Summer Travels

If you’re a regular reader, you know how much I love home swapping. Is there anything better than traveling the world and staying for free? Our summer trip this year is a home exchange to Boston and it’s a home swap with my good friend, Annie Kip! Annie and I used to work together at Ralph Lauren and she’s been wanting to try home swapping.

Annie and I are both registered with Inter-Vac (short for international vacation) and that’s the site we used to make our exchange “official.” While we could have skipped this part because we know one another, it’s good to put things in writing and complete the agreement that’s required for a home swap.

I always urge folks to use a home exchange service for their home swaps and not just respond to an ad on Craig’s List. You can see pictures of your potential home swap partners and their home. You can also write reviews of your experience.

Annie and I are also trading cars so neither of us have to rent a car.

While we’re away, I’ll be using my vacation meal planner. I’ve received many requests for it as a Word Document. I can post it as a PDF here but not as a Word Document that can be edited.

The vacation meal plan is available here: Vacation Meal Plan. The camping meal plan is available here: Camping Meal Plan.

My suggestion to those of you who are using the meal planner and planning meals with several families is to add it to Google Drive and edit it live there. While I like having it and printing it (and yes, putting it into a page protector! Nerd alert!), if you are planning meals for a large group, it’s easier to add it to Google Drive, invite people to edit it, and do it live online. You could email it back and forth but then updates may get lost or not updated to the most recent version.

I have not organized guest posts while I’m away like I usually do. Somehow, time got away from me and I didn’t contact my usual suspects in advance. Amy Suardi, from Frugal-Mama, is babysitting my blog while I’m gone. (Thanks, Amy!) I’m babysitting her blog soon while she takes time off to have baby #5. We did a “blog swap” so that we can both take time off and be with our families during the summer.

There are posts coming your way while I’m gone but I won’t be answering questions or replying to comments. My plan is to stay off-line as much as possible for the next month but you may find a few updates on Twitter or a photo or two on Instagram.

As always, I’m so thankful to have such faithful readers. Please have a happy summer and safe travels wherever you’re going!

Where are you traveling to this summer? Are you planning a stay-cation or a go away vacation?

Go Gingham related links:

Camp cooking supplies and what I cook with
Our first home exchange is here
Travel packing tips with a PDF chart are here
Vacation meal planning
Meal planning for campers