Family Vacations with Kids: 3 Tips for Less Stress & More Fun

[00:00:00] Welcome to the Guiding Parent Podcast where you'll find the mindset and tools to parent with greater confidence, clarity and purpose, even when there aren't any easy answers. Together we're going to explore how to better nurture and guide our children to support who they are and who they're becoming so that they can fulfill their unique potential and thrive in our ever-changing world. I'm Tammy Ulrich, your host, parenting and early childhood educator, mom and most fun, Gammy.

[00:00:27] And I'm Shannon, your co-host. I'm Tammy's daughter and mom to a very energetic little dude called H. We're glad you're here. Let's get started. Hey Shannon, how was your vacation? It was great. We just got back from a little trip over to Kauai. My husband's family puts on a boogie board competition and so we got to go over and see all the family and hang out with cousins and aunts and uncles and grandparents and it was lovely.

[00:00:55] Oh, what fun. Vacations are so fun and so many good memories but you know there's also can be some chaos and challenges with a lot less structure and predictability and you know there's those moments of excitement followed by being mom I'm bored. So we're gonna see challenging behaviors. It's just to be expected. Might see some of ourselves as well as our kids. It's just everything's mixed up and we don't tend to be at our best.

[00:01:25] So we thought we'd talk about that vacations since Shannon was just on one. So Shannon before you left you were telling me about making Spam Musubi. So what all did you do before you left to get ready to go? So you're right. I did make a bunch of food. You might want to tell our viewers what Spam Musubi is.

[00:01:46] So Spam Musubi is a Hawaiian kind of we'll call it a delicacy but it's just a little burke of rice with a piece of pan fried Spam on top wrapped in nori which is seaweed. It does not necessarily sound appetizing if you are not familiar with Hawaiian food but it's delicious.

[00:02:07] And so I made a ton of them because they're a really easy thing to just throw in your beach bag or you know I ended up feeding them to six kids who at one point were all at the pool with me and auntie we're hungry.

[00:02:20] And I was like oh I got Musubi so I ran back up to our condo and we had Musubi but yeah in addition to you know food prep and stuff like that we wanted to make sure that you know my son had a good idea of what our schedule was going into you know this long weekend that we took.

[00:02:39] Making sure that you know we have his you know the stuff he wants to do balanced with the stuff my husband and I want to do and you know kind of pre-planning our schedule when we're going to spend time with certain people all of that just so that we all have you know kind of an idea of how everything is going to run. Yeah that's so important to kind of give them a you know a preview of preview of coming attractions things to be aware of and know.

[00:03:04] So and it's really nice when kids get a chance to have some choice in some of the things that they want to do so that everybody has something that that they get to that they can look forward to. And so maybe even you know depending upon the age of of the children letting everybody pick something and help plan the itinerary. Yeah and in addition to that you know we made sure that we had boogie boards and skateboards you know all of our stuff are different activities.

[00:03:31] You know my son had his tablet for the plane to make sure that was fully charged. I know you know when he was younger we merely made a point to make sure that we had you know his favorite toys that you know were able to travel with. Little play sets and stuff like that to take on the plane or if we were going to be stuck in the car for a long time. It just made it so much easier when we really had you know some of his favorite things. Absolutely. Kind of purse them out as we go. Yeah.

[00:03:59] Well it's especially good if you know it's special things that maybe they haven't seen before. It can be a special little oh we're really bored all of a sudden and oh look at this we've got this little thing to do and kind of take the give something special when in some of those down times.

[00:04:13] And thinking about down times I know you know we need to make sure that we're keeping routines and such as close to close to normal as possible and that we do especially for little little ones you know it's really easy when we when we're traveling for some of those routines to just go out the window.

[00:04:33] But things like naps and making sure we still have predictable meals and bedtime routines can you know really really make a difference and kind of have with those do get off schedule kind of have a plan for how we're going to get things things back on board again. Absolutely. Yeah I know like for us setting up our trip we made sure that not only you know were we going to watch this boogie board competition which is something my husband and I really like and my son will go along with as long as he's watching his actual cousins compete.

[00:05:02] But it's not something he wants to spend three full days doing and so you know we kind of balance that with making sure that he had pool time had time to get shaved ice which is another one of his favorite things. You know and a lot of time to just run around with his cousins and play in the water you know on his own own timeline as well. Right.

[00:05:21] I remember when we went to Hawaii one of the first times when you guys were young and we definitely had some conflicting ideas of what should be done on this trip. I was all about the ocean. I love the ocean and so that's what I wanted to do. It's like we're in Hawaii of course we're going to the beach right? Well you kids all you want to do is play at the pool.

[00:05:44] So we had to find ways to balance that out so that you got your pool time and I got some ocean beach time as well. Yeah I know another thing that we try and balance when my family's traveling is kind of the like need for activities and being busy the whole time and then also needing downtime and being able to take a break.

[00:06:07] Like we kind of made a point this last trip of coming back to our little condo pretty much every day I think to have lunch and just give ourselves 45 minutes to an hour of just you know everybody gets to just you know A be an air conditioning and then also you know have a little bit of time where we're not with other people and we can kind of kind of re-regulate.

