Mexico!!!!

That's right!

We've booked our Mexico trip for next summer. 

We're going to the Dreams Tulum Resort and Spa, an all-inclusive resort about an hour and a half from the Cancun airport, near the Mayan Tulum ruins.

I'm super excited about it!
Dave?  Not so much.  Well actually, that's not really true, but I do think he has some reservations.

He's sad because our original plan was that a group of friends and/or family would come with us, and we've gotten lukewarm responses, particularly from his brothers - two people that we thought would definitely be in.   We've had a few other people ask us about it, and we were totally willing to organize the travel dates and/or location if someone was willing to commit to going and felt strongly.  But no one wanted to commit, and after weeks of waiting and watching the prices slowly crawl upwards, we decided that we just needed to decide what we wanted and go for it.

He's also concerned about the cost and rightfully so.  We've had a lot of HUGE expenses sneak up on us over the past few weeks, including a new washer and dryer and new tires for my car which were more than $700.  Add on top of that my need for new contacts and glasses, and Dave's desire to start his grad classes up again relatively soon does definitely leave us feeling slightly poor. 

But, I've been saving up for this trip since our honeymoon, and while these "savings" are the vast majority of our savings, my new goal is to save the total amount of the trip over the next few months by eliminating unnecessary costs.

Let's start with tonight - Dave is at Bar Louie and I decided to stay home. Why go out to eat and drink when I can save that money and count it towards this trip?  I'm counting $15, even though I would have probably spent way more than that.  I'm going to continue to cut my own hair in the front, and let the length grow out.  That saves me about $10 a month (a "bangs" cut is only $7.)  I'm going to groom Murphy at home instead of taking him the groomer - a savings of $50 per quarter.  And finally, I'm not going to enroll in the January session of the Zumba class that I wanted to take, and will instead work out at home on the equipment that we already own, which would have cost me another $50.  Already, that adds up to about $227, and if I keep thinking of ways to save, I will have "saved" the cost of this trip all over again!

Anyway, back to the vacation...

Dreams is nice because if any of our friends/family with kids wants to come, it's child-friendly.  And for all of our young, couple friends, it's all inclusive which means a lot of drinking.  The distance from Cancun means that it's more secluded and in a more rural area, which I already enjoy.  I don't like being surrounded by a bunch of other hotels - I would prefer to be able to walk along the beach and enjoy the scenery and not have to worry about wearing a plastic bracelet that identifies which resort I'm staying at.  The other thing that I like about Dreams is that they don't have an ala carte restaurant limit.  At many Cancun resorts, you get a certain number of restaurant reservations per number of nights staying - for example, 3 restaurant reservations per 7 nights of staying at the resort.  At Dreams, you go to whichever restaurant that you want to go to, and if there is a wait, they give you a buzzer just like you're going to Red Lobster or something like that.  From the reviews that I read online, there weren't too many complaints about long waits, so I hope that it ends up being true.

But no matter what, I'm determined to have a great time!!!  We don't get to take major vacations every year, and since our mini-vacation last year was basically rained out, I've been craving some sun and relaxation. 

If you are friends or family of ours and you are interested in coming with us, please contact me for the details!  I will give you the specifics and we really hope that you can come.  But even if no one else comes with us, I know that Dave and I will have an amazing time and an amazing vacation - just the two of us.