Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / #135 Family Holidays Suck - But Do They Have To?

Transcript

#135 Family Holidays Suck - But Do They Have To? · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Why family holidays hard.
• 0:01
  Speaker 2: Because you take the kids.
• 0:02
  Speaker 3: Oh yeah, the kids have to go.
• 0:04
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 0:05
  Speaker 3: Okay. It's the Happy Family's podcast, the podcast for the
• 0:11
  Speaker 3: time poor parent who just one's answers Now. Hello, My
• 0:14
  Speaker 3: name's doctor Justin Coulson, dads six daughters, author of six
• 0:16
  Speaker 3: books about raising happy families, and I'm joined by somebody
• 0:19
  Speaker 3: who was a mum to six daughters, my brand new
• 0:22
  Speaker 3: co host for the daily Happy Families podcast, missus Happy
• 0:25
  Speaker 3: Families herself, Kylie Colson.
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: Are you excited about today?
• 0:28
  Speaker 2: I'm so excited.
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: Okay, So today we're going to talk about this thing that.
• 0:32
  Speaker 3: Well, why don't you tell us, because because you would
• 0:35
  Speaker 3: the one that thought this would be a great podcast idea.
• 0:37
  Speaker 3: And I'm nervous about it because I've been told I'm
• 0:39
  Speaker 3: not allowed to winge about it.
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: But this is a wingy kind of thing for me.
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: To well today, I thought it would be really good
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: for us to talk about our latest family holiday.
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: Hence the winginess.
• 0:50
  Speaker 3: I don't think we should just talk about the latest
• 0:52
  Speaker 3: family holiday. I think we should talk about family holidays generally,
• 0:55
  Speaker 3: because you know, I reckon family holidays are hard yep,
• 1:00
  Speaker 3: So we're on the same page there, So here's what
• 1:02
  Speaker 3: we're going to talk about in this in this particular podcast, folks,
• 1:05
  Speaker 3: We're going to talk about how family holidays are hard,
• 1:08
  Speaker 3: and we will talk about our most recent one, because
• 1:10
  Speaker 3: that's why Kylie wants to talk about it.
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: Anyway.
• 1:12
  Speaker 3: I think it's just so that the gloss can come
• 1:14
  Speaker 3: off Doctor Justin Colson a little bit.
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: We'll see how this goes.
• 1:18
  Speaker 3: Kylie has mentioned that she wants to talk about when
• 1:19
  Speaker 3: family holidays actually do work, and I want to share
• 1:22
  Speaker 3: with you our brand new brain wave for how we
• 1:25
  Speaker 3: think we're going to absolutely nail our next family holiday.
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: Oh I'm looking forward to this.
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: Okay, So let's just go through the list.
• 1:32
  Speaker 3: Why are family holidays hard for you as a mum,
• 1:35
  Speaker 3: Because your list, I reckon, is going to be different
• 1:36
  Speaker 3: to mine.
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: Do you reckon?
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you go for it. Why family holidays hard.
• 1:40
  Speaker 2: Because you take the kids, the kids have to go.
• 1:43
  Speaker 3: Yeah okay, yeah, if the children weren't on that family holiday,
• 1:47
  Speaker 3: it would be the best family holiday ever. Now, No,
• 1:51
  Speaker 3: we love our kids, I mean, don't get us wrong,
• 1:53
  Speaker 3: but they're tiring, right, So let's talk about the Well.
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: When you look at it, you know, you go through
• 1:59
  Speaker 2: a turn all of the children and parents included. We
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: all start to get exhausted as the term goes on, Right,
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: so you.
• 2:06
  Speaker 3: Get get to week ten and everyone's like, oh, we
• 2:08
  Speaker 3: need this one. Yeah.
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: But then in order to have a great holiday, you've
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: number one, got to have a really good plan in place.
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: And how good are.
• 2:16
  Speaker 3: We actually getting that plan right?
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: It doesn't happen very often.
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: Okay, we have done it.
• 2:19
  Speaker 3: Well, but let's talk about that like, okay, requires effort
• 2:23
  Speaker 3: yet next.
