Hellobee

For the one year anniversary of our marriage, Mr. Oyster and I traveled to Martha’s Vineyard for a long weekend….with 10 of our closest friends. Needless to say it was crazy and a lot of fun! We returned once more with that group before we had children. About a year after having Scallop, we took him with us on our anniversary trip. A year after that, we went again, and were lucky enough to spend some time with my brother-in-law and his girlfriend too. We then took a couple of years off, while I was pregnant and Pearl was little.

This was our first year going back to the Vineyard as a family of 4, and we decided to make it a multifamily vacation. One of my best friends growing up (we’ll call her Mrs. Summer) and her family joined us on the trip! Mrs. Summer and her husband have a son who’s about 3.5 years old, and a daughter who’s 7 months old. Our families try to get together about once a month for various activities with the kids, but this was our first time traveling together.

I will admit, I was a little nervous. Mrs. Summer and I are best friends, but we’d never traveled for an extended period of time together before, and our families had never spent more than a day together. Would the trip leave our friendship tenuous? Would the families want to spend time together again??

All of my fears were completely unfounded! We had a great time!! The kids got along wonderfully and the adults loved getting to have some “grown-up” time (albeit, bleary-eyed) at night. The 5 days flew by but the break from our daily routine was much needed. Here are my tips for a multifamily vacation:

1. Make lists (my favorite!!): We had lists for food, toys, and things to do on our trip! We coordinated who would bring what type of food items, in order to cut down on the cost of grocery shopping on the island. Each family also brought items that we knew our children specifically would eat. We did also grocery shop once we got to the island, and just split our bill down the middle. I brought most of the indoor toys for the kids, but tried to keep the amount of stuff to a minimum. I also brought a few movies, for any rainy days or when the parents were getting dinner ready. This worked out really well! We weren’t in the house for a ton of time each day, but when we were there the kids were playing with toys together (or running around the house like crazy people). I’m not sure that anything was doubled up on between the 2 families, so our pre-trip lists worked out pretty well!

2. Choose a point person: In terms of planning the vacation, I kind of took the reigns as the point person. I love looking for beach houses, so I found the rental house and worked out the terms with the owner and our families. I also looked up the ferry schedules and coordinated times with the families. Once we were on the island, Mr. Oyster was the new point person since the rest of us are all fairly indecisive – which makes making plans for 8 people tricky. There were times when we were trying to decide where to go and the 3 of us would all look at each other and shrug. Mr. Oyster to the rescue! He’s very decisive and easy-going, so we often let him make the choices for the good of us all.

3. Plan, but be flexible: Aside from spending A LOT of time at the beach, each family came with a couple of ideas in mind of things they’d like to do/see on the island. The Oyster family wanted to hike at a local nature preserve, while the Summer family wanted to take a drive around the island to see the sites. Both families also wanted to let the kids ride the Flying Horses carousel. We tried not to put too much emphasis on meeting these expectation though, as a lot of our time was spent just corralling the kids or figuring out nap schedules. Fortunately we were able to spend a lot of time at the beach! We were also able to hike the nature preserve one morning:

Yep, we found goats in the middle of the hike!

We spent one rainy morning and nap time driving around the island so that the adults could see the sites. And we even got to ride the carousel!

Fortunately we got to do everything both families wanted to, but I think we’re all easy going enough that we wouldn’t have been too bummed if things hadn’t worked out so well.

4. Keep to your schedule as much as possible: Being a SAHM, our schedule is my life. We live by it day-in and day-out and don’t deviate from it often. Because of that a vacation sometimes makes me want to cringe! Throwing off naps and bedtimes and meal times…oh my! I’m lucky that Mr. Oyster takes everything in stride and tries to remind me to do the same. I did try to keep our schedules mostly on track – but it was sometimes tough with 4 kids! Scallop no longer naps (ugh), Mrs. Summer’s son sometimes takes 1 mid-day nap, Pearl takes 1 mid-day nap, and baby Summer usually naps twice a day. Most days we just tried to make it back to the house for lunch and a mid-day rest for all, but there were times that it was tricky. At one point our families separated, with the Oysters going back to the house for nap time, and the Summers staying out and about. We agreed on our meshed schedules for the most part, but when we didn’t it was easy enough to work around.

5. Divide tasks: This was an easy one for us because Mrs. Summer and I are good friends and our husbands get along well too. If the girls were headed to the grocery store, then the “mannies” were on kid-duty. If the Summers wanted to go for an afternoon run while their kiddos were napping, the Oysters held the baby monitors. If the men were grilling, then the women were sitting on the couch drinking wine while the kids chased each other around the house. You get the idea. For us it happened naturally, but if it didn’t I think it would be an easy conversation to have.

6. Be sensitive to each other: All parenting styles are different – we know this. And that’s easy to deal with when you see someone at the park or for a short play date, but it’s another thing when you’re living in the same house for a few days. The Oysters and Summers are fairly used to each other’s parenting styles, and they definitely have their differences! For our families it was important to be sensitive to these differences. This would sometimes mean Mr. Oyster stepping in to reinforce the Summers’ rules with their son. It might also mean Mrs. Summer trying to help calm Scallop down from a tantrum at bedtime. In the end we’re all fairly aware that our children can be a handful in one way or another and what works for each family is for them to figure out.

7. Plan your next vacation!!: Things went well enough that we’ve talked about making this an annual vacation! We also talked extensively each night about an adults-only vacation in the future…..hey, we can dream can’t we?!