Product Review: Family Vacation

My story of our first ever, real, "family vacation" actually began weeks before we boarded any plane. The first step was to convince Steve that we should spend all of our tax return money on a trip instead of replacing our older than dirt sofas. Step one, done. After two weeks of calling travel agents and surfing the web for the best deals we decided that Cancun, Mexico would be the best choice. Thank God we got the all-inclusive package because that meant the alcohol was included. It was time for a drink (and I'm not talking about Sean's milk). By the way, all-inclusive is the only way to go when traveling with small kids because they will eat about one handful of Cheerios at every meal so that they can spend more time in the pool. Also, all-inclusive places always have buffets which means you don't have to waste time waiting for food to be prepared. Did I mention that the alcohol was also included?

Why Cancun? Easy. We'd been there before and knew exactly what it was like (this was no time to try anything new).

What was it like 6 years ago? Well, I remember the beautiful, white sandy beaches (great for snorkeling), glorious hotels (perfect for hours of lounging by the pool), and great night clubs (ideal for a few drinks and lots of dancing).

While making our reservations, I realized there would be no great snorkeling, no minutes of lounging (anywhere), and the only drink I had to be concerned with was Sean's milk.

We were finally on our way, after spending many sleepless nights worrying about taking two toddlers on 5 hour flight, we landed without a hitch. The kids slept for most of the flight, I got to watch a movie and had a meal to myself. By the way, the food on Alaska Airlines was awful (but I still ate). All those sleepless nights were in vain. Traveling with kids was a piece of cake.

And then...we got to our hotel at 7:00 p.m. By this point we had all been up and moving for 12 hours and were more than ready to let the fun begin. Wrong! Our great, 5 star hotel (so much for 5 stars ) was OVERBOOKED! We were transferred to another property 30 minutes away. Augh!

The new property was beautiful and came with an even higher rating (Gran Tourism). Cool, maybe this wasn't such a bad thing. After all, our room had beautiful marble floors and a sunken living room area. Well, unfortunately these would have been wonderful if I were still single, but I have kids people; thus the FAMILY vacation!!!!

Marble, by itself, is slippery as hell. Add water or sand to it and it can become a real pain in the ass. And the sunken living room meant there were stairs! Great, just what I wanted to do while on vacation, watch Emma and Sean challenge each other to a "jump off" every two minutes. Did I mention they were landing on wet, sandy marble floors?

Thankfully, days two through five were spent back in our meek 5 star hotel. Thank God, no more stinkin' marble floors or sunken anything. Plus, we got upgraded to an ocean front suite. Sweet! Finally, the vacation really began, the weather was good, the kids were having a ball in the pool, and even enjoyed staying up late listening to cheesy karaoke acts in the lobby while Steve and I took advantage of the free drinks.

However, when taking advantage of the free buffets, heed this VERY IMPORTANT TIP: I strongly suggest you send your husband to get his stuff from the buffet table first because he just might be the jerk who wants to try everything without realizing that the kids could care less if they have flower shaped butter balls, they just want to get to the pool (not that my sweet Steve was that jerk, no, not at all).

By day two, things were going so well we decided to venture out. TIP: WHEN TRAVELING TO MEXICO WITH SMALL CHILDREN, TAKE CARSEATS. We had to wait two days for a rental car that had one, and when it did arrive it smelled like puke. We even tried to buy one at Walmart (yup, there is now a Walmart in Cancun) but were really surprised at the cost and selection. There were only 2 really flimsy ones for more than $200 (U.S. currency) each.

Even so, our ventures away from the hotel were worth the hardships. We all got to swim with dolphins. The "Encounter" programs are great for families because you get to spend about half-hour touching, kissing and getting to know the dolphins while in the ocean. You stand on a platform so even small kids can participate. Emma, age 3, loved it. Sean, age 20 months, cried for about 20 minutes, calmed down, got splashed in the face and cried for another 10.

I was ecstatic to find that snorkeling (the only thing I really wanted to do) can easily be done with small kids. You just throw them in a floatie and tie them to your life jacket with the hair tie you were wearing and begin to tow (easy peasy). The beauty of this technique, that I'd like to believe I created, is that while you're face is in the water you can't hear a single noise from the kids above you. Until, as happened with us, a Barracuda the size of Emma swims by you and some "wonderful" lifeguard points this fact out to your child. Those screams, it turns out, can actually be heard quite well. I, of course, calmed Emma down by swimming in the other direction, completely unaware that I was swimming directly into the path of a 150 pound grouper. Oh well, live and learn (at least I got to snorkel).

The week went by too fast considering all the time, energy and sofa money it took to get us there. We finished the trip off with a great news. We were upgraded to first class for the flight home. Yeah baby! I've never done that before and I was excited. I was even gonna ask for some Grey Poupon.

The dirty looks we got while boarding with two small children reminded me why I had never gone first class before. Those other passengers were a bunch of Jerks, Snobs and *&%*%*(&_!! You'd swear they'd never seen a small child before. The dirty looks were compounded by the fact that both Emma and Sean had 15 minute power naps on the way to the airport. Neither slept a single minute. See,those sleepless nights worrying about flying were worth it after all.

The flight home was 5 hours of transferring Emma and Sean back and forth from one lap to another, eating with one hand while feeding the kids with the other, picking up dig-E-players that kept getting dropped and getting dirty looks from everybody that went to the bathroom. Even after all that, I can't help but laugh while remembering when Emma said (just before we landed): "So, mom, what should we pack for our next family vacation?"