We’re Going on a Real Vacation and I Can’t Wait!

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In two months, we’re headed off on our first real vacation in almost six years. We’ve been away a little bit, mostly family stuff for long weekends, maybe two weeks total, in the last five years. When a patient asked if I was taking time off this year, my boss actually joked that I’m a work-a-holic and never take time off. Thankfully I have a career I really enjoy or else I probably would have snapped a long time ago!

I have friends and family who work high stress jobs and need the time off or will mentally and physically burn out, I’m fortunate (or strategic in career choice?) that my weekends and odd day off are usually enough for me to re-coop from work. I don’t really need time away from my job, what I do need though, is time away to spend with my husband and family. Especially now that we have a kid.

For a long time, I couldn’t imagine spending our money on anything other than our debt. It just didn’t feel right. I was so guilt-ridden about the amount of post-secondary debt I brought into the marriage I knew we couldn’t ”afford” to take time off from our goals. So we didn’t and have grown to hate ourselves a bit for it.

Thankfully, we’re both homebodies and genuinely enjoy spending time home with our friends and family. We enjoy vacations but certainly don’t feel the desire to pick up a few times a year and jet off somewhere, but, like anyone, we need time away sometimes. Our time has come.

Our big goal, to be 100% non-mortgage debt free, is pretty grand and I’m proud of the efforts we’ve made so far, but being focused on one, singular thing, for so long, blurs the rest of your life. Suddenly you don’t totally remember why it’s so important. While throwing up a magazine cut-out focus board works wonders for some, we need to get away for a bit- take a break from our goal- to sit back and realize how far we’ve come and regroup once back at home.

So, we’re taking off. At the end of March we’re going away on an adults-only trip with four of our best friends to Nashville and I’m so excited. When the NHL schedule was released this past summer, we decided for hubby’s birthday we’d go away for a long weekend to catch a game with our favorite team, and visiting Nashville won our vote. I’ve been once and remember loving it as a kid so think it will be even more fun as an adult.

The fact that we’re going with four other people will help keep some costs down too which is always nice. We opted to rent a house through AirBnB which was huge cost savings. We’re also going during off-season which is also a bit cheaper and we watched flights like a hawk paying about $200 less per person than they’re currently advertising. Though the Canadian dollar conversion sucksssssss I don’t think we’ll make out that bad. I find food to be significantly cheaper in the US, both eating out and to buy, and portion sizes are much larger which means more sharing. Our two most expensive items (airfare and accommodations) were booked in CAN so the conversion didn’t affect us.

I’m not suggesting we’re going to blow through thousands of dollars (my fugal bone comes with me where ever we go thankfully) but we’re going to enjoy ourselves while there.  While some people enjoy shopping while on vacation, we enjoy eating, so dining out will be a big part of our vacation budget. I get excited to try new foods and restaurants, another big treat for us since our self-imposed family dine-out budget of $50 doesn’t go that far here 🙂

Especially in the last 24 months we’ve been grinding hard on this debt. And it’s paid off (pun intended). Last year we managed to knock off almost $30,000 alone, but all this grinding is leaving us kind of bitter. While some of you are likely of the mindset that ”you’re in debt, you’re only goal in life should be to pay it off”, and I don’t totally disagree with you, I also argue that a break may be exactly what we need. I think that we can’t afford not to take time off from our goals or we may never reach them.

Have you been to Nashville? Start the recommendations below!