Over the July 4th long weekend, Sarah and her family visited me in Pennsylvania. While our kids played with our husbands in the pool, we recorded a mailbag episode, which runs this week.
We cover lots of topics in this week’s episode — how the podcast itself gets made, how we get ideas for various things (podcasts, blog posts, newsletters, etc.), how we see childcare evolving long term, our dream travel destinations, advice on returning to work and how to answer loaded questions after maternity leave.
Please give the episode a listen! We also recorded an “ask me anything” video for our Patreon community members; you can learn more about joining here. We do mailbag episodes every few months so feel free to send more questions! [email protected] is a good way to reach me.
Laura, my family (kids are 10 and 11) just did the Utah national parks and I HIGHLY recommend. There are so many things to do in southern Utah you can easily choose your own adventure. We took 10 days and hit all five national parks (plus the slot canyons in Escalante National Monument), flying into Vegas and driving east, then driving back and flying home. There are also a ton of amazing state parks and other adventures outside the parks like rafting, ATV-ing, canyoneering, etc., so if you wanted to only do a fewer number of national parks and add in state parks and such to avoid having to drive all the way across the state, that would also be a great trip.I recommend checking out former BOBW guest LagLiv’s blog (check her travel section for all her Utah posts–her family has done two Utah national parks trips).
You mentioned on the podcast needing to book in advance–this is true if you want to stay in the Zion Lodge inside the park, which I strongly recommend. Zion was our favorite park, and you really need to book a year in advance for that. It’s not luxe, but it’s a nice stay with a decent restaurant and, most importantly, you have amazing views from your balcony/breakfast/dinner of Zion Canyon (truly one of the most beautiful places in the world) and never have to get in the car the entire time you’re there (Zion is crowded and traffick-y at the entrance, but once inside the park/at the lodge you just ride the shuttle to all the trails! But other than the Zion Lodge the rest of the lodging can be arranged on much shorter notice.
Another note on timing–the summer can be pretty hot and miserable. We aren’t able to travel for spring break due to my job, so our solution was to go the very first week of our kids’ summer break, which was the first week of June, and it was hot but tolerable. I know your kids get out later so that may be a little late in which case you might want to consider spring break. I think April would be an absolutely fabulous time for this trip but the one thing to keep in mind is that the Narrows hike in Zion (truly one of the greatest hikes in any national park–probably my favorite hike of all time) would probably be closed in April due to the strong currents that time of year. So you’d have to read about the Narrows and decide if that’s a dealbreaker for you!
@Emily –ooh, thank you for all this! It is definitely on the list so I just need to figure out how we’re going to organize it. It could be a spring break trip some year – or maybe a year where we start school several days into September…