue experiencing this with our grandchildren.

I certainly can’t say that every moment of every family vacation is a beautiful, once-in-a-lifetime experience. People get tired. People get cranky. Water—as in a good portion of your water bottle— spills inside your purse (I know! It happened to me on Monday!).

A few tricks are to be proactive, to be flexible, and to laugh uproariously — like we do today when we remember the time I left the car door open when we backed out of the garage when starting out on one vacation and the time Ray sat on his Wendy’s® Frosty®.

Here is a sampling of the things that helped on this last vacation:

• I printed off 200 jokes for kids from a site on the Internet. These grandchildren love the robot sound that I use for my timer. I repeatedly set my timer for 15 minutes. When the robot made its funny and annoying chatter, I read a joke. You know, jokes like “Why did the turkey cross the road?” “Because the chicken was on vacation.” If an adult or child in the car guessed the punch line, I heard urgent calls for “Do another one.”
• We played endless games of the travel version of Guess Who?® Did I say endless???
• We switched seats many times, giving the children special times with each other, with Mama, and with Little while Daddy drove and Notty navigated.
• We all forgot our umbrellas and enjoyed walking in the rain anyway.

• Notty and Little took care of our own breakfast at the Airbnb and one other meal for everyone. Our daughter and her husband took care of their family’s breakfast and one other meal for everyone.

• We broke up our visit to the Heinz History Center with a walk to “The Strip” for a sidewalk picnic and a trip to Grandpa Joe’s Candy Shop.

• Toffee- or chocolate and caramel- or M&M’S®-covered pretzel anyone?

• Or Jelly Belly® jelly beans?

• Or how about some cotton candy soda?

• We skipped the pre-planned trip to a museum and took a boat ride instead. We love museums, but enough museums are enough museums.
• We had so much fun riding the Duquesne Incline in the rain on Thursday that . . .

• We decided to ride the Monongahela Incline on Saturday.

• We didn’t count calories or sugar grams. When our daughter told the children that everyone was going to have to a parent brush their teeth one night, no matter how old they were, our granddaughter told them, “Then Notty or Little is going to have to brush Mama’s teeth!” After all Mama had had a lick of the giant lollipop from Grandpa Joe’s, too.

Most importantly, Ray led us in a prayer when we gathered in our driveway to head to Pittsburgh. When we returned safely six days later, he led us again as we thanked God for His blessings.

Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice!
Let your gentle spirit be known to all people.
The Lord is near.
Do not be anxious about anything,
but in everything by prayer
and pleading with thanksgiving
let your requests be made known to God.
And the peace of God,
which surpasses all comprehension,
will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
Philippians 4:4-7

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