Travel: How to Plan a Trip to New York City

by Margarita Ibbott on May 6th, 2012 | No Comments »

I’m a blogger, right? And as a blogger, I find that I tend to blog about all sorts of things. But sometimes I get the opportunity to to travel to one of the most exciting cities in the world and I also get to blog about it. At the beginning of this year, I was talking to my friends about attending the largest blogging conference in the world—Blogher. Last year it was held in San Diego, CA with over 4,000 attendees, and basically, it was the most fun a girl can have without going to jail or getting a divorce. This year’s Blogher conference will be held in New York City and I couldn’t wait to start planning the trip.

Planning

The first part of planning was convincing my husband that we needed to go on a road trip with the kids to the city that never sleeps—New York City. Here were the first things on my to-do list:

Register for the Blogher conference.
Make hotel reservations.
Arrange to stay with my cousin for a few days (she lives in Brooklyn).
Let hubby know the dates of the vacation so he can set those aside.
Go to AAA/CAA to request itinerary.
Get passports (We're Canadian).
Get additional health insurance (as we Canadians traveling outside our country).
Get a parental permission letter to have our children cross the boarder with only one parent (yes, we are both traveling but just in case, it is always good to have).
Check out travel sites to read forums on what to do, where to eat and what to avoid:
1. Frommers
2. Trip Advisor
3. NYC tourism office
4. Find all the cool food trucks and diners that we always see on the Food Network.
5. Search travel blogs & mom/dad blogs for ‘real life’ experiences and suggestions

Packing

Now we have to sort out our three children: ages 16, 13 and 11 respectfully. Each has their own particular needs but the list is the same when it comes to packing:

Suitcase for each (keep things simple and each is responsible for that piece of luggage)
Clothing for each child: 7 pairs of underwear, 7 pairs of socks, 3 pairs of pants, 6 tops, 2 bathing suits, 3 pairs of shorts, 1 hoody, 1 towel, 1 pair of sandals, 1 pair of running shoes
Reading material (books, magazines)
Video games, chargers, extra batteries

One of my favorite resources to itemize what each person needs to bring and keep track of is Knock Knock’s Pack This! This list has details for all the items you need from toiletries to number of t-shirts to electronic toys.

I love to travel and planning a trip is half the fun. I love the anticipation of not knowing what to expect (okay, I usually know what to expect, I’m an organizer, after all, and leaving things to chance doesn’t really work for me). As my children get older, I find that having them as part of the "research" team is helpful. So each one has been charged with finding out three things they want to do on this trip. It will be interesting to see what they will choose to do and see.

The success to any family vacation is to plan ahead, share the work and have fun. I’ll send photos from New York City in August!

How do you like to plan family vacations with your family?

Featured image courtesy of Flickr.

Margarita Ibbott is a mother of three, Professional Organizer, blogger, social media trainer and is addicted to attending & speaking at conferences (Blogher, Blissdom, She’s Connected & TechWeek Chicago to name a few). In 2011 she addressed 800 professional organizers in San Diego, CA at the National Association of Professional Organizer Annual Conference as an Expert panelist. In the fall she facilitated an Advanced LinkedIn workshop for her colleagues at the 11^th Annual National Conference of the Processional Organizers in Canada. Her most interesting social media adventure of 2011 brought her to Harpo Studios in Chicago to be a LiveBlogger for Oprah’s Life Classes (not once but twice). Through her blog, she continues to evangelizing people, products and services, brands and companies using social media. You can connect with her on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and read her musings about organizing, product reviews or social media training on either one of her two blogs: Downshifting – Professional Organizing Solutions and LinkedLearning.ca.