This past weekend we had our first getaway as a family of four and since the pandemic began! Our last trip, pre-covid was our honeymoon. Needless to say, things look a little different these days!

We’re still not comfortable with air travel, so we decided to do a little road trip to Naples. Naples is about two hours away from Miami. This would let us see how Annabelle would do with a longer car ride since we’ll be driving to North Carolina in August. Spoiler, she did GREAT! Luckily, she enjoys being in the car!

We decided to stay at the Naples Grande Beach Resort. Overall, while we enjoyed our stay and the property, the service left quite a bit to be desired. Would we be back? Perhaps if the surge in hotel prices (happening all around Florida) stops and the prices go back to normal. But at the current rate, I don’t think we’d be back. Though the service was not the best, we had a great room and really did enjoy our time at the pool!

Here’s a run down of how our weekend went!

Friday:

Thomas had school on Friday, so we picked him up from school, snack and Nintendo Switch in tow, and went from pick up line to Naples. Conveniently, his pick up time coordinated with Annabelle’s nap time and a car ride always puts her to sleep! We were originally going to stop at Seed to Table (came highly recommended by a great friend) to get some food for the hotel, but the complete disregard for wearing masks and not to mention the sign outside the store on 10 reasons not to get vaccinated, we opted against it! But I can’t wait to check it out when things normalize a bit! We then checked into the hotel and headed right to the pool while Annabelle and Mama sat poolside enjoying the hotel’s champagne happy hour! Later that night, instead of doing room service we ordered delivery from Don Tequila and we could not get over how great it was! If you ever find yourself in Naples, we highly recommend!

Saturday:

Saturday was our only full day in Naples, so we decided to take advantage and make this our beach day. While the hotel itself is not on the beach, they offer a shuttle service back and forth to the beach. Whenever I know our day is going to deviate from our typical routine, I try to make sure Annabelle has a good first nap of the day. I have found this to be HUGELY helpful! Once she was up, we headed off for our beach day. We weren’t the only ones with this idea. Unfortunately, the beach is also open to the public, so it was packed! While on the beach we at no point felt unsafe or too close to others, but when ordering food from the hotel’s restaurant at the beach, there was no social distancing nor people wearing masks. This was pretty common in Naples. This was Annabelle’s first beach day, but baby girl was NOT a fan of the cold water! Her and I spent most of day on lounge chairs napping and I am not upset about it one bit!

That night we headed to dinner at Lamoraga. It was actually our first indoor dining experience since the pandemic and we were really happy overall! The food was delicious, yummy cocktails and Thomas tried so many new things! We have a rule that he has to try anything we give him, if he doesn’t like it he doesn’t have to eat it, but more often than not he ends up loving what we give him! His latest try, tuna tartare!

Sunday:

We started our day making sure Annabelle got a great nap in and then made our way to the pool. We were so excited because the pool was so nice and warm and perfect for Annabelle’s first dip! She LOVED it! I think this girl will definitely be a water baby! Before heading home we had lunch at the hotel. We timed our trip back home around Annabelle’s nap time and this worked great!

We couldn’t have picked or planned a better intro trip to traveling as a family of four. I was definitely anxious about Annabelle’s schedule, how she would do deviating from her routine, being away from home, and how all of that would impact Thomas and all the hopes I had for our weekend. Check out some of my tips if you’re going to be traveling with a baby:

• If you’ll be using a pack and play for sleep, make sure to practice naps here so it’s not a completely new sleep environment!
• If you have a bedtime routine, try to replicate it while traveling! Our routine is bath, pj’s, nurse, sleep sack, story, top off with a bottle and time for bed. Friday night we did the whole routine, Saturday, bath time was earlier in the day, but we kept everything else the same!
• As mentioned earlier, we did the first nap of the day in the hotel room before starting our day. This may not always be feasible, but worked well for us!
• Don’t stress if things don’t go according to plan, now this is coming from a type A, so it’s hard for me to just roll with it. But nothing a cocktail can’t help!
• To make things a little easier, check out the packing list I’ve created, below! You can download and print to use for your next weekend getaway!

Do you have any upcoming travel plans? Leave me a comment and let me know where!