About

Traveling With My Son

The first time I traveled with my son, he was eight months, and we spent a week in Arizona.  Despite traveling with all the big things that go along with a little one, the trip was pretty easy and even offered up some laughs when he practiced crawling down the aisle of the airplane stopping to touch some lady’s leopard suede boot. Although our first trip went smoothly and was a lot of fun, we didn’t travel a lot until my son entered the third grade.  It was in the third grade that he began to learn about social studies and science, and I found that going to places that he was studying about actually enhanced his learning.

Planning Trips

Besides planning trips around what my son is studying in school, I have also been using Frommer’s 500 Places To Take Your Kids Before They Grow Up.  It has been a lot of fun to check out many of the places listed, and many of them are educational.  So far we have checked off over 100 places, so we still have ways to go!  One of the primary goals of our travels is to learn something we didn’t know before, so in addition to historical, scientific or literary pit-stops, we also like to go to places where we discover a new skill, like blowing glass or archery.  Of course, I do try to keep a balance and include a little “R & R” and enjoy days in national parks taking in nature or soaking up some rays by the ocean.

Places That We Loved So Much, We Might Have To Go Back Again

My son would excitedly say the Atlantis in the Bahamas.  He enjoyed the trip and loved swimming with dolphins, snorkeling, and feeding the sea turtles and stingrays.  I, on the other hand, am a city girl and love Washington D.C. and London and could go back often since I am a culture and history fanatic.

Traveling Before My Little Guy (who is not so little anymore)

I did travel before I had my son, but not extensively.  To be honest, I didn’t start to travel until my early 20s when I moved to New York City from Louisiana after college.  Moving to NYC opened my eyes to different cultures and made me curious about the world.  One of my favorite trips was to Italy with one of my best friends.  Seeing Rome was fantastic, but traveling to Sorrento, Pompeii, Pisa, and Siena were terrific because it was low key and my friend Tracie and I were able to spend time with the locals.  It was during amazing these trips that I reflected on as my son started growing.  I realized the only way my son was going to understand different cultures and diversities were to experience it first hand. The world is a book and seeing a place like Stonehenge is fantastic.  There is no way to grasp how large the stones are unless you see them.  You can’t get that from TV or a book.

How I Travel

I am a big fan of road trips because you can see so much more and also your money can go a little further so you can do more instead of spending on how you get there.  Of course, we do often fly too, so I typically use sites like Trip Advisor, Expedia, and Hotels.com and I always take advantage of rewards programs.  I also do a ridiculous amount of research.  I love searching other travel blogs, following others that travel on twitter and I am addicted to Pinterest!

Why I Blog

Honestly, after traveling for a couple of years with my son, many of my friends told me I should write a book.  Intimidated by the whole book thing, I thought about doing freelance writing, so I signed up for travel writing course through the Travel Channel.  When I arrived in Washington, D.C. for the weekend course, I quickly learned about the world of blogging and set up this blog in the class.  All of our adventures that I write about are budget-friendly, and I get very excited when we discover something new, so I hope by sharing our experiences I will entice other families to travel.  I also hope that the things that I have learned on our trips will help other families that are planning trips to the same destinations or perhaps give them a travel idea that they didn’t think of before.  So in short, I only blog to share experiences and be a resource to others, and I am not looking for press trips or free travel.   I am on the other hand interested in expanding my writing and would love to do a guest post for other family travel bloggers and am open to freelance travel writing opportunities.

DREAMING BIG And If I Could Travel To Anywhere In The World, I Would Go…

I would love to go on a Smithsonian Journeys Tour.  Specifically, I would like to go on their  “Cultures & Cuisines Tour” to Asia, the Middle East, and Europe.  After I finished the tour, I would love to stay in Europe for six months to a year bouncing around and with extended time in France.

A Word of Thanks

If you are reading this page, I assume you are interested in traveling and hopefully have enjoyed some of my posts, so I want to THANK YOU for clicking on The Traveling Classroom sincerely.  If you found a post that has been helpful or that you only just enjoyed reading, please subscribe, so you can receive email notifications when I make a new blog entry.  Don’t worry you won’t get inundated since I typically update my blog once a week.  If email is not your thing, you can always “Like” my page on Facebook, or follow me on Twitter or Pinterest.  Thanks again for clicking and Happy Travels!