I like to do recaps of trips we take, highlighting our spending decisions. For spring break, we had planned on doing a big trip out west. Ultimately, we decided the kids were still too little to push such an itinerary. Along that timeframe, I also started a new job, where taking a week off just didn’t feel right, and then Mr. ODA had the weight of “what’s happening in the government” on us too. So we decided to do a long weekend to Columbus and Cincinnati Ohio, which aren’t extravagant, but met our needs with little kids.
We went to CoSI in Columbus, which was a perfect day. We explored that city one day, went hiking on another, and then went to a Reds game.
ENTERTAINMENT: ~$200
We went into this trip for a specific entertainment purpose, so we knew we’d spend money on those things. We bought 4 tickets for the 5 of us to get into the CoSI museum. It was well worth it. We were there before opening and closed the place down. The kids had a great day.
On day 2, we explored Columbus. It was a little chilly, so it wasn’t great being outside. We went to a nature center and walked around inside, doing their little coloring activities. Then we did an obstacle course that was meant for adults, but the kids gave it their all. Outside of lunch at McDonalds and ice cream at dinner, we didn’t spend anything this day. We were able to get back to the condo for the littlest to take a nap, so the day worked out really well.
On day 3, we packed up from our condo and went hiking at a state park. It was a really nice day and the kids did so well keeping up and walking the whole way (well, the 2 year old was in a pack). We checked into the hotel and then went to dinner at a sit-down restaurant, which killed some time.
On the final day, we ate breakfast and the kids went swimming at the hotel. Then we packed up, drove into KY to find free parking, walked across the Ohio River to the Reds stadium, and spent the afternoon at the baseball game. The Reds have a kids play area, which was right at our seats. Surprisingly that didn’t pose an issue with the kids; we went to our seats and watched the whole game. It definitely helped that it was barely more than 2 hours of game time! Then we all walked back over the bridge (this was impressive to me with 2 kids walking) and got home before bed time.
LODGING: ~$900
We like to pick an AirBnB type place for our trips. Our youngest still required a pitch black room for sleeping. We also just want to be able to put the kids to bed, but stay up ourselves. We booked a condo (which I try to avoid so I don’t have the stress of keeping kids quiet for neighbors), but it was awesome. There was a pool table in the lobby, it was easy to navigate, and we didn’t have any sound issues. It was walking distance to CoSI and we had a surprise art fair right outside one night. I just wish it had been a bit warmer so we could have used the pool they had open, but I really enjoyed.
We had paid $246 for a hotel night in Cincinnati. We booked it through our Chase travel portal, which becomes relevant later in this story. The itinerary of our trip meant that we wanted to leave Columbus, go hiking for a day halfway to Cincinnati, and then spend the night near the baseball stadium. We figured a hotel would be easiest because we’d get a pool to play in and breakfast handled for us. We checked in, got our things from our car, and THEN the front desk told us “oops – you booked two beds, but we only have a king.” We ended up making it work, but that was frustrating. Then the next day, they had told us they’d take $100 off, but our bill showed about $60 off. We tried to fight it, but they kept claiming they couldn’t do anymore because it was a third-party booking (and yet you could do something?).
FOOD: ~$150
We didn’t go into it pushing that we’d eat at the AirBnB, so that was a nice break from stress. We usually make sure to maximize our food budget by eating meals at our house, but it helped our itinerary this time around to eat at restaurants. We brought breakfast foods since we’re not extravagant breakfast people.
We stopped at Costco on the way up there, which gets us gas and a quick/cheap meal. We ate lunch at the museum on day 2 and made dinner after a long day at the AirBnB. On the third day, we ate lunch at McDonalds (which we’re well-versed in using the app for deals) and made dinner again after getting ice cream out. Then we packed lunch for a hiking day and ate at a restaurant that Mr. ODA was reimbursed for (doing ‘shops). For the final day, we ate breakfast at the hotel and then ate at the Reds stadium the last day. Mr. ODA bought one of the ‘all you can eat’ packages, which worked out well for us.
