My Dream Beach Vacation Vs My Real Vacation with Toddler

I am going to the beach. Yayy!

But with a nine month old toddler added to the mix, I wonder if it’s actually going to be a vacation.

Just 5 days to go until the official start of my family vacation in Goa. And it’s not like ‘just 5 days to go before I hit the sand’ but rather more like ‘just 5 days to go until I get three root canals in succession’!

In my perfect dream vacation, my family and I would spend our time together basking under the glory of the sun, savoring scrumptiously chilled watermelons while bonding over teamwork to create perfectly designed sand-castles.

But in the real world with toddler, my vacation would go something like this – “Mom, baby SMASHED my palace!” NO…Don’t throw sand at the baby! What? Did baby SWALLOW that shell? Hell!

In perfect world, I lie languid at the beach with my favorite book. My son is somewhere around the sea playing with my husband as I relax and enjoy endless hours of solitude. My marble skin gradually tans into a shimmery shade of bronze and my hair look perfect.

I know reality would bite, when every afternoon the sole mission of our every activity under the sun would be to protect our toddler from the scorching heat. The summer thunderstorms would chase us. And my hair would turn into an enormous cloud of untamed fringes!

In my perfect dream vacation, after putting our 6 year old son to sleep, dear husband and I go out for long romantic walks at the beach, we have fun at night clubs and linger over drinks.

But with a toddler in tow, most of our typical romantic nights in real world vacation would be crammed into that precious three-hour space between her finally falling asleep and us suddenly passing out! I know it’s going to happen!

My toddler whose whole life is a vacation is blissfully unaware of my vacation. So relaxation is not really in the cards when I think about my upcoming vacation. But this does not mean that I won’t have fun. I will have fun but it will be a different kind of fun.

I may not get plenty of peaceful time, I may not get enough romantic time, but I would surely get lots and lots of play time. Though ‘play’ can be a strong phrase!