Resist Vacation Conformity

There are those that insist vacation means eating every meal out – not me! I do love going out to eat, experiencing new flavors, tastes, smells, and soaking up the ambiance. However, I quickly slip in to overload if I have to do it every day for every meal.

We keep learning great ways to make dining in on vacation easier, healthier, and by all means fun. On our recent vacation I cut up chicken, poured on some Soy Vay Veri Veri Teriyaki, tossed it all in to a freezer bag – and froze it solid! I also cut up all the veggies we had in the refrigerator the morning we were leaving, put them in a separate freezer bag with some more of the Soy Vay, and sealed it tight. The key was remembering to pack it up and put it in the cooler before we left the house. On our 6 hour drive the frozen chicken was perfect for helping keep the veggies and rest of our perishables cool.

My kids love arriving at new destinations and getting the ‘lay of the land’ as soon as we will set them free. As long as the boys help us unload the car and put their stuff in their room, they can go discover while we get dinner ready. We love this time settling in to our new ‘home away from home’ and shifting in to vacation mode.

Keeping dinner easy, chicken and veggie skewers, (we also made some rice-a-roni – boys eat a lot!!!!) was the perfect way start to a great week in Southern California.


Prepped at home!


Yum!

Kari On and Keep Traveling

No Leaving until the Sheets are Changed

We have this crazy rule in our house that everything needs to be spic and span before we go on vacation. Without a doubt, I’m completely neurotic in the hours leading up to our walking out the door and transitioning in to vacation mode. Pre departure always starts out with the feeling of plenty of time to change the sheets, vacuum the floors, take out the trash, clean the refrigerator, rotate the laundry, empty the dishwasher, fluff the pillows, water the plants, and deodorize the toilets.

Ha! So much easier said than done.

On departure day we always wake up early, skip the coffee in bed, strip off the sheets and start a load of laundry. Those first 20 minutes we feel like we could conquer the world. We are so productive! We are cleaning and organizing machines! We are making great time! Somewhere after this initial 20 minutes of brilliance and 2 hours later we are at each others throats wondering why in the world we waited up NOW to clean the entire house. It’s not even like our house is dirty, but I have this uncontrollable need to make sure EVERYTHING is done before we go. I become obsessed with thinking we have time to do more – should we quickly clean the windows? Touch up the paint? Re-grout the tile?

The kids have learned to stay out of the way the final 20 minutes before we lock up and shove off. They know absolutely NO using the bathroom if the toilet is sparkly clean with blue-tinted water and no final snack that might leave a crumb on the counter.

You may think I’m crazy to go through such extremes when the goal is to chill out and slip in to vacation bliss as quickly as possible – and I completely understand that. But for me, after a fun-filled vacation I find returning home, walking in to a clean house and climbing in to my own bed with crisp clean sheets is the best way to top off time away from home.

Kari On and Keep Traveling

Coffee can turn a good morning in to a great morning!

Home or on travel, we start every morning with coffee. My ritual is the first cup in bed while I read the news and my favorite blogs. This is the one time of day when my husband truly spoils me – he gladly gets up first, makes the coffee, and delivers the piping hot cup to me bedside. I am loved! When it’s time for my second cup, I’m adequately caffeinated and coherent enough to get vertical and tackle the day.

Finding new coffee roasters is a travel must for us. There is something about the coffee house culture that defines a neighborhood and instantly makes us feel part of the local community. As an added bonus, most of the coffee roasters we visit usually have a delicious array of pastries from a local bakery – it’s fantastic, we get two local treats with one stop. Best of all, coffee joints attract the full spectrum of humanity and we never know what interesting characters we’ll run across sitting at a table (or outside on the curb) sipping a ‘cuppa joe’. The baristas are usually very friendly and happy to share their favorite local spots for surfing, shopping, eating, and hanging out.

It might seem silly at first, but packing our coffee grinder on trips is a must for us. Freshly ground coffee beans are definitely one of my top 10 favorite smells and catching a whiff of those aromatic grinds instantly perks me up. The minimal amount of space the coffee grinder takes in the suitcase is worth its weight in the pure caffeine bliss we experience with every cup of locally roasted deliciousness.





Kari On and Keep Traveling

The Hardest Part of Travel...

Without a doubt, the BIGGEST challenge of all for us when traveling is leaving our dog. Magnum will be 14 in June and we know (sniff sniff) he won't be with us forever. We've had Magnum since he was 8 weeks old and our boys have never known life without him. Although Magnum sleeps a lot these days, he still has his moments when he acts like a puppy: chasing the tennis ball, trying to catch his tail, and going absolutely insane with excitement when he sees his lead and knows he's going on a walk. The walks these days are short, but the bliss Magnum exudes when he goes to the bus stop and back makes me pause to appreciate how even the briefest of outings can bring him such joy.