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: And then you've got to actually have the energy to
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: execute it.
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 2:28
  Speaker 3: And the other thing that I found is so you
• 2:30
  Speaker 3: get in the car and the kids start fighting with
• 2:31
  Speaker 3: each other, even if you're only going an hour up
• 2:33
  Speaker 3: the road, totally, and so you've got the siblings squabbles
• 2:37
  Speaker 3: and everybody's tired. Oh and it's not even that. Family
• 2:40
  Speaker 3: holidays are hard because depending on what you're doing, Like
• 2:42
  Speaker 3: even if you don't do a hotel or an airbnb
• 2:44
  Speaker 3: or something like that, you know, a self contained unit.
• 2:47
  Speaker 3: You've got to get the kids together and pack all
• 2:49
  Speaker 3: their gear and make sure I've remembered everything. And you've
• 2:50
  Speaker 3: got to get the toothbrush and the toothpaste, and the
• 2:52
  Speaker 3: hair brush and their hair tidy.
• 2:54
  Speaker 2: Well, yeah, let's just make that really clear. Who ends
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: up doing that?
• 2:57
  Speaker 3: Well, but that's because I'm now you know, I'm in
• 3:00
  Speaker 3: the office trying to tidy up all the loosers.
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: I talk about this a little bit in my blog
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: that's just gone.
• 3:06
  Speaker 3: Okay, So, for those of you who are not members
• 3:09
  Speaker 3: of the Happy Families membership, Kylie has this little spot.
• 3:12
  Speaker 3: Sorry I've said that so patronizingly. Kylie has this a
• 3:15
  Speaker 3: really great contribution that she makes mecembership. But that's called
• 3:18
  Speaker 3: Kylie's Corner. Well when you say little spot, it fits
• 3:21
  Speaker 3: in the corner. Kylie's Corner is actually one of the
• 3:23
  Speaker 3: most popular parts of our membership, where Kylie just writes
• 3:26
  Speaker 3: this article about her insights, and the most recent one
• 3:28
  Speaker 3: is actually really cool about the cognitive load that mums
• 3:33
  Speaker 3: carry when it comes to organizing the family. And I
• 3:35
  Speaker 3: don't think that it's on display any more readily than
• 3:39
  Speaker 3: when we're going on a family holiday, because I mean,
• 3:42
  Speaker 3: in our home, I'm usually so busy in the office
• 3:44
  Speaker 3: that I'm leaving you in charge of the planning of
• 3:46
  Speaker 3: the holiday, the reservations and booking of the holiday, the
• 3:48
  Speaker 3: planning the meals, the planning of the activities, packing the
• 3:51
  Speaker 3: kids stuff. I jump in and pack the car because
• 3:53
  Speaker 3: I'm good at packing.
• 3:54
  Speaker 2: Cars, very good at packing a car.
• 3:56
  Speaker 3: But you carry that cognitive like it's exhausting just to
• 3:59
  Speaker 3: get on the holiday. And we've we've got a lot
• 4:00
  Speaker 3: of kids, right, so five kids to wrangle and make
• 4:02
  Speaker 3: sure that they've put everything into their suitcases that they're.
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: Supposed to have.
• 4:04
  Speaker 3: It's hard.
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: And then you'd get there.
• 4:07
  Speaker 3: And not every family has this, but if you've got
• 4:10
  Speaker 3: different age groups trying to get activities.
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: That are going to keep everybody occupied, yeah, totally.
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: And I think that the hardest thing as a mom
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: is that you actually don't holiday. You actually don't get
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: to holiday.
• 4:21
  Speaker 3: It's NonStop because the kids normally go to school.
• 4:24
  Speaker 2: That's right, and I get a few hours it's a
• 4:26
  Speaker 2: cleaned everything. In all that.
• 4:29
  Speaker 3: It's really interesting because when I run my workshops, I'll
• 4:32
  Speaker 3: sit down with parents and I'll say, so, when's your
• 4:33
  Speaker 3: family the happiest And people will say, oh, well, we're
• 4:35
  Speaker 3: on holidays. And then I'll sort of talk to them
• 4:38
  Speaker 3: about are you sure about that? And we talk about
• 4:40
  Speaker 3: how hard holidays are.
