Because Life with Him Would be Boring...

That is, if he gave me more then 4 days notice to get ready to take our kids on a 2 week long trip! But of course that couldn't happen:-)

For the past month Ken has been trying to get us to accompany him to Alabama over Spring Break. He's had to be onsite for about 3 weeks out of each month, and has been coming home on the weekends. So naturally it seemed great, Spring Break is coming up let's go for a week, or maybe even two weeks. Until...

Ken's Boss: Uhhh, Ken please keep the week of March 16th free so you can come to our Engineering Offsite in California.

And then Ken broke the bad news to me...
Me yelling into the phone: Are you kidding me, that's the week of Spring Break!

Anyway, so for the past month there has pretty much been one or two days every single week where it has been...

Ken you need to go to Alabama that week.
Oh, No. Ken you need to go to California.

My hopes have been raised and dashed multiple times, thankfully we didn't ever break it to our kids before it was for sure. And since we didn't know (I was pretty sure we wouldn't be going) I didn't even bother to look up things to do or where to go.

And Finally on Tuesday night it was official. He will be going to Alabama the next two weeks. And the best part is that this somehow worked into a thing where he is getting tons of praise and thank you emails from his VP, SR VP, and CEO and we are getting to do exactly what we wanted! Darling, you totally ROCKED this one!!!

So this past week while he has been out of town I have been frantically trying to shop, plan, and pack for our trip. We decided to take the kids out of school for a week so we could spend two weeks away. And more importantly have a weekend to play around that didn't involve driving there or home.

Here's our plan
We are going to stop in New Orleans for a day and night so we can play around.
Then we will be in Montgomery, AL for a week.
Friday we will go to Pensacola, FL (because we have always wanted to visit ever since we saw the movie Contact)for the weekend. And I got us a suite right on the beach using our hotel points.
Then the next Monday we will be back in Alabama for another week.
And we haven't decided our drive home but we will have 2 1/2 days to make it so we are thinking of going through Mississippi and seeing what's around there.

And the best part about our whole trip (other then being with Ken and having my kids all to myself without housework and chores!) is that I am trying to make it completely free. Well, actually better then free because I forgot about the mileage reimbursement.

Ken gets $40 a day per diem in Alabama. We are staying at Embassy Suites which has the great breakfast included that we all love. Then I bought tons of snacks, drinks, and goodies for the kids. And usually on these trips I make them a lunch anyways because we spend most of the day at museums and parks so it is perfect to have picnics. So that leaves us with money for dinner and activities. But I also bring my electric fondue pot and can cook simple meals too like tacos and spaghetti if we don't want to spend money on dinner.

And of course our hotel in town is totally paid for by his work. When we go to Florida we are using points. And I got a $220 Marriott hotel room in downtown New Orleans for $82 with tax on Priceline (SCORE!)

Then for gas he gets reimbursed at like $.54 a mile. He can charge them for 1600 of our 2100 miles we are going to drive. So he will get $900 for gas, but with gas prices being so low we won't spend over $200. Totally Awesome!

Which means technically all in all we could spend way more per day and it still won't come out of pocket. But the thing is that this trip I want the boys to be in charge of the money and have to make some uncomfortable, but not super difficult $$$ choices. And $40 is pretty much the perfect amount for them to be in charge. And can easily cover the three daily expenses we will have Lunch, Dinner, and Activities.

The boys are sooooooo excited. We all are!!! Ken has already secured us passes onto the Air Force Base. I guess there are jets we can look around and tour. Plus he found out when they do their exercises and he has arranged a tour for the boys. They get all excited just when their Dad send them a picture of a jet. If you look really close (he took it with his blackberry)

They are totally into Military stuff so this is a dream come true for them. The whole trip is a dream for me too! I still can't believe we are going, that is if Ken ever gets the car packed.