Our parents live abroad, but it would never have occurred to us to go on a long trip without our kids. It didn't occur to my BILs who live close to my MIL and could have asked her to babysit. We want to spend time with our kids, OP. To each his own, but I confess I don't understand why people have kids if it's just to leave them at home while they off gallivanting.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We only go away for one night at a time. Grandparents can handle that ok. If we go away for longer we take DD

Why don't you hire a sitter.

We love our kid.

Lol

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We only go away for one night at a time. Grandparents can handle that ok. If we go away for longer we take DD

Why don't you hire a sitter.

We love our kid.

If you REALLY loved her, you would nurture your marriage.

We have never had family close by, but here's how we've done little getaways with just DH and me:

1) Swapped with my BIL and SIL. Once a year we would take their kids for a weekend and the next year, they would take ours
2) Twice we went up the street on our anniversary and left our kids with our nanny (but we stayed in town)
3) when the kids got old enough for sleepaway camp, we had a few nights then

I'm a fan of small getaways - even if just for a night as it's good for our marriage to just be able to focus on us for a short time.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We only go away for one night at a time. Grandparents can handle that ok. If we go away for longer we take DD

Why don't you hire a sitter.

We love our kid.

We go to a resort that has a kids club AND hire high school senior or college student (18+) to come with us. The sitter stays in the same room as the kids at night and deals with them before a reasonable hour in the morning (usually they just order room service breakfast and get them into swimsuits or whatever. We take the kids to the pool or something for a few hours during the day, then drop them at the kids club and do our own thing. We pick them up and do bath/dinner then the sitter deals with tucking everyone in and staying in their room overnight in case anyone has trouble sleeping. DH and I are done with kids by 7, have a nice dinner and a full nights’ sleep. Sitter is on duty 6:30pm-10:30am and gets to enjoy the resort all day. Kids get some time with us instead of being home with someone they don’t know for a week. Win/win/win!

The years with little kids was hard. We went to family camp where it is a lodge, all meals are just served as a buffet (no arguing over restaurants or what to cook, no cooking!) and there are activities set up and kid camp in the morning and the afternoon for a few hours. Love it! They are common on the west coast, I bet they have them in new england too.
^^
Hey poster! Can you name the family camp(s) you know of on the West Coast? I know of a great one in the East but recently moved West....

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Get that out of your system before you have kids. It isn’t about you anymore once you have kids, don’t be so selfish. Seriously.

A weekend alone with your spouse once every few years is obviously the height of selfishness.

Yes, it is.

You need to get out more.

I'm divorced with joint custody. I still take my daughter everywhere with me. Her mom has never taken her anywhere outside of the DC area. I can't afford to do more than one trip a year, so she goes wherever I go.

OP, could you dig a little deeper? Consider hiring someone like my own college junior DD who loves longer term gigs like this?

I've also flown cross country to take care of my elementary school age nephews when my brother and SIL had to take a semi-emergency trip (not a vacation but ill relative) for one week. They paid for my airfare, but I basically stepped in and got them to school, sports practice, helped with homework, packed lunches, made dinner, etc.

Anyone else in your family (a little younger?) who'd be willing to help? My parents couldn't travel, much less take care of energetic little boys.

Not that there’s anything wrong with going away without the kids but for plenty of people, probably the majority, it’s not really a financial option.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Get that out of your system before you have kids. It isn’t about you anymore once you have kids, don’t be so selfish. Seriously.

A weekend alone with your spouse once every few years is obviously the height of selfishness.

Yes, it is.

Anonymous wrote:We do use my parents regularly but the first time are using our nanny to stay with them one night when my parents aren't available and we both have to travel for work. Kids are 3 and 1 and it's one night. I probably wouldn't feel comfortable with a sitter or nanny for much more than that until the kids are a little older.

This makes no sense. If you only trust your nanny to stay with your children for one night, how can you trust her at all? Your parents are much older than your nanny and do not have her energy or experience.

Anonymous wrote:We only go away for one night at a time. Grandparents can handle that ok. If we go away for longer we take DD

Why don't you hire a sitter.

We rarely went anywhere without our kids and we were fine with that as they all got along and they didn’t drive us nuts. A few times we brought a sitter or nanny with us and that was great as we’d get some adult time. We both worked full time and going away without them didn’t feel right to us.