Do you take family vacations and not bring all your kids?

[Anonymous]

How did you choose which kids to take on vacation and which to leave behind?

[Anonymous]

It depends on their chores. They dont do them, they don’t get to go to the ball. Who am I kidding though, Im not letting that Cinderella go anywhere, regardless of how many chores she does!

[Anonymous]

Why would you take a family vacation without a child?

[Anonymous]

Where do you leave them behind?

[Anonymous]

No that is weird.

I've taken 2 out of 3 kids to visit my parents, leaving spouse and 1 kid behind due to other commitments, but that's not an actual vacation.

When they are adults with their own careers and lives, it would be totally different.

[Anonymous]

We haven't done this, but we've debated it. Our younger son really doesn't enjoy travel. He's a homebody and at this age (15) really wants to be around his friends. When he travels, he's constantly asking when we're going home and is just generally out of sorts. Doesn't matter where we go - city or beach. We're going on a trip this summer and I am a bit nervous to bring him. I want him to have fun and be with us as a family, but I am not sure he really wants to - even though he says he does.

[Anonymous]

Sure.
Right before covid, I found a great deal on airfare to Colombia. My older kids (high school and college at the time) said they didn't want to go--so my husband and I just took our youngest (middle school at the time.)

Also, once our kids started going to college, we took some trips with just the kids still home. Schedules get very difficult to coordinate when kids have different breaks, have jobs/internships, etc. If we waited for a time that the entire family was available, we would never be able to go.

We also do trips with just one parent/one child frequently.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How did you choose which kids to take on vacation and which to leave behind?

How many children do you have? A dozen?

[Anonymous]

We did it. My teen does not enjoy travel and doesn’t want a break from her job and sport so we are allowing her to skip some family vacations provided she goes on others. It’s not the choice I’d make but there no sense dragging a angry teen with you.

[Anonymous]

We didn't take my stepkids when they were with their mom instead of us, and didn't take the college kids when they were in school. And we only took the kids in HS when going on college tour vacations.

[Anonymous]

Unless one of my children had a violent type of mental disorder that is not conducive to travel, or my teen was old enough to have other priorities, no I would never exclude my children from family vacations.

[Anonymous]

This seems very specifics to your family circumstances. I'd imagine most people will say 'hell no' but I can imagine that for someone out there, this makes sense.

I debated taking my kids individually to Disneyworld b/c they are far apart in age and interest, but we ultimately decided to do it as a family.

[Anonymous]

Not yet but I'm guessing once the oldest is off to college this may happen.

My friend whose son has autism never takes him or acknowledges that he isn't there. She takes her other two children and they take 2000 pictures as a family of 4 that she posts on FB. At least 4 times a year.

[Anonymous]

Do you have a blended family? I have a friend who had 3 kids with her first husband and 2 kids with her second/current husband. Sometimes they vacation with all 5 kids and sometimes with just the 2 younger kids. I assume 3 older kids are with their Dad during those trips and that they also vacation with their Dad. Seems complicated but I think its just the fact of a blended family.

[Anonymous]

Unless you're talking 17+ and your high schooler or college student asks to not go, this is a weird question.