Post by cricketwife on Jan 7, 2024 13:03:55 GMT -5
Our kids are the same ages and we also really just started vacations last year, for a myriad of reasons.
I work at a school and I have zero flexibility for when I can take off, but I don't love the idea of taking kids out of school for a vacation. I feel like it sends a message that school isn't important and that it's fine to demand more of a teacher so that I can save some money. That said, maybe if it were actually a possiblity to travel during the school year for me, I'd feel differently.
Since we are limited to school vacations, and since regardless of what you do now, you probalby will probably be limited within a few years, just given your older one's age, here is what we're doing.
Last year we took two separate vacations. One week - Chicago (flight required) One week - beach (driving distance)
We used points for flights and the hotel for Chicago. Beach is driveable for us so that keeps costs down.
This summer we are going to again do one week at the beach and the other trip is going to be a road trip to Niagara Falls. (Godspeed to us. We have never ever wanted to do a roadtrip, but the kids are a bit older and really it's the only way we can do some of the things we want to do.)
So yes, travel is crazy expensive (I don't know if that will ever change) and it's even worse during peak seasons (school breaks.) This wasn't your question, but here are a few things we are doing to still have vacations, but also live within our means.
Alternate cheap vacations (beach, driving) with more expensive vacations (genearlly those that require air travel.)
We are basically keeping our vacations domestic because I'm just not skilled enough to play the game of figuring out cheap/free international flights with points that are one days that we actually want or need to travel to a place we actually want to go.
I'm remember that kids want time with us, so for them, it's not less or more fun to visit a city that's a few hours drive from us, than to fly to somewhere "cool" like NYC or Chicago. I mean, *I* have more fun in those places, but they have been just as happy...or unhappy, lol, regardless of the destination.
I'm planing ahead for the $$$$ trips because I do want to take them overseas and there are some US destinations that expensive for us from the East Coast that are also high on me list. So I'm not making reservations years out, I'm just planning and saving years out.
I hope that's helpful. I have not gotten over the sticker shock of post-Covid travel prices. It really is insane. We are privileged to be in a better financial situation than we were when the kids were younger, so even with the higher prices, travel (withing limits) is accessible to us.
this is helpful....I'm hearing I really need to plan better and in advance! I was on the Costco travel website last night and so annoyed that everything they had was for 2024 and largely booked up during the breaks (!)
mrshandy you're right about 4 days being tight...esp w/air travel. Ugh...
It’s tight, but you could also extend your trip a few days and only miss 2 days of school. So far, the last day before breaks is almost a throw away day of school, anyway.
cricketwife and others very helpful! I think we’re of the same mind we the balance and alternating. Even if we splurged in grander trips I just don’t have the Will to plan and organize them. 😂 and you’re so right re the quality time. I get stressed flying, I’m not my best self.
Visiting my mom near the beach is so cheap and still so much fun for the kids too.
Now that my oldest is in middle school I really don't want to pull my kids out. It was easier when they were younger and one was in preschool. But yes we typically travel over school breaks. Closer to home trips for the 4-5 day weekends and longer ones over spring and summer break. Not everywhere is slammed during those times. You just pick your locations wisely.
I pulled my 4th and 6th graders out for 5 school days over Halloween. We do this every year (last year they missed 7 days over Halloween and 4 before spring break for a swim meet 😬). After this past trip my oldest said never again does she want to miss that much because they are at a new school and the amount of make up work she had was insane.
So we are shortening our Halloween trip to missing only 2 days and we are doing vacation over their 2 week spring break and also in august the week before school starts.
we are willing to pull our first grader for a day or two before or after the breaks, but we did pull him for a full week where he missed the entire first week of school this year for a once in a lifetime trip to Ireland with three generations of our family.
But again, under normal circumstances we will not pull him for more than a day or two and otherwise just stick to summer or school breaks.
DD is in 6th now, but I've always struggled with this. I am mostly against pulling kids out of school for vacation except for a day here or there. It just seems so hard on them to catch up on school work, and it's even worse now with middle school.
We just travel during school breaks. It especially sucks because spring break is butting up to easter so everything is even more expensive. Flights to Puerto Rico from the east coast were $1500 per person. Legit lol. Obviously we pivoted.