[00:06:27] Right and that's not necessarily my son's favorite part of the day but you know it was really important for my husband and I and that made us you know it's one of those things like take care of yourself first examples of you know needing to make sure that we're well regulated so that then we can absolutely you know A be you know enjoy our time with family but also you know be there for our son and give him our full selves when we're when needed.

[00:06:51] Right yeah it's really important to just kind of figure out what each individual's needs are so that those get met amidst amidst all the fun and crazy as well. It also makes me think a lot about prepare with purpose because this is all about you know preparing for a change in routine but it's also you know taking that time to anticipate prepare ahead so that we can save a lot of time and sanity.

[00:07:16] You know it might take more time you're spending all that time making spam moves to be and some of your other things but in the long run it saves saves so much time because you've got you've got the things you need right there and you've planned ahead and so you're not as surprised and also saves a lot of our our sanity.

[00:07:33] So you know we want to we want to plan and prepare our kids environments and routines so that they have optimum development but we also really want to make sure we're planning for those everyday changes and and outings and such.

[00:07:50] Absolutely I know you know it can really vary depending on where kids are different excuse me developmental stages you know how long is their attention span you know what are their interests at that particular age.

[00:08:03] I know I tried to take H at one point to the National Portrait Gallery in DC and I had just you know such a agenda I guess of this being you know educational experience and you know to me this museum is amazing it has this you know beautiful painting of the four justices there's tons of other like important historical paintings there and so you know we get there and he could care less about the paintings.

[00:08:32] But he did discover that there were many a naked statue and if you went to the backside of said naked statues you saw booty and so he just flitted around that museum giggling his little self to death looking at bums and so it was not necessarily the you know cultural experience that I anticipated.

[00:08:55] But I'm sure that that naked bums on statues is way more interesting than you know four justices paintings. Right. I mean I think it's cultural but for a little guy.

[00:09:08] Yeah it's really important that we consider consider where they are where they are developmentally and and that also helps us to maintain our expectations because you know thinking about their age and what their interests are and you know are they going to how are they going to feel about these these activities and are they going to are they going to enjoy them.

[00:09:27] And that doesn't mean we shouldn't do them we should still we should still be introducing them to you know to to cultural things and and different experiences but we just also need to maintain kind of an an an idea of who they are and and their development so that our expectations are in alignment. We can help make things go a little smoother when they aren't as interested as we might we might want them to be.

[00:09:53] Yeah I know in addition to that just kind of considering developmental schedules and you know is this a time where you know you want to skip your three-year-old's nap because there's so much exciting stuff going on and practical you know standpoint is that going to then wreck the entire rest of your day if you skip said nap.

[00:10:13] And it can be really easy to think like oh you know we're on vacation where you know can be kind of loosey-goosey with you know what would normally be our routine and it can definitely come back to bite you when it's things like nap time or meal times that you know really are the big things for our littlest people.

[00:10:32] I remember when we were helping you move and you know we were all out of our normal routine and we'd been running around getting things and running errands and none of us had eaten right the entire day and we started noticing how surly H was getting.

[00:10:50] And we all know in the family that when he doesn't get you know he hasn't eaten regularly he gets very hangry but he was he was definitely getting getting very surly and we just you know we hadn't taken the time to make sure but we went and had a nice dinner and it was like total change. We were all back to you know back to ourselves again. So we're just having that awareness that oh that's what's going on can really can really help.

[00:11:16] Well yeah and I think it makes such a huge difference when you take the time to pay attention to these kinds of things about your kid you know like you said he's very predictable in that if he's behaving a certain way 99 times out of 100 he needs food. And so you know for some kids it may be they need quiet time or they need you know something different more stimulation but yeah being able to you know kind of gauge like for your own child like oh we're having you know we're inching towards a meltdown.

[00:11:45] What can we do to intervene before it becomes a full-blown situation. Right. I think too we need to really be aware of having realistic expectations about about when we're planning special events that you know our vacations but anything special birthdays and and so forth.

[00:12:03] You know we've we want to make our vacations be this be all in doll have all these lovely wonderful memories but really you know they any of our trips are not going to be what we see on Instagram as Instagram perfect.

[00:12:16] I saw a little a little reel the other day of just showing just that it had a little little guy on a boogie board floating around in the ocean with his dad and it looked all nice and lovely but then they put in the sound and it was like no you can't go back to the back to the room and watch TV. We're doing this so we just made it very clear that what you see on Instagram might not exactly be what's happening what's truly truly happening. Yeah.

[00:12:43] So we we really need to be you know be aware that we don't need to make it perfect. We just need to create a nice experience and have some things you know things in in line. We don't need to give our kids the perfect trip and at our own expense either we need to still do the things we want to do make sure we're doing things that that they want to do but really you know consider the whole family and kind of figure out what can we do together that creates connection but still has that sense that we're taking care of each other.