SUMMARY
I definitely recommend CoSI. Our kids were 6, 4, and 2. All 3 of them had fun, and we had no issue staying the whole day. I don’t think it’s necessary to do a second day. We did two planetarium shows and were able to hit all the sections except the indoor toddler play area (which I didn’t find necessary since we can do that outside a museum). The kids did great at the museum, walking around Columbus, hiking, and going to the baseball game. It was just the right pace that kept us occupied, but not overly busy and stressed.
This was a good year. We took a lot of trips, made some good memories, and purchased some fun things. While day to day life has been hard with 3 little kids and managing some of my own interests, it really was a fun and rewarding year when I look at the big picture.
PERSONAL: MY YEAR
I went through a lot of growth in this year. I started the year with a girls trip, which was really healing in my mom-of-3 world. After that trip, I hunkered down on my diet and exercise. Over 10 months, I lost 22 pounds. Each kid added about 10 pounds to my body’s desired size (where I just plateau unless I put a lot of effort in). It’s not something that I regularly discussed with people or mentioned, but it is something that I’m pretty proud of and took effort. I ran a 5k in August, where I beat my time from the year before, and it didn’t feel like it took any effort to beat that, which was nice.
But then my oldest started kindergarten, which was a surprisingly hard adjustment in my schedule. He was completely ready for school, and him going wasn’t the hard part. I welcome new phases of life and mostly don’t dwell on the losses that those mean. However, the schedule of the year took me two or three months to get used to. He gets on the bus at 7, #2 gets dropped off at 9, she gets picked up at 12, baby takes a nap from 1:30-3:15, oldest gets off the bus at 2:45. It was just a lot of broken up time in my day, and it took so much out of me each day. I finally feel like I’m used to it and can be productive in those short periods in between.
We were told that our preschool will be changing ownership next school year, which threw a wrench in my plans. Sure, things will work out. But it doesn’t change that I had a plan that didn’t need to be thought about. I had a financial expectation that didn’t need to be budgeted for or considered any further. It was another thing that took mental energy from me. I had originally thought I’d not send the 3rd kid to a 2s year like the other two kids. I spent some days mourning that alone time I was giving up by keeping him home. But I toured a preschool, and that’s my wish list for next year. If we don’t get into that preschool, I’ll likely just keep him home with me and try for the 3s year there. It’s just a socializing desire. I don’t work and need child care, so it’s a privilege to send him if it works out.
On top of all the parenting jobs I have, my job managing our rental properties is another job that takes a ton of time and mental energy, but no one really sees the fruit of that labor. May was the only month this past year where everyone paid rent on time. While I’m pretty lenient on that, that’s still time that I’m taking to manage and keep up with. I have one tenant who hasn’t put the water bill in her name yet. Supposedly it’s a city issue, and she always pays when I send her a picture of the bill, but it’s still a time sucker that I have. Then add in that we have several maintenance requests that come up, and a few big projects that were needed.
Related to the rentals, I made 44 posts on this blog. I set a goal to post once per week, preferably on Thursdays, for the year. I fell short by 8 weeks, and I wasn’t consistent with the Thursday post each week. I did well when I had inspiration, and I always did the monthly updates, but I didn’t meet my goal. I’ll keep the same goal of once per week, preferably on Thursdays, for this year. While my reach isn’t far, I do hope that someone will find this little corner and gain a new perspective on their finances. Plus, I appreciate being able to go back to our monthly updates to see how things have changed. It’s hard to see it when you’re looking month-to-month, but to see a drastic jump in numbers from a year ago is nice.
PERSONAL: THE FAMILY
We made it to 12 states this year, and that’s pretty cool. The kids got to see a lot, and they’re really interested in different states and their stats. I appreciate that curiosity and the ability to learn while traveling. Only one trip was on a plane, which was to Colorado. We did a 2-week long trip to New York and Michigan, with a few stops in there. We went to Chicago for a wedding and explored the area, took the kids to Gatlinburg for Fall Break, went to Ohio to watch the eclipse in totality, and tagged along on Mr. ODA’s work trip to South Carolina.