There are a cluster of days off around Halloween and we've toyed with doing something then (she'd miss one day) but she still enjoys ToTing so we opted not to last year.
DD is in 6th now, but I've always struggled with this. I am mostly against pulling kids out of school for vacation except for a day here or there. It just seems so hard on them to catch up on school work, and it's even worse now with middle school.
We just travel during school breaks. It especially sucks because spring break is butting up to easter so everything is even more expensive. Flights to Puerto Rico from the east coast were $1500 per person. Legit lol. Obviously we pivoted.
There are a cluster of days off around Halloween and we've toyed with doing something then (she'd miss one day) but she still enjoys ToTing so we opted not to last year.
You might try Puerto Rico trips earlier in the summer. We went in late June and paid $1150 for 4 of us to fly with Jet Blue. Definitely would recommend!
We never pull kids for trips -- maybe if it were a once in a lifetime thing but that hasn't come up. I'm a teacher, so it would be hard for me, the kids would have a ton of makeup work to do, and I don't like to send the message that school is expendable and that teachers should do more so you can save money.
We travel in the summer (but we get out earlier than most public schools so a mid-June trip is common for us and is usually less expensive and less crowded) and spring break (we don't work around Easter so again, we are usually off at a different time than public school). This year, neither is happening as spring break is near Easter and DH has something this summer that doesn't allow for a multi-week trip.
"Hello babies. Welcome to Earth. It's hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It's round and wet and crowded. On the outside, babies, you've got a hundred years here. There's only one rule that I know of, babies-"God damn it, you've got to be kind.”
We both work in schools (H is admin so harder for him to take off though) so we likely wouldn't pull our kid for a trip. We don't get long breaks for spring break/Easter either, usually just Thurs-Mon. We're done before Memorial Day though so that gives us plenty of flexibility for a June or July trip.
We prefer to avoid pulling Kid #1 out of school for a vacation if we can help it, I think the last time we did it was kindergarten (he's 5th grade now and Kid #2 is in preschool). Currently Kid #2 is a complete honey badger so the thought of taking her somewhere with sightseeing makes me want to cry and hide, and thankfully both kids are total beach nuts so we're all happy with a week at the beach. Which needs to be done in the summer aka beach busy season so that there's a better chance of good weather. Eventually Kid #2 will hopefully be a little less fearless and feral so we may broaden our options then, but will likely still avoid pulling out of school.
Post by icedcoffee on Jan 16, 2024 21:22:02 GMT -5
We don’t pull kids. I’m in the “it sends the wrong message” team. Also, I don’t want you the teachers to go out of their way for my kid to go on vacation. We just travel when it’s busy and expensive.
We will make 1 exception to do a one time Disney trip in a year or 2 with some extended family. And I really don’t want it to go longer than a day or 2 of school missed.
I do wish we had a week off in like February for skiing but our calendar doesn’t really allow for it. Xmas week is always too early to ski on the east coast the past few days. Oh well! Someday the kids won’t be in school.
now that my older son is in middle school we try to use his schedule so we are going away when he has conferences and spring break and summer. Even then he will have soccer tournaments but since we don't know yet hopefully not too many
Our kids are 9 and 6. We sometimes take them out of school, but we typically just bite the bullet and pay the premium for school break travel.
We actually have approved calendars for a few years out, and I'm excited because they've added a full week October break for the '25-'26 year. I feel like that's a great time to travel almost anywhere due to lower cost, lower crowds, and good weather.
I wish our school would publish future calendars early. They don't publish the calendar for the next school year until the spring. It makes it really hard to plan. For example, they still haven't published the start dates for this fall (the 24/25 school year) and won't until around April/May. But we need to register for summer camps starting now, which makes it really hard to plan. It is frustrating.
It looks like an unpopular opinion, but I have pulled DD1 from elementary school for a week for vacation. She's currently in 3rd grade, DD2 will be starting K this fall. My parents live in FL and we visit annually in the spring (Feb/Mar) but the prices are insane to go during school breaks. This year I really tried, but it was literally $1K per ticket to fly during winter or spring break. We are pulling DD1 for a week and it is costing $1k total for all 4 of us. I have noticed it is getting harder for her to miss school and I always figured we would do it through elementary and stop in middle school. We may stop earlier, we will see how it goes this year.