[00:13:12] You know we're making sure everybody gets to do something that they want to do but also you know having some of that benefit of learning from being having to wait your turn or being a little bit bored from from time to time. Well yeah I know nobody ever goes on vacation just thinking like oh we're gonna like chalk up a bunch of life lessons on our you know trip to Hawaii.

[00:13:35] Obviously it's not the point but you can kind of I think have it in the back of your mind that you know there are advantages like you said to boredom. There's advantages to a kid not getting to do exactly what they want to do 24 hours of the day. You learn how to exist in a family unit in a community where you know there are other people's needs that you need to consider. And so yeah if you have a kid melting down because we're doing what brother wants to do right now rather than what you want to do.

[00:14:01] You know you can just kind of remember like oh yes we we are teaching life skills here even if it is not at a convenient moment. Exactly right and those life skills don't tend to happen at convenient moments. But that's a really important point to remember is that you know when those times come you know to remember it's a process. You know kids aren't going to learn how to care for everybody else and put their needs aside while somebody else has their turn. You know that takes time and development before before we get there.

[00:14:29] So you know when our kids are melting down because they're not getting to do what we want it's not because they're spoiled. You know it's because they're still developing and they still have those moments where their emotions get big. And where you know they may be you know as we've already talked about hungry or tired our routines are off. And so you know giving them having a little empathy there of what's going on for them and that that this is just part of development is that sometimes things are think sometimes it's hard for little people.

[00:14:59] I love the whole idea of you know nothing being a perfect vacation that you know that there's what you expect going into it and then what a kid actually takes out of it. You were talking about social media stories and there was one I saw recently that I thought was absolutely hilarious and you know this family had gone on I think a European trip you know lots of culture lots of different experiences all the things. And you know when they got back they were asking their kids you know what was the best part of your trip.

[00:15:26] And one of the little people just pipes up and was like oh I remember when dad farted at the airport. And like this you know weeks long adventure and the fart at the airport was like the major takeaway. I think that's just such a great example of you know you can you can curate the perfect family vacation. And even if nothing goes wrong like what your kid takes away from it is going to be different than what you anticipate.

[00:15:54] And so I just thought that that was such a great you know it's hilarious but it's also you know a good little lesson of reminding ourselves that you know yeah all the planning in the world and it can still not be you know the takeaways that you intended. Right. Which makes me think about our European vacation and how we had you know it was going to be this great educational experience for everybody.

[00:16:18] Um but we were we were in Italy and went to a really nice restaurant and ordered you know nice Italian food real Italian food because we're in Italy. And your sister ordered fish and was quite traumatized when the waiter brought her a fish. A full fish head scale skin the whole bit.

[00:16:41] Oh she was so upset I had to hide and and pull some meat out of it for her and she wouldn't eat anything but pizza the rest of the trip she was so traumatized. But it's just I'm sure that's what you know one of her main memories from that vacation instead of all of the you know museums and monuments and you know cultural experiences that that we had. It was the fish yeah. It's the fish with the head on it.

[00:17:10] So as we come to the end um we have three tips to leave with you. So the first one is remember to prepare. We make things so much smoother when we take the time to anticipate what the wants and needs of everybody in the family might be. And also to take make sure that kids know what to expect and that they have some things that that um they're really gonna they're going to enjoy doing. And that that can find kind of fill in those gaps when um when we have a down time or when we're in the midst of an airplane ride or a car trip.

[00:17:40] So then second create an itinerary that works for everybody you know depending upon the ages of the kids let everybody choose their number one thing that they want to do and make sure that everybody has at least that one thing that they're looking forward to. And then third make sure that we keep some realistic expectations consider your child's development and that we're all out of our normal routine. So you know to give everybody a little grace if we slide out of our best behavior from time to time. Absolutely.

[00:18:09] And so I will end with a little try this. And so my favorite thing when anytime in our family things are out of the norm you know big moves big vacations start of the school year anything like that is to do the story of tomorrow. And so at bedtime lay down with my son and just talk about everything that's gonna happen the next day.

[00:18:31] And you know from where we're gonna have breakfast to who we're gonna see and what activities we're gonna do just anything that I know is gonna happen. And in my experience that has just added so much ease into you know his predictability for his next day and you know gives him just a little bit more control over the situation. And so it really does seem to make a difference in him you know being able to pop up the next morning and jump into whatever adventures we're having and knowing more about what's gonna happen with his day.

[00:19:01] Once you started doing that it was such a difference in how he how he handled things it's one of the greatest things one of the best things to try so yeah. So that's the end of today so we'll see you next episode. Thanks for joining us today on the guiding parent podcast. Remember behavior is communication. Connection leads to cooperation and with understanding and intention we can parent with greater ease peace and joy.

[00:19:30] Be sure to subscribe so you don't miss future episodes and we're here for you. Let us know in the comments what other topics you'd like to hear about. Click the link in the show notes to subscribe to our newsletter and visit the guiding mindset website for articles and resources to support you on your parenting journey. Until next time this is Tammy and Shannon with you on the journey.