Mr. ODA sold his 15 year old vehicle, and we purchased a Tesla. I didn’t have a great experience with one in Colorado, but I think that was more related to the circumstances than actual electric vehicle ownership. I had a great experience with the test drive, and we picked one up by the end of that week. We took advantage of their 0% interest and 3 months of free charging. We also referred a friend of ours, so we received $1000 in Tesla credits that we’ll use for charging after the free period.
We bought a hot tub. That was a purchase that was about a year in the making, so it wasn’t made lightly. There hasn’t been two days in a row where someone didn’t get in it, until we just left for a week (hoping that the water is in good shape when I get back!). Our deck was crushed by a tree in July 2023, and it wasn’t rebuilt until May 2024. Then we had to take the time to make the decisions on what we wanted, get it ordered, and wait for delivery. It was delivered in November, and it’s been a great purchase thus far. We haven’t done such a splurge before, and it’s nice to give ourselves something that we can enjoy.
The kids are doing their activities. We’ve been in a nice lull, but I recently saw our March calendar from this past year and was reminded of all those hours! Our oldest is doing t-ball for a second year. Our second is regularly doing gymnastics, but we’re also letting her do t-ball this spring. Our oldest is also doing an after school activity for checkers, but supposedly it’s in a fun way, so that’ll be interesting to see pan out. He was accepted into an advanced program for his 99th percentile state testing scores, which was a really exciting moment as parents. Our second will finish out her preschool year and go to kindergarten next year. And we hope to have another fun season over the next two months with everyone on skis!
RENTAL PROPERTIES
Besides the management of late rent payments, I had to put a lot of hours into these houses this year. We took a trip to Richmond, VA to work on quite a few of these houses. On top of that, there were several other activities that were needed, management of tenant turnover, and management of rental income, but I’ll save that for a future post so this doesn’t grow too long.
FINANCES
Our net worth increased by $745,000. We started the year with a goal of hitting $4 million net worth, and that was achieved in a short time. Month to month feels like we’re barely moving the needle, but it’s amazing to see that number over the course of a year.
We paid off one 0% interest credit card from our carpet replacement in our personal home, and then we opened a new 0% interest credit card to pay for the hot tub. That new card gets 2% cash back, so it’s being used more than we usually use a 0% interest card. Typically, we just pay for the major purchase and then pay it down over the 0% interest period. This time around, it’s being used for every day purchases so the monthly payment I’m making is more than I’d usually see.
I have a separate post that goes into our extra income that we brought in over the last year, which is related to earned credit card rewards and interest on savings accounts and bonds. That’s even cooler to see the total ($14k!) because that was actual cash that went into our account and was used.
In the last year, I only officially worked 11 days, which is crazy to think about. But I’ve been doing random other jobs to help others out. I’m on our homeowners association board of directors, and I’ve been helping a new school get their financials up and running. I’m ready to take a step back from the finance work because my commitment to the HOA feels more pressing, but we’ll see how the next couple of months progress. It’s just really hard to get things done when I’m rarely without a toddler who wants my attention (unless I get up at 4:30 or 5 am).
SUMMARY
This year has felt like it took a lot more hours from me for work and management of things. But I also feel like I have more energy now that I’m two years from having our last baby. We have lots of other things planned for this coming year, and I hope to take some even bigger trips to see more of the country now that we have a bit less baggage coming out of the baby years. We have no plans to make any big purchases at this time (although there are new windows needed on our house in the next couple of years), and I really hope this year is lots of fun with the family more than anything else.
In 2021, we looked to buy a lake house. We tried so hard to find something, and we almost settled on something that didn’t fully make us happy. It was March or April of that year, and we finally stepped back and said, “instead of buying a house here that we feel pressured to come to every weekend, what if we just went on vacation more.” Up until that point, we traveled a good bit, but it was typically with a purpose instead of just traveling for the sake of seeing somewhere new (e.g., one of us tagging along on work travel). We calculated that our mortgage payment on that second house would be $1200 per month. That was our budget for travel each month. I wrote a whole post about it.