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: And people start laughing, like, actually, our last holiday was
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: like the.
• 4:44
  Speaker 3: Holiday from hell. So I want to just briefly talk
• 4:46
  Speaker 3: about our last holiday. I promise I won't win you
• 4:48
  Speaker 3: too much, but this is what prompted our conversation. We
• 4:51
  Speaker 3: went camping. We're based in Brisbane, and we packed up
• 4:54
  Speaker 3: the trailer and we went to a place on the
• 4:56
  Speaker 3: north side of Brisbane, just near Bribe Island called Sandstone Port.
• 5:00
  Speaker 3: Fantastic new facility, great new holiday park. It was a spectacular,
• 5:05
  Speaker 3: amazing water slide. By the way, this is not product placement.
• 5:08
  Speaker 3: They don't even know we're talking about them. We haven't
• 5:10
  Speaker 3: been paid for this. But not only was there the
• 5:12
  Speaker 3: cognitive load of having to pack the car and get
• 5:14
  Speaker 3: everything organized and get there. When we went to bed
• 5:17
  Speaker 3: the first night, the wind was howling, and if you've
• 5:19
  Speaker 3: ever camped on a windy night, it's like the tent
• 5:21
  Speaker 3: was going to be blown to China. It was just
• 5:24
  Speaker 3: so impossible to sleep. The next you know, we've.
• 5:27
  Speaker 2: Been warned the first night at camp is never good.
• 5:30
  Speaker 2: It doesn't matter what the weather's like, what the wildlife's like.
• 5:33
  Speaker 2: That first night was such a rude shock when you
• 5:37
  Speaker 2: lay down on that wonderful air mattress.
• 5:42
  Speaker 3: So then we got woken up at four o'clock in
• 5:43
  Speaker 3: the morning by cookabaros, and they went off every ten minutes.
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: As soul.
• 5:46
  Speaker 3: It was worse than the snooze alarm on your phone
• 5:47
  Speaker 3: because at least you can turn that thing off just
• 5:49
  Speaker 3: every ten minutes from four am. And then the next
• 5:52
  Speaker 3: night we got new neighbors and they stayed up until
• 5:54
  Speaker 3: eleven o'clock with their music going in their loud conversations and.
• 5:58
  Speaker 2: Their TV's hooked in.
• 5:59
  Speaker 3: The gone camping and they've taken their TV and look
• 6:02
  Speaker 3: at that's you. That's fine, no judgment from us.
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: We're just going camping, so we don't watch TV. I
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: had a rough camp.
• 6:07
  Speaker 3: You actually enjoyed it a lot more than.
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: Me I did.
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: The thing that I love about camping is it just
• 6:13
  Speaker 2: is so simplified. Life is so much simpler with one
• 6:19
  Speaker 2: fork and one knife and one.
• 6:21
  Speaker 3: Cuff, you cause in ten minutes it's done.
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: I do. I wake up in the morning, the kids
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: go on and get ready for the day, and I
• 6:29
  Speaker 2: sweep out the ten and we're done in about five minutes.
• 6:31
  Speaker 3: Yeah, the problem is the day starts at four am.
• 6:33
  Speaker 3: Let's talk about two more things. Let's talk about when
• 6:36
  Speaker 3: family holidays do work, and let's talk about our crazy
• 6:39
  Speaker 3: idea for how to make family holidays awesome. So when
• 6:42
  Speaker 3: camping holidays and when family holidays work.
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: This was your idea.
• 6:46
  Speaker 3: When we were putting this podcast planned together, you said,
• 6:48
  Speaker 3: I want to talk about when family holidays work best.
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: So I'm curious, Well, I think I.
• 6:53
  Speaker 2: Really touched on it in the beginning. There has to
• 6:56
  Speaker 2: be a plan, especially when you've got a lot of
• 6:59
  Speaker 2: children or numerous age groups that you're dealing with. Having
• 7:02
  Speaker 2: a plan is so important.
