Our honeymoon was pretty much the greatest thing ever. We thought it would be awesome to take another big trip like that before a baby arrived on the scene.
For most of our engagement and first year of marriage, we planned to try for a baby born during Adam's first semester of grad school. We hoped to take a vacation right after he finished undergrad as a "yay! we're done with college and we're having a baby!" kind of thing. Our dream was to use some air miles to fly to Seattle or Vancouver and then take an Alaskan cruise. I even sorta blogged about those tentative plans here.
{option one - an alaskan cruise via}
But, then it dawned on us that it would make more sense for our family to try for a baby born during the summer before Adam started grad school. Because Adam would have a lot more free time to bond with the baby during the summer than right smack dab in the middle of his first semester of grad school.
The only tiny downside to this change of heart was that it didn't leave a lot of time for a big vacation. Since Adam would be in school for the whole pregnancy, we could really only do something over Thanksgiving, Christmas or Spring Break. We wanted to spend all of Christmas with our families and I would be too pregnant to travel over Spring Break, so that left Thanksgiving.
{option two - new york city via}
We let go of those Alaskan cruise dreams for the time being and thought that, instead, we could spend Thanksgiving Break in New York City. A couple years ago, we took a way too short trip to NYC. We were excited about the chance to explore the city further, especially during the Christmas season. However, two things occurred to thwart that plan:
1. Adam's family decided to come visit for Thanksgiving. They decided this early in the summer, when we couldn't exactly tell them about our tentative babymoon plans because we weren't even pregnant yet.
2. We took a long hard look at our finances and decided a big vacation just really wasn't the best idea. Moving our family expansion time-line up by several months meant that I would stop receiving paychecks several months earlier. It just wasn't the most prudent decision.
A babymoon would have been an amazing experience, but we really weren't too sad about giving it up. We reminded ourselves that we had already gotten to take some memorable weekend trips this year {like Washington D.C. with my sister, Toronto with Adam's brother, and West Virginia for our anniversary}.
Little did we know, God had something different in mind. In early October, Adam went to an information session for a really big software company. It was basically just a whim. But he gave them his resume and, a few weeks later, they asked him to come in for an on-campus interview.
Turns out, the interview went really well, because they offered to fly him to Seattle for a final interview. It is scheduled for a Monday morning in December. They wanted him to arrive on Sunday and return on Tuesday. He asked if it would be possible to fly out on Saturday instead and they agreed.
We decided to turn this unexpected opportunity into our babymoon trip! We are using some air miles to purchase my ticket. The company is paying for a rental car the whole trip as well as our hotel and meals for Sunday, Monday and Tuesday. So the only costs of this vacation will be admission to attractions and our hotel & meals on Saturday.
{option three - seattle via}
A totally budget-friendly trip to Seattle. Can you believe it?! God is so, so, so amazing.
A little disclaimer. You're probably wondering why exactly is Adam interviewing at a software company if he's planned for so long to earn his PhD? Well, we thought it might a good opportunity to earn the big bucks for a few years and then continue on with the grad school plan. It would be super nice to pay off debt {our car and student loans} and save, save, save {for a house down payment and a little extra cushion for those grad school years}. But, we don't have our hearts set on this plan and the interview process is really competitive anyway, so we're just thinking of this whole thing as a basically free trip to Seattle!
For most of our engagement and first year of marriage, we planned to try for a baby born during Adam's first semester of grad school. We hoped to take a vacation right after he finished undergrad as a "yay! we're done with college and we're having a baby!" kind of thing. Our dream was to use some air miles to fly to Seattle or Vancouver and then take an Alaskan cruise. I even sorta blogged about those tentative plans here.
{option one - an alaskan cruise via}
But, then it dawned on us that it would make more sense for our family to try for a baby born during the summer before Adam started grad school. Because Adam would have a lot more free time to bond with the baby during the summer than right smack dab in the middle of his first semester of grad school.
The only tiny downside to this change of heart was that it didn't leave a lot of time for a big vacation. Since Adam would be in school for the whole pregnancy, we could really only do something over Thanksgiving, Christmas or Spring Break. We wanted to spend all of Christmas with our families and I would be too pregnant to travel over Spring Break, so that left Thanksgiving.
{option two - new york city via}
We let go of those Alaskan cruise dreams for the time being and thought that, instead, we could spend Thanksgiving Break in New York City. A couple years ago, we took a way too short trip to NYC. We were excited about the chance to explore the city further, especially during the Christmas season. However, two things occurred to thwart that plan:
1. Adam's family decided to come visit for Thanksgiving. They decided this early in the summer, when we couldn't exactly tell them about our tentative babymoon plans because we weren't even pregnant yet.
2. We took a long hard look at our finances and decided a big vacation just really wasn't the best idea. Moving our family expansion time-line up by several months meant that I would stop receiving paychecks several months earlier. It just wasn't the most prudent decision.
A babymoon would have been an amazing experience, but we really weren't too sad about giving it up. We reminded ourselves that we had already gotten to take some memorable weekend trips this year {like Washington D.C. with my sister, Toronto with Adam's brother, and West Virginia for our anniversary}.
Little did we know, God had something different in mind. In early October, Adam went to an information session for a really big software company. It was basically just a whim. But he gave them his resume and, a few weeks later, they asked him to come in for an on-campus interview.
Turns out, the interview went really well, because they offered to fly him to Seattle for a final interview. It is scheduled for a Monday morning in December. They wanted him to arrive on Sunday and return on Tuesday. He asked if it would be possible to fly out on Saturday instead and they agreed.
We decided to turn this unexpected opportunity into our babymoon trip! We are using some air miles to purchase my ticket. The company is paying for a rental car the whole trip as well as our hotel and meals for Sunday, Monday and Tuesday. So the only costs of this vacation will be admission to attractions and our hotel & meals on Saturday.
{option three - seattle via}
A totally budget-friendly trip to Seattle. Can you believe it?! God is so, so, so amazing.
A little disclaimer. You're probably wondering why exactly is Adam interviewing at a software company if he's planned for so long to earn his PhD? Well, we thought it might a good opportunity to earn the big bucks for a few years and then continue on with the grad school plan. It would be super nice to pay off debt {our car and student loans} and save, save, save {for a house down payment and a little extra cushion for those grad school years}. But, we don't have our hearts set on this plan and the interview process is really competitive anyway, so we're just thinking of this whole thing as a basically free trip to Seattle!
Way cool! I'm so excited to hear that. God is amazing and is full of surprises for those who seek his will! :) Enjoy your babymoon!
ReplyDeleteI totally get this. Jeff and I have "take two more awesome vacations" on our before-baby to-do list (is it weird to have a before-baby to-do list? haha).
ReplyDeleteWhat a wonderful little blessing! Seattle is lovely. We have friends that live up there. Y'all should try to make it out to Bainbridge Island if you have time... it's soooo pretty!
PS - I went and looked at your wedding portraits in an old post after reading your comment on my blog... Adam's family is tall!! Haha. Wonder which side of the family Baby will take after?