Then I got pregnant and we bought a new primary residence in the summer of 2022. Almost all our ‘travel’ that summer was just us going to the new house to work on it before we moved in. Then the summer of 2023 was spent recovering from the newborn phase of that third kid that was unbelievably painful. I was just happy to be sleeping and in a routine again, and I wasn’t willing to leave home much and risk lack of sleep.
We made up for it this summer.
JUNE: MD, NY, OH, MI $1,251
Our first trip of the summer was two weeks long. I was so nervous to manage 3 kids (one of which is still a high maintenance sleeper) and a dog for that long, but I had hoped it would be fine if I prepared correctly. We hit four states.
Our son was on the Oriole’s for his baseball team this spring, so that became his favorite MLB team. It just so happened that they were playing at home on our drive from KY to NY (meaning, if we really wanted to, Baltimore could be on the way). As an added bonus, they were playing the Braves, which is Mr. ODA’s favorite team. So we made that work. We booked a hotel in Baltimore that was pet friendly and walking distance to the stadium, and then we bought the tickets. Actually, we bought two tickets for 5 of us to go. The Oriole’s stadium has a program where if you buy a ticket in the upper section, you can have up to two free tickets for kids up to 9 years old. It’s an incredible program. The detour cost us more in tolls than we’d typically spend on our route. It was worth it. Our son watched the whole game and was so happy with it.
Then we traveled to NY. There’s no lodging cost there because we stay at my dad’s house. We went to the local team’s baseball game one night, hung out at the beach one night, had two cookouts, and went to my cousin’s bridal shower. The bridal shower was the reason for the trip. The Michigan component then was booked as the other side of the family’s annual trip. It didn’t make sense for us to drive home from NY and then back up to MI, so we just buckled up for the two weeks gone. We didn’t eat at any restaurants while we were in NY, so our costs were a couple of grocery trips and our family cookouts.
The trip from NY to MI was 13.5 hours without any stops, so we didn’t want to push the kids that far. We typically do the KY to NY trip in one day. That takes 13-14 hours depending on traffic and our stops. It would take about 11.5-12 hours without kids. We usually do two quick stops and one longer meal out of the car when we drive straight through. But with it starting at 13+ hours, I didn’t want to risk it. Plus, I wanted to arrive in Michigan around check in time, which would have us leaving NY at about 2 am. I covet my kids’ sleep too much to risk that one!
Our stop on the way was Cuyahoga Falls, OH. Again, we needed to find something that was pet friendly without charging us $175 to have the dog there for 14 hours. We found a hotel that didn’t charge for a pet, and it appears that’s because they don’t really care about cleanliness. The room was disgusting. The mirrors looked like they’d never been cleaned, the counters had someone’s old rice on them, the door wasn’t fully attached to its hinges, and the sinks didn’t drain. At least the bedding was clean (I inspected closely). I was grateful to only be there for 14 hours.
We went hiking that morning and then headed to MI, dropping the dog off at a sitter on the way there. We use Rover to find a sitter, which is where the sitter takes the dog into their house. I appreciate this type of care/attention than a kennel; we’ve used this service for 11 years now.
Our MI trip was Mr. ODA’s family trip for the year. His parents treat us to the house, and the kids’ families cover the food. Usually our trip doesn’t involve many extra expenses, but this year we sought out a place with activities, so there was a lot of money spent. We went on a dune buggy ride, walked a windmill island, went to a little ‘dutch village’ theme park, picked cherries, and spent a lot of time at the beach. We usually eat all our meals at the AirBnB, but we did have two meals out and lots of ice cream this time around. Honestly, it was the best trip we’ve taken in a while. I appreciated the ‘vacation’ aspect of it, where we did things around the area and had fun with activities.
JULY: VA $570
This was actually a work trip. Last summer, we didn’t make it to Richmond to do property walk throughs because our baby was such a handful. We’ve had a lot of work done over the last year, and there were a few things noted by tenants that are just easier for us to handle in a few minutes than pay someone hundreds to handle.
