{"id":417,"date":"2013-07-17T15:05:42","date_gmt":"2013-07-17T15:05:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kamillamilligan.com\/2013-07-17-on-the-road-with-a-little\/"},"modified":"2013-07-17T15:05:42","modified_gmt":"2013-07-17T15:05:42","slug":"2013-07-17-on-the-road-with-a-little","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kamillamilligan.com\/index.php\/2013\/07\/17\/2013-07-17-on-the-road-with-a-little\/","title":{"rendered":"On the road with a little"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Friends, I am about to be a published writer. On Tuesday night at around midnight, just before we headed out on our vacation, I sent an inquiry to a local magazine asking if they might be interested in my writing for their next annual issue. I didn&#8217;t know when it was to be published; in fact, I assumed I had missed the deadline since it was a summer publication. Writing to them was on my &#8220;to do&#8221; list, however; and checking off that list before a trip is a genetic necessity for me; so I wrote.<br \/>\nWhen I checked email on Thursday, I saw their reply: we love your ideas! Can you write up the first two by Friday?<\/p>\n<p>Gulp. &#8220;Yes!&#8221; I replied. &#8220;How many words?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>My next two vacation evenings were spent trying desperately to get my daughter to sleep at a decent hour; and, when that failed, drafting, editing and completing two 600-word articles starting at about 10:35 each evening until midnight. (Important note: my husband would undoubtedly have made time for me to write, had he not been in a different country attending a yoga retreat at the time).<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;ll let you know more about the results in a while. One of the articles was about traveling with a toddler. As we near the end of this trip, I have a lot more insight than I did when I wrote it a few days ago. Here, unsolicited, are the tips that didn&#8217;t make it into the article.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>It doesn&#8217;t hurt to think of the toddler first when making plans. Everyone needs to have fun on a family vacation; but if the toddler isn&#8217;t having fun, no one will. Ensure that your location and schedule allow time each day for lots of activity combined with quiet and rest.<\/li>\n<li>We have found it worthwhile to include at least one of the following activities each day: playground; running on grass or down a nice trail; playing at the beach; or a non-pressured get-together with other kids.<\/li>\n<li>Pack even lighter than I told you to in the article. How do I have too many clothes yet again for myself, and not enough for her?<\/li>\n<li>Have a plan. Book a hotel, know what activities you want to do, when they happen, and how to get tickets. Be able to go straight to where you&#8217;re going. We have discovered our uncanny ability to not do this, and while we luck out a lot, we also lose time as we try to plan on the fly.<\/li>\n<li>Snacks. Lots of them.<\/li>\n<li>A first aid kit: include a thermometer. She came down with a cold one night, and I complete freaked out.<\/li>\n<li>Make the little things fun. My daughter&#8217;s biggest delights on this trip have been saying &#8220;We&#8217;re going to Saaaan Fraaaaan Cisco!!&#8221;; exploring every corner of our hotel room, including trying on the bathrobes; running along between our hands; putting things into little bags; and, apparently, &#8220;shopping for mama&#8221; as she picks items out of stores for me. An attitude of fun has made things fun.<\/li>\n<li>Also: don&#8217;t do work during vacation. Which I&#8217;ve done. And am stopping.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Happy summer vacation to all of you!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Friends, I am about to be a published writer. On Tuesday night at around midnight, just before we headed out on our vacation, I sent an inquiry to a local magazine asking if they might be interested in my writing for their next annual issue. I didn&#8217;t know when it was to be published; in [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"saved_in_kubio":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-417","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kamillamilligan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/417","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kamillamilligan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kamillamilligan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kamillamilligan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kamillamilligan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=417"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/kamillamilligan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/417\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kamillamilligan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=417"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kamillamilligan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=417"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kamillamilligan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=417"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}