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I Loved Having a Vacation Budget

  January 9

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Hey blog peeps!! I have so many fun updates to share with you over the next few days. It’s been a whirlwind past few weeks with the holidays and getting the hubs home from Grenada and then traveling to San Antonio for a week long vacation. Oh, and hey – I’m a full time blogger now. What whatttttt. Party in the hizouse!

I definitely want to fill you in on the transition to self employment, how I did on my 2013 goals, and a few other fun things, so get ready for some information overload over the next week or so! I know you’re pumped. 😀

I have a lot of great things to say about San Antonio, which is where the hubs and I traveled last week to celebrate our 4 year anniversary and our “babymoon” aka our last trip before our twins arrive!

I know that a lot of people take short breaks to Paris or the Caribbean or other awesome places during this time of year, but we were really happy with our easy vacation to Texas. It only took us about 7.5 hours to get there, and it was a really peaceful, calming drive.

The best part was that it was the holidays, and the good peeps of San Antonio hang thousands of lights along the Riverwalk. Woo hoo – talk about romantic. We basically just spent four days walking up and down the river, trying new restaurants, and we took one of those little boat tours where you bundle up and go look at all the lights.

Here is the worst iPhone picture of all time so you can see what I mean:

San Antionio riverwalkHonestly, my favorite thing that we did the whole trip was go see a movie. We haven’t been to a real, legitimate movie theater in years. Literally. Grenada doesn’t count, haha. This movie theater was fancy schmancy too. It had massive leather chairs that you could lean all the way back. It was basically like hubs and I had a big couch to ourselves, and because we went for a matinee, it was only $4.50 each. We left wondering why we never go to the movies. It seriously was the best day. (Obviously after living in Grenada for so long, we are easily impressed with just about anything in the States, haha!)

As far as our budget, we did pretty well on that front too. As you might remember from this post, I saved up $1,500 for about a year and a half for this getaway. We ended up spending around $1,650 which is pretty good seeing as we had a lot of nice meals, five nights in a hotel, and I had an expensive prenatal massage.

I can’t tell you how great it was to just take the savings we had and apply it immediately to the credit card when I got home like it never happened. I don’t know why I spent so many years without a budget or without properly planning budgets for vacations. It completely took the stress away to have the money saved up ahead of time and a ballpark figure in my head while we went about our day-to-day activities on our trip.

Overall, we had a nice time, but it’s definitely back to work for this blogger. 🙂

How was your holiday? Did anyone else travel anywhere fun or back home to see the fam?

27 responses to “I Loved Having a Vacation Budget

  1. Sounds like so much fun Cat! Glad you guys got to go away for a bit.

  2. Looks like you both had a well deserved vacation! Glad to see you used the money and didn’t feel guilty for doing so. We all need time off to enjoy ourselves. I have a free vacation coming up thanks to rewards but I’m taking off more days than I normally would because I need the time off.

    Congrats on the full time blogging now too!

  3. I stayed around home this year. In the past, we went away between Christmas and New Years . We would stay at a B & B or hotel for the week. As a lifelong planner, I would never go on vacation or go out without a budget. It may not be formal, but I want to know I can enjoy the experience.

  4. That sounds like a great trip! I hear you on the movies being a great date night. I’ll let you in on a little secret: the missus and I go see a movie in every country we visit. I know it’s a lame thing to do when you’re abroad, but it’s fun, so we don’t care. Plus, you can buy a beer in a movie theater in Ireland. How cool is that?

    Glad you’re having a relaxing babymoon, and congrats on going full time freelancing!

  5. So glad you had a good time!! We’re saving to take a family vacation this year too, nothing big just a few days unplugged!

  6. Hi Cat! Funny story: my wife and I went to a movie on Christmas Day for the first time in a LONG time, and we went to a different theater than we usually go to. Little did we know they renovated the theater and have reserved seating, and the seats were those nice big leather lean-back chairs! We are questioning why we would ever go to another theater. I suppose if we went with a group of friends we’d go to a “regular” old theater but those chairs are hard to beat.

    Looking forward to some more of your updates.

  7. Glad you had a nice babymoon! Glad you guys got to get away. And FYI, I have also rediscovered the movies in adulthood. We have been at least 5-6 times in the last few months!

  8. I’m so glad you and your husband had a chance to take a nice vacation before the twins arrive! San Antonio is beautiful and I bet the Riverwalk is gorgeous during the holidays. I love my vacation budget too. Sure, it may mean I can’t go on fancy vacations as often as those who just put them on their credit cards and worry about paying for it later, but it feels so good to payoff that vacation in one swoop.

  9. Glad to hear you had fun on your babymoon. My wife is still disappointed we didn’t take one. Now with the little one, we’re too tired to go anywhere. Though I know many couples with young children who travel. Fortunately, most of our family live nearby and my wife’s siblings came here during the holidays.

  10. Sounds like you had a great vacation. I often find that driving to a destination is very often more relaxing than flying, and you can bring more stuff to make yourself more comfortable. On top of that, saving up, prior to spending money is always preferable to me. It’s how I was raised. 🙂

  11. Sounds like such a great time! Vacation budgets are AMAZING. I’m so jealous of the prenatal massage…always wanted one while preggo but never splurged! With one pregnancy I had to go to physical therapy, though, so that kind of counted. :p

  12. Glad you had a chance to relax and go on a babymoon. Vacations are the best, and when you budget it can be carefree! I went home to LA to visit family and it was so nice. I hadn’t been home in 4 years during the holidays, so it was awesome. I look forward to hearing more about your transition to self-employment and rocking the blogging front!

  13. We stayed at home, since my pregnant belly is pretty big now (4 more weeks till birth), but we do save money upfront for our vacations and we DO BUDGET. It’s a great way to enjoy ourselves and yet not go over the budget or into debt.

  14. That sounds fantastic! Love that you had a wonderful time and weren’t stressed about money! Budgeting for fun is wonderful, isn’t it?

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