We cleaned the siding on multiple houses, checked some gutters, replaced a few things, and painted a front door and front porch. It was a 3 night trip, and we put about 20 hours worth of work into it. It was hard to juggle the work that needed to be done, having 3 kids in tow, and a heat index of over 110 each day, but we got what we could get done. I wrote a post about the work we did earlier this summer. Our expenses were the hotel ($401), gas, and food. We actually had a surprisingly low food expense on this trip considering we stayed in a hotel (lack of kitchen and time).
While there, we were able to see a few of our old friends. However, we planned this trip fairly last minute and had to fit it around other activities already scheduled at home, so we didn’t get as much ‘play’ time as we’d prefer.
JULY: CO$3,350
Mr. ODA’s brother wanted to celebrate his 40th birthday by hiking 14-ers in Colorado. He invited a few people to join, and Mr. ODA spent the first half of this year getting in shape for that activity. Honestly, in January, this idea seemed so far away, so it was exciting when the moment arrived. Mr. ODA wanted to go out earlier than the trip’s original itinerary to acclimate to the change in elevation. That’s where I came in.
We booked a flight for all 5 of us to fly out there on the 18th (well, the baby was free). We spent the weekend around the Denver area, and then I flew home with the kids on the 22nd, while he stayed to hang out with his brother’s crew.
We had to buy flights, rent a car, book lodging, and buy groceries/meals. We did more-than-average entertainment for this trip with a concert and baseball game, so that increased our expenses.
On our first full day, we visited Mount Blue Sky, which is a drive up to the top of a 14er (a summit above 14,000 feet). It was a really unique and cool experience. On Saturday, we hiked at Red Rocks and went to a concert at Ball Arena. On Sunday, we went to a Rockies game and walked around Denver. It was a great trip, and the kids were troopers through all the fun.
AUGUST: NY $430
My cousin got married in NY. Typically, I’d take this opportunity to get my whole family to NY to see my side of the family. However, our oldest started school already, and I didn’t want him to miss any of that, especially on day 3. The whole family flying to NY is expensive, plus we’d have to figure out the babysitting need for while we’re at the wedding. While I have a few people I could call on, it’s more difficult when the intent is for the closest adults I know to be at the wedding.
We booked direct flights for Mr. ODA and me to fly out Friday afternoon and come back Sunday afternoon. We had the kids stay with grandparents for the two nights, and this way the grandparents didn’t have to manage any kid activities except getting our oldest off the bus. Our two flights cost $376.40, and it included a checked bag if we wanted it because of our American Airlines credit card rewards. Parking at the airport is $11 per day, so that was $33. Our original plan was to take the train from JFK to where my dad’s house is, but we pivoted because he offered to pick us up and take us out to dinner. Our meals were covered except for on the way out and the way back, and one coffee I purchased while there. It was a nice little trip where we had fun and could just focus on that versus managing the kids’ schedule, so I appreciated that.
Mr. ODA had two work trips this summer on top of all that we did as a family. Those net us income instead of expenses, so I won’t go into them. I mention it just to point out how busy and entertained we were. I’d say we’re looking forward to winding down, but now baseball and gymnastics start up on top of managing kids at two different schools. But I’m loving it and looking forward to what this next season brings.
Why did we do so much traveling and activities this spring and summer? Most people probably assume all our travel was making up for a year of not traveling during the pandemic, but we came at it from a different perspective.
We’ve had a long term goal of a beach/lake/mountain home. After another failed search to make this dream come true this past Spring, we decided to redirect that money to trips this summer. I’ll run through the background, the financial decision, and how we spent our travel “budget.”
BACKGROUND
We first looked into a vacation rental in Snowshoe, WV – six years ago. Snowshoe is a ski resort, and one of the better available ones to those of us south of the Mason Dixon. It also has a draw during the summer with hiking and mountain biking, albeit not as constant of a stream of people needing a rental. The draw for us was that it was halfway between our home in VA and Mr. ODA’s family in KY.
