Planning ahead for 2014

Recently during a conversation over dinner with my husband we discussed our family life and how we felt we could offer our children a childhood filled with great memories. We spend a lot of time together but normally this is at home and we find everyone is off doing their own thing. So our plan is to get out of the house, get active and spend quality time with one another.

Of course at the moment budget plays a big part in what we are able to do but luckily our three love the great outdoors and spending time outside is of course normally free and great for their physical wellbeing. So we planned a few weeks in advance and looked at all the local parks and wooded we could take them to. This meant that we could plan the rest of our weekends around these activities. Of course the children have embraced the lifestyle change and it has made a huge difference to how well the children have been getting on with each other and surprisingly the weekends feel a lot longer.

One of the things I am looking forward to most of all in 2014 is taking the children away on holiday. Now that I’m back to Childminding I want to treat the family to a regular weekends away where they can visit and explore different parts of the country. Our children love the outdoors and the UK has some wonderful hidden gems, especially in Ireland and Wales.

I plan to first of all look into hotels in Dublin from Travelodge. This would mean the break would remain reasonably priced but we would still have the comfort and convenience of staying in a hotel which would put my mind at rest as Tinnie is still under two. Dublin is a county we have wanted to visit for a while and planning a visit in the Spring would mean we could visit not only the museums and Dublin zoo but also take some woodland walks and explore the beautiful gardens.

I would like to make the most of these break by incorporating the children’s interests and also continuing the Reggio Emilia approach which we have adopted at home. Taking water colours and photo’s of what the children see while on our weekend breaks will help the children to make the most of these visits and help keep the memories stored in a scrap book too.

This post was made possible by Travelodge Ireland