The Best Laid Plans

Last week my family and I went on a little vacation close to home. We’d been kicking around various ideas, most of which included all manner of things my husband and I would enjoy but that would likely have left the boys uninspired. When sanity resumed, we realized that at this stage of life, we’re probably better off doing something considerably more kid-friendly. And so we found ourselves at the Great Wolf Lodge.

For the uninitiated, Great Wolf Lodge’s claim to fame is an indoor water park. Thankfully we were there “off season” – so the crowding was minimal and most of the kids actually seemed to be around the age of ours (vs. being overrun with college and high school students.) When we settled on this, I thought I would probably be able to sneak in quite a bit of writing as someone would have to take the baby up to the room for naps – so that would be a good four hours of solid quiet time. As I’m a tad behind on my deadline for my next novel, this was definitely a needed bonus.

It didn’t quite work out the way I’d hoped, sadly. The baby loved the water (that part is good!) but he also seemed to not really be feeling super well after about a day. So while yes, I got to take him up to the room for naps, he was so unhappy that he really just wanted to snuggle. I love snuggling, so I was happy to oblige, but it’s hard to type on a laptop with a boy snuggled on you. So I read. (Let’s hear it for the Kindle and one-handed reading!)

Now we’re home. (And oh how lovely to be home.) More tired than we were when we set out (isn’t that just the way with vacations?) And I’m going to seriously have to put my nose to the grindstone on my novel if I’m going to squeak into my deadline.

If you’ve vacationed with kids, what’s the best thing you did with them?