• 7:05
  Speaker 3: So there was a holiday that we had. We were
• 7:06
  Speaker 3: living in Wollongong. We came up to Brisbane to hang
• 7:08
  Speaker 3: out with your family. But we well, no offense to
• 7:10
  Speaker 3: your family, but we didn't really want to just hang
• 7:12
  Speaker 3: out with the family.
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: We wanted to have a holiday.
• 7:13
  Speaker 3: We wanted to have a holiday. Yeah, that's all right,
• 7:15
  Speaker 3: And so you spent a couple of weeks surfing the
• 7:17
  Speaker 3: internet and finding activities so that every single day we
• 7:19
  Speaker 3: would have something to do.
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: We did, and it was an epic holiday. We went
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: to these tiny.
• 7:23
  Speaker 3: Little theaters and watched some you know, amateur theater productions,
• 7:26
  Speaker 3: and we hung out and did like we did really interesting,
• 7:29
  Speaker 3: unusual kinds of things that we normally would not do,
• 7:31
  Speaker 3: either at home or on holidays, and it was really memorable.
• 7:34
  Speaker 3: So when else the family holidays work, I think that
• 7:36
  Speaker 3: our best holidays have been we went to Club Med
• 7:42
  Speaker 3: in Bali and that was great. But that kind of
• 7:45
  Speaker 3: goes to the other thing that you said. Holidays are
• 7:47
  Speaker 3: also when you don't have to worry about the kids,
• 7:49
  Speaker 3: and Club Med had this kid's club that we didn't
• 7:51
  Speaker 3: have to worry about the kids. We just took the
• 7:53
  Speaker 3: kids to kids club after breakfast at eight thirty in
• 7:55
  Speaker 3: the morning, and then we picked them up at five thirty.
• 7:57
  Speaker 3: They were happy, they were doing activities and hanging out
• 7:59
  Speaker 3: with other kids, and we were happy because we didn't
• 8:00
  Speaker 3: have any kids. But we didn't make a lot of
• 8:03
  Speaker 3: memories with the kids except when we intentionally went and
• 8:05
  Speaker 3: pulled them out of kids Club and did stuff together
• 8:08
  Speaker 3: like the cooking class or the trapees or whatever it
• 8:10
  Speaker 3: might have been.
• 8:10
  Speaker 2: Yeah, So I think the things that make your holiday
• 8:13
  Speaker 2: like the ones that have worked really well for us,
• 8:16
  Speaker 2: is where either you and I have actually had time
• 8:20
  Speaker 2: away for a couple of nights together. We get on
• 8:24
  Speaker 2: the same page and we have that time together to
• 8:29
  Speaker 2: just be together without interruption, because let's face that, once
• 8:32
  Speaker 2: we're on a holiday, there's really no time for you
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: and I at all together. And so by the time
• 8:38
  Speaker 2: we've had that time together and then we got a
• 8:39
  Speaker 2: family holiday, we're pumped, we're energized, we're on the same
• 8:43
  Speaker 2: page together, and.
• 8:44
  Speaker 3: We've had time together, which means that we've got time
• 8:46
  Speaker 3: to spend with the kids and we don't feel resentful
• 8:47
  Speaker 3: of the kids for taking away this little bit of time.
• 8:50
  Speaker 2: That's one thing that I feel makes such a difference
• 8:52
  Speaker 2: to our holidays. The only other thing I can think
• 8:55
  Speaker 2: of that has had the biggest impact is our ability
• 8:58
  Speaker 2: to be present. Yeah, we've done a lot of working
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: holidays where you've had to kind of duck away or
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: take a phone call here and there, and that has
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: definitely complicated our holidays a little bit. And so, you know,
• 9:12
  Speaker 2: just being able to be flexible with those kinds of
• 9:15
  Speaker 2: things sometimes has been easy and other times hasn't.
• 9:18
  Speaker 3: Yeah, so what you're really saying is, don't take work
• 9:21
  Speaker 3: on a holiday.
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: Yeah, where possible.
