I want to travel the world with my family

People ask me all the time why I want to travel the world with my family and if they have a moment, I tell them about my in-laws. They have the cutest relationship, my mother in law was raised in Benin, West Africa where the official language is French. My father in law, on the other hand, was raised in Nigeria, a neighboring country in West Africa where the official language is English. Neither of them speaks the other language, they converse solely in their tribal tongue of Yoruba. Their children speak a mixture of three languages to varying degrees in addition to all the other languages they know. My husband is a product of travel.

I want to travel the world with my family beccause I too, am a product of travel. A first-generation American born on the land that bought my parents together. The ocean breeze is in my veins, saltwater guides my steps and my thirst for climbing trees laden with fruits knows no end. I am the descendant of men and women that survived a perilous journey through sea swells and beneath torrential storms beneath the eyes and boots of lesser men.

My husband and I met and fell in love a million miles from his homeland. Born to a West Indian Girl and a West African Boy, Our daughter is the product of travel. I want to travel the world with my family to retrace our parents’ steps and show her the places that made the people that made it possible for her to be. I want to travel the world with my family to show my daughter there are more narratives for little girls than the ones

My mother made sure we traveled, as an immigrant, travel had literally changed her world, it was important for her that we too saw there was more to the world, then what we saw. I got my first passport before I turned one, and traveled “home” to Jamaica shortly thereafter. Every year she made sure I traveled outside the country for at least a month. As I got older that meant her shipping us out to relatives in far away places. I took my first solo plane ride to Europe when I was 9, I spent the summer months getting teased by a whole new set of cousins and living a life my mother hadn’t even seen herself. Travel was important to her so she magicked up ways to make it possible for my sister and me.

People always ask “I want to travel the world with my family, how do you do it?” I understand that I’m privileged in many ways and traveling far isn’t always in the cards for everyone but traveling at all is more in reach than most people allow for. The truth is the first step to prioritizing family travel is often the unglamorous task of assessing your life and seeing what you can give up at home to make their dreams of travel a reality.

Ask yourself these questions before spending money at home:

Can this purchase COMPLETELY pay for something on vacation?

It’s easy to think its only a nominal fee, it won’t take out of my spending budget, but lunch in my home town is more than a one night hotel stay with an all you can eat breakfast buffet in Vietnam so I have no problem eating in at home.

Can I get this thing for cheaper where I’m going?

If you’re going to Thailand, maybe hold off on spa services for a few months prior as a they’re exponentially cheaper in Thailand.

I want to travel the world with my family so, I haven’t gotten my nails done since I was pregnant. I don’t get my hair done in America either, I retwist my locks myself and treat myself to a professional wash in salons when I go away, it’s a fun way to meet locals. I want to travel the world with my family so I do the hair of every other member of my family. Our Christmas budget is $50 each for Noon. I carry picnics and take food to go wherever I am. I recognize that I am privileged in many ways but the way my mother opened up the world to me as a child inspired to do the same for my daughter.

I want to travel the world with my family, so I do without…

Astrid | I try to be as frugal as possible, to free up funds for travel. I love books, but one of the decisions I consciously made was to stop buying books and utilize the local public library. Now that we’re traveling full-time, my library membership has come in really handy as I have access to so many ebooks. Another thing that my family and I tried to limit when we were at home was eating out at restaurants. We cooked a lot of our meals at home, and that really helped.

Jasmine | A car note. *laughs* It’s so not worth the exchange.

Monet |Cable, eating out, and going to the movie theater.

Kameko | When Im home I limit socializing with my friends because I live in New York City and most places we end up going to for a night out cost me a plane ticket.

Daniela | Shopping for stuff. I try so hard to be a minimalist. We currently live in a furnished rented apartment and therefore we don’t really own anything. As for clothes and toys, also, we have the minimum, and I have a rule: I won’t buy it until I am stuck in a situation in which I’m bitching and whining because I desperately need it.

Ashley |Shopping. I don’t spend that much on my clothes or shoes and anything really nice that I own was a gift.

Montoya | Our approach to handling out finances for travel is a little different. Instead of cutting specific things like cable (although we don’t have cable) we siphon off a percentage of every pay check to a travel fund. We pay that account before we pay ourselves. We also postpone filing for reimbursements from our childcare FSA until it is time for our big trip. So our “sacrifice” is having less funds in our daily financial rotation so that we always have something available for vacation.

I want to travel the world, how to travel more