A park or playground.

Hear me out. True, you can play on a playground in your hometown, and a city park might not give you a one-of-a-kind experience you can get only in your destination. But you’ll never regret the time you and your kids spend at the playground on vacation—and in fact, adding it to your vacation itinerary can work wonders on your kids’ attitude (and your stress level!). Here’s why.

5 reasons to add a playground to your family trip itinerary

1. Playing at a park lets your kids burn off energy

If your littles are anything like mine, they finish road trips and plane rides with, ahem, an abundance of energy. Letting them loose on a playground allows them to stretch their legs, get the activity their growing bodies need and just be silly. Trust me: You’d rather have your kids burn off energy at the playground and not the local art museum.

2. Parks are familiar

Especially if your kids are very young or nervous about new places and situations, building something familiar into your family trip itinerary will be comforting. Your kids are less likely to melt down later if they’ve already done something they love—and that they’re used to from their routine at home.

3. Locals’ tips and advice

Here’s my favorite part about adding parks to every family trip itinerary I plan: Hitting up a park gives me the perfect opportunity to meet local parents. These are the people who will give you insider tips on where to eat, play, explore—and what to avoid.

4. Playgrounds make kids happy

Family vacations are all about, well, family time. Planning a trip itinerary only on what you want to do—museums, walking hip neighborhoods, shopping, exploring antique stores—is a sure bet to make your kids cranky. Build in a playground stop and they’ll be in a good mood the rest of the day (like when you stop in at an art gallery, or whatever else you have on your family trip itinerary).

5. Playgrounds let kids be kids

When families go on vacation, kids are often asked to be on their best behavior: They have to eat unfamiliar food at restaurants, stick close to a parent on busy sidewalks, be quiet in museums and otherwise restrain themselves at every turn. But at a playground—the destination they’ll be so glad you included in your trip itinerary—they’re free to be their usual, rambunctious selves.

Have you and your kids ever stopped at a playground on vacation? How did it work out? Do you have other tips to plan a family vacation?

The post Planning the perfect family vacation: The destination you need on every family trip itinerary appeared first on To & Fro Fam.

It’s super-high tech. It’s super high-end.

It’s a bag of gallon Ziplock bags.

Mic drop.

Hear me out! We’ve been using this cheap, easy hack packing for a family vacation for the last two years, and I will never go back. It makes planning what to pack, keeping track of multiple kids’ clothes and remembering what is dirty and what’s clean a breeze.

Vacation is meant to be relaxing, not stressful, so the next time you’re packing for a family trip, try this travel trick. You’ll wish you started ages ago.

The best hack for packing kids’ clothes for vacation

Packing like a pro is straightforward. Here’s how:

1. Pack one outfit per bag. Include everything you need for a complete outfit—including underwear, socks, headbands, the whole shebang.
2. Include at least one outfit per day. My kids count how many days we’ll be gone and we pack that many bags—plus extras. ‘Cause I don’t know about your kids, but mine find ways to get waaaaaaaay messy (mac n cheese! sand! glitter!), no matter what, so we pack extras.
3. Involve the kids. Each of my girls, even the toddler, pack their own clothes in the Ziplock bag—and they love it! In fact, recently I was trying to be efficient and packed the bags myself and both girls lost their minds. I had to take everything out and let them redo it. Bonus: Picking out their own outfits makes them excited to get dressed once we reach our destination, so it’s not a fight to get them out of their PJs.
4. Label—if you want. Feel free to label each bag with the day of the week of your family vacation. This step is overkill for our family, and the girls like the flexibility of picking whatever outfit strikes their fancy, but it might work for you.

No-stress packing for family vacation

Here’s why I love this family travel hack:

It takes the guesswork out of packing. I know exactly what clothes to pack for my kids and how much of everything I need. And once I’m packed, I’m confident I have enough of everything. No running to the store to buy extra underwear!

It separates clean and dirty clothes. Clean clothes are in Ziplocks, dirty clothes are in their own bag, and never the two shall meet.

It makes coordinating outfits easy. When you have a mess of pants, tops and dresses jumbled in a suitcase, it’s mayhem trying to find a matching outfit. Organizing outfits in Ziplock bags means less stress on vacation.

Extra travel tips to be a pro packer

Want to make packing for a family vacation packing even easier? Try out these other organization hacks the next time your family plans a trip.

• Color coordinate your Ziplock bags. Ziplock makes colored bags around the holidays (green and red at Christmas, etc.). Buy a few extras when you see them at the store and assign a color to each kid. Then it’s easy to see whose clothes are whose—at a glance.
• Don’t go generic. We’ve used gallon plastic bags from the Dollar Store before, and they just don’t hold up. Now I buy brand name bags, and we reuse them for all our family trips.
• Bring a dirty clothes bag. As soon as clothes come off, they go straight into a dirty clothes bag. That way they’re all together (no cross-contamination!), and I just dump it straight into the washer when we get home.

