a mother with three small children sit on a large swing on a farm

Travelling with Kids, The Nightmare Version

by

Christine Coughlin

,

Motherhood, Travel

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Do you travel with your kids?

Mine destroyed private property on our recent Whistler getaway. That was a fun end to the trip! ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
Let me back up a minute.

Matt sweetly suggested we take his mom to Whistler to celebrate her birthday. I had also been saying I wanted to do a Whistler trip, so he was getting all kinds of brownie points.

Starting Strong

The first two days of the trip were amazing! Everyone was excited and on best behaviour. Saturday we met with friends we hadn’t seen in years and had a lovely day at North Arm Farm. The weather was perfect, the kids all got along and the parents actually got to visit. We were winning!⠀⠀

Travelling_with_kids_whistler_bc
North Arm Farm, Pemberton BC

The Shift

That night we got everyone to bed early and were about to settle in for some kid-free time. Suddenly, the fire alarm in the hotel started ringing. We woke up the two little ones, scared the hell out of Maddie and evacuated the hotel.

It was a false alarm. Now to put everyone back to bed, no biggie.

Except they’d basically had a 1.5 nap so no one was tired. Still, we got to do a run-through of fire safety procedures, which was a good lesson. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀

From the second eyes opened the next morning it was a battle zone. Everything was a big f’ing deal. We got packed up and headed out for a stroll in the village. ⠀⠀⠀

travelling with kids in whistler BC
The Whistler Village, Playground

The Incident

Matt decided to pop into a store to look for some boots. At that point, our kids turned into animals and took turns hanging off the clothing bar in the change room. Which they managed to rip it out of the drywall causing one kid to smash to the floor and get scratched by the falling bar.

Where was I you ask?

I was sitting nearby helping hubby choose some new boots. After two days of making everything magical AF for my beautiful family and a very rough morning, I just needed to sit down and help hubby make some fashion choices.

Seconds before “the incident,” Matt asked, “Where are the kids?” To which I happily said, “in the change room, what trouble could they cause in there?”

Cue crashing sounds! 

The Parenting Shame Spiral

After death stares from the store manager, judging eyes from other very young employees who still have the privilege of being perfect hypothetical parents, one incident form filled out, two pairs of boots bought (because guilt), one parenting walk of shame we left the store. 

Our drive home was tense. We were both in a parenting shame spiral, embarrassed, exhausted and wondering why this feels so hard for us. 

It’s now three days later, the emotions are starting to fade. We’ve had two good nights’ sleep. We’ve all discussed our favourite parts of the trip. There were beautiful memories made, but my word we worked our asses off for them! 

Do you have a cringe-worthy travel memory with your kids? Share in the comments, because it helps to know you aren’t the only one on the struggle bus.

You may also enjoy, Tips for Travelling with Kids, featuring The Panel, where several Mothers share their best tips and mindset tricks for successful family travel.

XX Christine

Originally posted to Instagram October 9, 2019

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