6 Tips to Prepare for a Family Vacay with Kids

After taking our first, family trip to Lake George with “twins plus one,” I learned a lot from the experience – things I hope to remember the next time we plan a trip together.   I mean, really, the thought of surviving a nearly 4-hour long trip there from Manhattan, along with the twin’s first time away from home in a hotel for 5 days, was nerve wrecking.  Ultimately, I’m glad we took the risk and built some wonderful family memories there this summer.  And who knows where the Dedaj’s are off to next!

I’ve always been a planner and taken great pride in organizing and putting together events, whether it was for a Publishing Party in my English middle school classroom, or my twins’ baptism celebration.  I consider myself a pro and actually enjoy putting together “agendas” for day trips with my husband or friends, researching and collecting sites to visit.  However, traveling with 2 one-year old’s and a rambunctious 5-year old was a whole new experience for even this organized “teacher mom.”  It took a lot of thoughtful time to “plan” and put together, and even to get through while we were there, but the smiles and laughter beaming from my “Dear 3 Boys” is a priceless memory now. 

Here are my 6 Tips for Preparing for a Family Vacation with the kiddos:

1.  Do some serious research about your destination

Plan to spend some quality time researching your destination before committing to or booking anything.  It’s so important to know what to expect before getting somewhere.  Read the Trip Advisor reviews before choosing a hotel.  Use Yelp to look up places to eat.  Mommy Poppins is one of my favorite mom blogs I use for planning trips, locally in NYC and farther out!  The point is, you want to spend time being thoughtful about where you will stay, what the place has to offer, what the weather is like, where the closest convenience store is, etc.  All of this will help you have a better experience on your trip.

2.   Create an Agenda of Sites to See & Places to Eat

Planning a trip with young kids is really different, and you don’t want to over plan.  When I suggest creating an agenda, I mean a very flexible one, more like a list of a collection of things you can possibly do and places you may eat at.  You may not get to everything on your “agenda” and that’s perfectly fine – when my family was enjoying their time on the beach on our first day, we decided to just stay there for longer and ditch the place we thought we’d go to in the afternoon.  Do not disrupt the flow!  Some thing I was really glad I added to our agenda were a few indoor spots (an arcade and an indoor playground place) that totally came in handy when it rained one afternoon.  The “agenda” was something I shared with my husband before we left, so we could agree on which were our top items or places we really wanted to make sure happened, and it helped me have conversations with my oldest child about the different activities we’d be doing while we were away.

3.  Make a Light Packing List

A week before leaving for our trip, I made a list of all the items I needed to pack on my phone one day while my kids were playing in the living room.  You can put your Packing List anywhere – your phone, a piece of paper, on your laptop, a post-it note – the main idea here is to think ahead about what things you absolutely need, so that you’re not over packing the day before leaving.  When you’ve already got 3 kids in the backseat, packing lighter is best – most hotels even have laundry rooms available for minimal fees that you can use there.  My packing list is usually broken up into 3 sections:  clothes, things for the car & extras.  (2 things I made sure were on my packing list that I am so thankful I did not forget were our mini crib mattresses and sheets.)  Keep it as simple as possible!

4.  Clean & Do Laundry before leaving

Tidy up and get your laundry done as close to the day that you’re leaving for your trip to avoid coming home to even more work.  It was such a wonderful feeling coming home to a clean home, that I didn’t need to vacuum or mop that first day back.  There will already be loads of vacation laundry to do, etc. so the pre-work will be worth it!  I was even able to tidy up a bit while everyone waited for me down by the car the day of our trip. 

5.  Check the weather forecast 1-Day before Traveling

Make sure you’ve checked the local weather forecast by zip code the day before you leave for any last minute adjustments you may need to make.  You’ll want to know if you should pack a few umbrellas, or light sweaters, etc. 

6.  Have a Travel Plan

Before you leave, make sure you’ve looked at your route options at least once prior to decide on which highway you’ll want to take and the total amount of time it’ll be until you get to your destination.  Set a plan for at which hour and where you’ll want to make a stop to do diaper changes or grab a snack.  We made sure to stop at a large mall half-way through our travel destination just to make sure the boys could run around, while mom & dad grabbed coffees.