We went as far as meeting a Realtor and looking at properties. If the house was off Snowshoe proper, it was a good distance from the ski lifts and not in great condition. If the house (condo) was on Snowshoe proper, it came with a lot of rules and regulations and costs. Everything near the ski lifts had to be under Snowshoe’s management, which included their cleaning costs, and their booking process. This meant that someone couldn’t necessarily go onto the website to book our unit. Someone would go on their website and book “a 2 bed and 1 bath unit” and the system would cycle through the bookings. With the high condo costs and the uncertain bookings for those units, as well as the distant location of the units that weren’t subject to the condo process and cost (plus finding a management and cleaning company for that), we stopped the search.
Since then, it’s been on the wish list, but we weren’t sure what direction we wanted to go.
When we moved to KY, we decided to look into a lake house. We want it to be close enough that we could just pick up and go (e.g., trying to keep it under 2 hours), we want it to be on a lake that allows motor sports (so this rules out anything that’s “no wake” or prohibits motors of any kind), and we want it to be lake front (we learned this during our recent search, and hadn’t fully realized how much we wanted this until we saw a house that wasn’t on the lake directly).
We looked at parcels of land and kept an eye on a few houses listed in the March/April timeframe of this year. Our initial thought was that we would purchase land and hold it until we were ready to have a house built. The parcels of land we looked at didn’t meet the criteria we wanted (good size, on the water, ability to build a dock). I started to feel like we were pressuring ourselves to make a decision for something that we didn’t actually need.
We took a break and just kept an eye on Zillow. We went to see a new construction house on Herrington Lake, but it wasn’t actually on the lake. It was next to the community pool, across the street from the community’s dock, had 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms with a loft, and it was brand new. It even had a two car garage, which wasn’t something on our wish list. However, the price tag was high; it had been listed for many months, and we didn’t feel the comps supported such a cost for it not being literally on the lake. We spent a lot of time mulling it over, but decided to not even put an offer in. Lucky for the seller, they did get a full price offer shortly after that.
I decided that we should wait at that point. I figured we may have better luck waiting until the end of the summer (perhaps people will think they’ll spend their last summer on the lake and then unload it?), and that we shouldn’t force this decision to not get exactly what we want for something that isn’t a necessity.
THE FINANCIAL DECISION
If we purchased a $250,000 second home, and I assume an interest rate at 4.5% (even with excellent credit, the rates you see advertised are for primary residences), we’re looking at a mortgage payment of $1,200. On top of that, we’ll have escrow costs, HOA costs, the possibility of management fees, and then even PMI costs. That was another big factor; we’ve been throwing any ‘extra’ money towards paying off two rental property mortgages, so we don’t have $50,000 liquid to cover a 20% down payment. Without having the 20% down payment, it wasn’t even guaranteed that we’d be able to get a loan for a vacation house.
Knowing $250,000 was even more than we expected to spend, I conservatively assumed $1,200 in monthly house costs. Instead of spending $1,200 each month to go to the same destination over and over again, why don’t we just mentally allocate $1,200 each month to travel and go to all different places? And so, months of a crazy amount of travel began.
HOW DID WE SPEND OUR ENTERTAINMENT ALLOCATION?
MAY: $618
We started with a last minute trip to Atlanta to see the Braves. We spent 4 nights in Atlanta, went to two baseball games, met up with family for lunch, visited Stone Mountain, and explored the city parks. We stayed in a 2-bedroom hotel room because it was cheaper than any AirBnB options, and I was highly focused on giving the kids separate sleeping spaces. The hotel experience was less than favorable (dirty, AC broken, limited breakfast, roaches … and a good name hotel!), and after some conversations with the hotel, we ended up not paying for it. They had credited us one night without us asking after the AC continued to not work after their “fix.” Mr. ODA then had a casual conversation with the manager about the stay as he was checking out, and the manager credited a second night. I thought we paid for the rest of the nights, but it never showed up on the credit card. Our total trip cost was $460.
Later in May, we went camping in the Daniel Boone National Forest with some family. We booked a “cabin” (I used that term loosely; it was walls, a roof, and platforms for sleeping bags, but it had electricity and AC!) for two nights. We went swimming, rode bikes, and hung out under a canopy while it poured on us for most of the main day we were there. Our dog got to come on this trip, so we didn’t have any pet fees. We brought groceries to cover our meals since there’s nothing close by. Since we’d be buying groceries anyway and gas is negligible since it’s an hour away, I’ll just focus on lodging, which cost us $158.
