Last year I wrote about an Empty Nest Christmas, this year, the players are the same, as are the general philosophies, but we continue to change and grow a little each year.
I am thrilled to have a new son-in-law! I have never been a mother in law before and I plan to try hard to be a good one. When we sent out our Christmas cards this year it was fun to include the newly married couple and our son and his girlfriend too. It just felt right to have ALL of us!
It was so easy when the kids were little. You knew the rules. You had a system. As a mom I was in charge of their calendar and almost everything else in their world.
Then they leave the nest, grow up, mature, and establish a life of their own.
It is what is supposed to happen, but no one warns you when you give birth that eighteen years later the rules change. You ultimately start over and create an adult relationship with your child.
I struggled with it at first, but now I embrace it, in a BIG way. I have written a great deal about what to do with your adult kids, as well as multigenerational travel (see links below). I see on my blog what readers search for and how they find my blog. Many parents are looking for suggestions and ideas for activities to share with their adult children.
Welcome Back Laura! This Guest Adventurer writes the fun blog called CoastofIllinois.com. She is a land-locked beach bum who works days as a nurse and shares her land-locked life with her husband who recently retired from a career in law enforcement; just scratching the surface of their sit-com similarities. They have two grown children who still insist on Sunday dinner and a cat who has no interest in bettering himself, unless he can learn how to open his tiny food cans. A fixer-upper sailboat takes up a good portion of time these days, as does preparing for more travel adventures inspired by good food, Hemingway stories and Jimmy Buffet music.
I am thrilled to receive the gift of time whenever our kids can give it. Do you feel like that? Our family lives many miles apart and a plane ride away and I look forward to any time spent with them. Our daughter was married only a month ago and we were blessed with lots of time with family and friends. Lucky us! For me, I am content just soaking up the sunshiny moments and conversations we have. If I see the kids in person, I get this silly, happy, motherly grin on my face. Do you do that? Do you know what that looks like?
About three years ago, I sent out a request for all of you to share your favorite holiday destination. This collaborative post was super fun to do and I thoroughly enjoyed reading where YOU like to go!
I think it is about time we did this again!
Let me first say congratulations to the Boston Red Sox. The better team won and if I didn’t love the Dodgers, I would have rooted for the Red Sox. They are an impressive team.
So I survived the longest World Series Game in history. I even left with a smile on my face. It was the single most intense professional sports event I have ever experienced – On television or in person.
Books and travel, travel and bookstores, they go together like peanut butter & jelly, cracker and jacks and iced tea on a hot summer day. I have been an avid reader my whole life and since I started the blog I have learned to combine my reading life with my travel life. As part of every itinerary, I look for local bookstores when I visit a new city. Do you do that?
This passion for connecting my travel destinations and my readerly needs has gotten stronger and stronger now that I have so much more time to read. When my children were young and we were so busy with school and sports activities, I was lucky to read a book a month. But now, I can plan my reading life, explore more and even try to pair books with my upcoming destinations. And there’s more…
In just a few days, Alexandra, our oldest child, will be a bride walking down the aisle, thirty-four years to the day that I did. Did I know three and a half decades ago that our daughter would be getting married on the same day as we were? No, of course not.
Please welcome my newest Guest Adventurer, my friend and travel journalist Stacey Wittig. Here is her quick bio:”I can’t stop exploring the world (I blame it on my father’s Viking blood) and write about my adventures – many as a solo woman traveler. Life isn’t always rosy; I lost my firecracker reasoning skill to head injury in a horrific rollover accident that should have taken my life. Brain injury hasn’t stopped me from traveling, although sometimes it makes for amusing travel anecdotes.” Follow along at www.UnstoppableStacey.com
Someone recently asked me why I thought that multigenerational travel works for some, but not for others. After giving this some thought, I think the magic is in what you do. Is this an activity that is embraced by everyone? Or is this one person’s idea of a good time and everyone else has to go along with it?
The key to successful group travel, especially those with different age groups lies in the willingness of the group to communicate. To ensure that everyone is well represented and that members of the group are not railroaded into doing something that isn’t of interest to them.
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