The post The $3 hack to streamline packing for a family vacation appeared first on To & Fro Fam.

Until—drum roll please—in a stroke of genius/fit of desperation, I discovered this brilliant, cheap family travel hack to make my kids sleep on vacation—for real!

Make your kids sleep on vacation for mere pennies

Now, dear friends, I’m passing along the wisdom. For just $2 you, too, can buy the supplies for a magic sleep-making invention.

So instead of praying or hoping or resigning yourself to the nightmare of being up all night with your kids, behold: my tin foil trick to make your kids sleep on vacation.

How to make your kids sleep on vacation

This parenting hack isn’t complicated. Here’s how I discovered it:

One day on vacation, after Kiwi got up well before dawn, I stopped by the Dollar Store after grabbing Starbucks. (OMG THANK YOU CAFFEINE!!!!!!!) And while wandering the aisles looking for sand toys, I had a creative epiphany. I dropped a few dollars at the counter and rushed home to try out my idea.

Here’s what I did to make my kids sleep on vacation:

I covered each bedroom window with tin foil.

Simple as that.

Yes, I know there is a little light peeking through the gaps of the tin foil. (Cut me some slack, I was functioning on like 4 hours of sleep.) Perfect is never the goal round my house—good enough is good enough—so I let it stand.

And my tin foil travel hack was good enough got both kids to sleep longer the next night—by about 2 hours.

The family travel hack that will save your vacation

One particular family vacation, in which I met my husband at the coast and where he competed in a weekend-long disc golf tournament (love ya, Hubs!), was the worst for my kids’ sleep. I nearly lost it, and I nearly swore off family vacations altogether.

That’s when I discovered my parenting hack to make my kids sleep on vacation.

This little trick basically made me willing to take my family out of our comfort zone and continue to see the world. Yep, that’s right, this $2 hack saved family vacations for us.

You see, moms, I get that family vacations aren’t easy. You have to plan. You have to research kid-friendly activities and AirBnBs. You have to weigh the pros and cons of missing your kid’s nap time and letting them see one more exhibit at the aquarium. And you do all this on way less sleep because your kids wake up when the sun peeks through the definitely-not-blackout curtains.

Being a mom isn’t always easy, and it definitely doesn’t get easier when you plan a family vacation. That’s why anything to make your job easier—including a parenting hack to make your kids sleep in—is gold in my books.

After all, when mama’s happy, everyone’s happy.

So the next time you take a family vacation, don’t resign yourself to early wake-ups and bedtime protests. Just buy a few rolls of tin foil, thank your lucky stars for this family travel hack—and revel in the fact your kids may just sleep in.

Do you have any tricks to make your kids sleep on vacation—or any other time? What’s your favorite family travel hack?

The post Make your kids sleep on vacation: The $2 hack that will save your sanity appeared first on To & Fro Fam.

A city park might not give you a one-of-a-kind experience you can get only in your destination, but you’ll never regret the time you and your kids spend at the playground on vacation. Then again, you might find a unique and unforgettable park you’d miss otherwise.

Still skeptical (and ready to skip a park stop in favor of a museum or postcard-perfect landmark)? Try this family travel hack and you’ll become a believer. 

5 reasons to add a playground to your vacation itinerary

As you’re planning your trip itinerary for your next family vacation, remember this: add a playground stop to your trip! Here’s why.

1. Playing at a park lets your kids burn off energy

If your littles are anything like mine, they finish road trips and plane rides with, ahem, an abundance of energy. Letting them loose on a playground allows them to stretch their legs, get the activity their growing bodies need and just be silly.

2. Parks are familiar

Especially if your kids are very young or nervous about new places and situations, building something familiar into your family trip itinerary will be comforting. Your kids are less likely to melt down later if they’ve already done something they love—and that is similar to their routine at home.

3. Locals’ travel tips and advice

Here’s my favorite part about adding parks to every family vacation itinerary I plan: Hitting up a park gives me the perfect opportunity to meet local parents. These are the people who will give you insider tips on where to eat, play, explore—and what to avoid.

4. Playgrounds make kids happy

Family vacations are all about, well, family time. Planning a trip itinerary only on what you want to do—museums, walking hip neighborhoods, shopping—is a sure bet to make your kids cranky. Build in a playground stop and they’ll be in a good mood the rest of the day (like when you stop in at an art gallery).

5. Playgrounds let kids be kids

When families go on vacation, kids are often asked to be on their best behavior: They have to eat unfamiliar food at restaurants, stick close to a parent on busy sidewalks, be quiet in museums and otherwise restrain themselves at every turn. But at a playground—the destination they’ll be so glad you included in your family trip itinerary—they’re free to be their usual, rambunctious selves.

So don’t forget: When you’re planning your next family vacation, remember to include the one destination your kids are guaranteed to love.

Have you and your kids ever stopped at a playground on vacation? How did it work out?

The post The surprising destination you need on every family trip itinerary appeared first on To & Fro Fam.