Post by UMaineTeach on Jan 31, 2024 16:22:41 GMT -5
I can think off the top of my head 3 teachers I know this year who have gone on vacation when school is in, so I don’t get too worked up over a kid taking a vacation.
If the teacher isn’t going to “send the right message” we can’t expect kids and families to. Unless the right message is, take care of yourself, look out for yourself, take advantage of opportunities that come your way, and save money on travel.
Our teachers have enough personal days per year that if they were students they would be considered Federally Chronically Absent if they took them all.
I love that we have days and it’s any day for any reason, no reason needed to be disclosed. But the dedication to coming to work is way down. I think especially since March 2020.
I can think off the top of my head 3 teachers I know this year who have gone on vacation when school is in, so I don’t get too worked up over a kid taking a vacation.
If the teacher isn’t going to “send the right message” we can’t expect kids and families to. Unless the right message is, take care of yourself, look out for yourself, take advantage of opportunities that come your way, and save money on travel.
Our teachers have enough personal days per year that if they were students they would be considered Federally Chronically Absent if they took them all.
I love that we have days and it’s any day for any reason, no reason needed to be disclosed. But the dedication to coming to work is way down. I think especially since March 2020.
Omg I wish I had that many personal days as a teacher--in our district we get 3 personal days. And up until literally THIS year we couldn't use ANY sick days for family members, we had to use our 3 measly personal days. Finally, I am able to use a sick day now when my kid has the flu-like this week.
We pulled our kids out when they were in elementary school. Now that they are in middle school, I would be much more hesitant to pull them out and go on vacation outside of a school break.
Just wanted to note that our kids are missing a day at the end of spring break this year. Even though we tried to go over break, it was way,Way cheaper to fly Tues to Tues. not ideal, but saves thousands.
If the kids are doing well in school, I wouldn’t hesitate to take them out for an extra day or two to extend a long weekend or make travel cheaper/ easier. My 7th grader gets excellent grades and hardly takes sick days so it hasn’t seemed to have a negative impact. We do it less often as they get older. For summer/ winter break we try to book any plane tickets months in advance and for try to travel on the cheapest days of the week (often spending Christmas morning with DH at home and fly to visit family late Christmas night or back New Year’s Day). We don’t usually travel for Thanksgiving but they have the entire week off so it’s possible to miss the most expensive travel days. Spring breaks, school first and last days are different for every district so I don’t find it to be that bad, but I dislike crowded touristy places more than the cost. We have credit cards that offer travel miles and companion fares. If we want a cheap vacation we take a short road trip or do a staycation. We live in a tourist destination but staycations aren’t as relaxing for me because I feel the need to do stuff around the house). Last summer we did a big Europe trip but we really packed a ton in less than 2 weeks (5 locations) and tried not to do any little trips leading up to it (because what we spent on multiple weekend getaways = a big trip).
I can think off the top of my head 3 teachers I know this year who have gone on vacation when school is in, so I don’t get too worked up over a kid taking a vacation.
If the teacher isn’t going to “send the right message” we can’t expect kids and families to. Unless the right message is, take care of yourself, look out for yourself, take advantage of opportunities that come your way, and save money on travel.
Our teachers have enough personal days per year that if they were students they would be considered Federally Chronically Absent if they took them all.
I love that we have days and it’s any day for any reason, no reason needed to be disclosed. But the dedication to coming to work is way down. I think especially since March 2020.
Well, you have no idea what the circumstances were, right? I once took 3 days off school to travel for a family wedding and a funeral. I didn't tell parents why I was leaving and I'm sure some of them assumed. Oh well.
We definitely don't have enough personal days to cover a trip. And elementary/secondary teachers certainly don't operate with the assumption that coming into work is a possibility.
"Hello babies. Welcome to Earth. It's hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It's round and wet and crowded. On the outside, babies, you've got a hundred years here. There's only one rule that I know of, babies-"God damn it, you've got to be kind.”