JUNE: $200
Almost a year ago, we planned a trip with the extended family to Hocking Hills. This shouldn’t really count against our “monthly allowance” mentality since it was going to happen regardless, but I’m including it anyway since we didn’t do any other June trip. Mr. ODA’s parents covered the cost of lodging, and the rest of us covered the cost of food and our canoe rentals. We went hiking, got rained on, and played games at our rental. On the last full day, we rented canoes and went down the Hocking River, which was a great experience. We went with 6 kids, 3 of which were under 3 years old. So if you’re a beginner or looking for something to do with little ones, this was a fun time for $52 per canoe! This trip cost us about $200.
JULY: $690
Before we left Virginia, we discussed doing walk throughs of our properties and being more present with them. There were some properties that we hadn’t seen since we bought it because they don’t have maintenance requests or we call someone else for the work. Well, it was a whirlwind to move, and we didn’t do that last summer. After the debacle with the flooring replacement at one of the houses, we knew we needed to get back there to tie up loose ends. We have a wedding to attend in the area in September, but decided this couldn’t wait until then. The first weekend we could go ended up being the 4th of July. Being in Richmond, VA, there isn’t a large AirBnB market for a normal sized family. All of the options that were available were meant for multiple families in a large house, and we just aren’t interested in paying $700 per night for ourselves. We went with a hotel halfway between Richmond and our old neighborhood, and because we stayed for 5 nights, it was considered “long term,” and it only cost us $525, which included $75 for the dog being with us. Since our entertainment was either working on rental houses or visiting with our old friends, we just had food and gas costs. The total trip cost was $690 (and most of that was tax deductible!).
AUGUST $1069
We learned that St. Louis is only about 4.5 hours away from us, so we looked to see the Braves’ schedule. They were scheduled for mid-week games for the first week of August, so we marked it down. Unfortunately, things were busy, and I didn’t make the plans in advance. I struggled to find pet care for our dog, and I ended up booking an AirBnB the morning before we left. We searched and searched, and this one randomly popped up that morning, and it worked out well. Lodging cost us $585. Our entertainment (tickets and parking) cost us $135. Food and gas cost us $213. Total trip cost was $933.
My plan to visit my family in NY in July didn’t come to fruition because we had to manage 4 days worth of our builder being here to fix things in the house, and then I had a doctors appointment pop up that had to be a specific time. Instead of driving there and back (12+ hours each way), we booked some flights. We’re able to go from Cincinnati to JFK directly (such a blessing with 2 kids under 3!). The flight was 2 hours, plus an hour on each side for driving (although, it took us an hour and a half to get to my parents’ house when we landed at JFK because a 3:20 arrival, plus what felt like a 2 mile walk from the gate to passenger pickup, put us at getting on the Belt Parkway at 4 pm – that’s not good for that area!), and getting to the airport an hour early. We left out of LGA, but it was still a direct flight, and we arrived 25 minutes early! We had hardly any wait at TSA for either leg, no issues with boarding or the flight, and we got our gate checked bags easily. I’ll take 5-6 hours of travel over 12+ hours. The flights were booked through our Chase Travel Portal, costing us the equivalent of $833 in points. The parking is $9 per day, the gas to get there is negligible, and we actually didn’t spend anything on food (I very much owe my parents for that!). Our entertainment goal was to go swimming in my parents’ pool the whole time, and that’s just what we did! The trip cost us $36 in parking and $100 for our dog’s boarding.
On top of these long trips, we also did a lot more activities that were just for one day. We went to 2 Reds games, the Cincinnati Zoo several times, a UK baseball game, Bernheim Forest, and random family/friend activities. It turns out we didn’t spend the $1200 per month we had mentally allocated, but we kept ourselves really busy and had a great time making memories!
Now it’s time to enter a new phase of life: preschool and sports! I’m pretty excited!
One Dollar Allowance 