For such an old dog, Magnum is still naughty as can be. Lately Mag has developed a craving for toilet paper. If all the bathroom doors aren't closed, Magnum will sneak down the hallway, position himself right in front of the toilet paper holder, grab an edge of the toilet paper, and start eating asfastashecan! This isn't an occasional event, if there is a chance for Magnum to go unnoticed in the bathroom, he'll capitalize and have a tp snack EVERY day. Crazy old boy!

We love Magnum and all agree the hardest part of travel is leaving him behind.


What a trooper to tolerate the bunny ears!



Kari On and Keep Traveling

5 Travel Myths Busted

1. It’s expensive. Sure, travel can be expensive, very expensive; however, there are lots of options and ways to reduce costs. My favorite place to reduce costs is reducing the number of meals we eat out. I like the 80/20 rule or the 3 out of 5 rule. If a family has 5 eating opportunities a day on vacation (Breakfast, Snack, Lunch, Snack, Dinner), by eating 3 of those ‘meals’ with ingredients you get at the local market or pack from home, you’ll quickly save on the cost of the whole trip.

2. It’s fattening. By all means reduce the urge to binge, binge, binge. A little indulging is a good thing, but splurging at every opportunity on vacation is just bad head work. We all know that portion size at restaurants and venues has increased significantly over time. Don’t deny yourself a special treat here and there – just don’t go overboard at every funnel cake cart you pass. Another great option: share. My husband’s not big on sharing; however, through some training on my part, he now savors his half of dessert and about 30 minutes later he thanks me for preventing his “I’m so stuffed I can hardly move” feeling.

3. It’s time consuming / pre planning takes too much time. True, pre-planning does take some time. Begin to think of pre-trip organization as a hobby and soon it feels like fun. Taking the time to figure out some menu ideas and options a week before the trip starts the mental transition in to vacation mode.

4. Eating ‘in’ means missing ‘out’. Absolutely NOT. Eating in means MORE opportunities to go out. The more you can keep costs in check on vacation, the more vacations you can take!

5. There’s no way my family will go along with this. Honestly most of the time I don’t even think my family notices we’re saving money and not eating out at every meal. As long as there is good, tasty food available when they are hungry, they are happy.

Kari On and Keep Traveling

Resolve to travel more...and spend less!

Looking back, our resolve to travel more and spend less really began on our honeymoon. As most couples starting out, we didn’t have a lot of money, we hadn’t accumulated a stash of frequent flyer miles, and we didn’t have any hotel points for free nights or room upgrades. But we did have a desire to travel and take in as much culture and atmosphere as humanly possible in less than three weeks.

Our destinations of choice: France, Portugal, and Spain. We certainly didn’t start out with saving money in mind, we just wanted to have fun, see, and do as much as we could squeeze in to a day. The saving part almost happened by accident. Maybe it was exhaustion from the wedding, or the less than comfortable flight folded like pretzels back in coach, or the 9-hour time difference. Whatever the initial trigger, our timing for eating was completely out of sync with the gastro pulse of these dynamic countries. Not to worry, we absolutely got in our fair share of indulging in decadent French pastries, savoring unique Portuguese cuisine, and sampling both traditional and creative Spanish tapas. But fortunate for us, our mixed up internal time clocks led us to finding a passion for preparing food in our hotel room and figuring out how to pack snacks and meals for day trips.

We discovered that we love exploring all sorts of food markets: boulangerie patisseries, fromagerie, boucheries, epicerie. Spending time in these markets almost instantly made us feel connected to the people and the local neighborhoods. The challenge was what to buy, how to cook it (we didn’t have a kitchen in our hotel room), and how to eat it (we didn’t have dishes or utensils). Over the years we have figured it out. We’re always adapting and with each trip we pick up more tips and ideas that keep us going from one adventure to the next.

One of my greatest memories of our time in France is when we went to explore the Palace and Gardens of Versailles. With over 800 hectares of land, we walked and walked for miles. I’m convinced we saw every one of the almost 200,000 trees and I’m almost positive we saw all 50 fountains. Not only did we walk the perimeter of the Grand Canal, but we also took every path we could find. We were in the gardens for hours. Before we set off on this day trip adventure, we stopped at a local boulangerie in Paris and picked up a fresh baguette, headed next door to the fromagerie for a wheel of Camembert cheese, and made a quick stop at the market for some water. Never before has bread, cheese and water tasted so good as it did on that bench in Versailles.

We love to eat out and discover new culinary delights and we make sure to splurge on every trip we take. We also love to travel to all corners of the globe. The secret is balance. Doing both can get really expensive really fast. So we’ve worked out a plan to incorporate as much of both as possible to maximize on seeing and doing as much as possible.


Cherish the memories!

Kari On and Keep Traveling