• 9:24
  Speaker 3: All right, So we could talk more about that, but
• 9:25
  Speaker 3: we want to hear from you as well. Got an
• 9:27
  Speaker 3: email address. Podcasts at Happy Families dot com dot AU
• 9:32
  Speaker 3: podcasts at happy Families dot com dot you what have
• 9:35
  Speaker 3: been your worst holidays and what have been your best holidays?
• 9:37
  Speaker 3: When it comes to the family, I want to share
• 9:39
  Speaker 3: with you our crazy I don't know if it's that crazy,
• 9:42
  Speaker 3: but our thought out and well intentioned family holiday idea.
• 9:46
  Speaker 3: We sat down last week and we were talking about
• 9:49
  Speaker 3: how much money it costs to go on a holiday
• 9:50
  Speaker 3: and for our family. Let's say you're going to go
• 9:52
  Speaker 3: away for a week. You're going to do well to
• 9:55
  Speaker 3: do it for less than five grand, unless you go
• 9:57
  Speaker 3: in camping, which is even camping out to dinner a
• 10:00
  Speaker 3: couple of times, do the travel, pay for the site fees,
• 10:02
  Speaker 3: all that sort of stuff. So I do I spend
• 10:03
  Speaker 3: fifteen hundred dollars two thousand dollars for a week away. Now,
• 10:08
  Speaker 3: some families can probably do it cheap, but that's about
• 10:11
  Speaker 3: that sort of money. Imagine if you just stayed home
• 10:14
  Speaker 3: and did everything within two hours of home, and spend
• 10:18
  Speaker 3: the money here but had fun at home. Instead, go
• 10:22
  Speaker 3: on holidays at home, save on travel, save on accommodation,
• 10:26
  Speaker 3: save on all those expensive restaurants.
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: Then I have to clean my house.
• 10:30
  Speaker 3: Well, we won't be home enough to let that happen.
• 10:32
  Speaker 3: And so the idea is, so we're based in Brisbane
• 10:34
  Speaker 3: and there are so many things that we can do
• 10:36
  Speaker 3: within two hours of here. And if we were to
• 10:38
  Speaker 3: set ourselves a budget, let's say we've got a two
• 10:39
  Speaker 3: week holiday and we're sending ourselves a budget of a
• 10:41
  Speaker 3: couple of grand I reckon, there would be loads of
• 10:45
  Speaker 3: activities that we could do that the kids would absolutely love.
• 10:49
  Speaker 3: And we can do an activity one day and then
• 10:51
  Speaker 3: have a day by the pool the next day, and
• 10:53
  Speaker 3: then do an activity the next day and then have
• 10:55
  Speaker 3: a day at the beach. You know what would be
• 10:57
  Speaker 3: So it's free and then fee, and then free and
• 11:00
  Speaker 3: then fee for a couple of weeks.
• 11:02
  Speaker 2: I'd love to hear from our listeners if they have
• 11:06
  Speaker 2: any great ideas.
• 11:07
  Speaker 3: Would you do that? Like does that work? Podcasts at
• 11:09
  Speaker 3: Happy families dot com dot you That's podcast with an
• 11:11
  Speaker 3: s podcasts at happy families.
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: Dot com dot you.
• 11:14
  Speaker 3: Let us know your ideas about family holidays and what
• 11:18
  Speaker 3: makes them work and what makes them not work.
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: I reckon. I'm voting for stay home, especially in the
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: middle of a pandemic.
• 11:24
  Speaker 3: That way you don't have to worry about blowing your
• 11:26
  Speaker 3: money and not getting it back from travel agents and
• 11:28
  Speaker 3: all those kinds of airplane people and cruising people and
• 11:31
  Speaker 3: all that sort of stuff. I think that's the way
• 11:33
  Speaker 3: to go. Thanks so much for listening. We hope you've
• 11:35
  Speaker 3: enjoyed the changes that we're making to the Happy Families podcast,
• 11:38
  Speaker 3: and we hope that you feel like you're part of
• 11:39
  Speaker 3: the Happy Family's family. Kylie, I can't wait to talk
• 11:41
  Speaker 3: about what we're going to do tomorrow. Heavy topic, it
• 11:44
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• 11:46
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• 11:49
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• 11:53
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• 11:55
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