Home away from home..

When we were deciding to go on a vacation, I went through a long list of vacation destinations - in Italy, France, Spain, Mexico etc. The list quickly reduced given that we had a 3 and half months old and a 3 and half years old! (And the soaring gas prices that made tickets twice as expensive) We were looking for a change(and ofcourse in a good way) .. but then with the kids the question was 'how much of a change?'

Because--

When I order a $20 main course in a restaurant and my snob daughter refuses to taste it, I am not sure if I should feel bad for her being hungry or about the wasted food!

When I wake up in the morning (or should I say when I am half asleep) and have to leave the room for a breakfast that I dont really enjoy . (Other than Mc Donald's sausage biscuit on the way to Tahoe before skiing)

I dont want to spend more money on cabs than I spent on the air ticket but I cant walk for miles with little ones hanging on to me.

And most importanly becos vacation was meant to be relaxing!

So I concluded that a kitchen is a must and started looking for vacation rentals. After looking through pages and pages of really grand villas in Italy, Spain, France and Mexico, I was totally disappointed by the fact that I could not go there. And, air fare was least of the problems. They were all booked! (This was 2-3 wks in advance.) So I started searching in US and in California specifically with an intention to drive. Imagine not having to pack up everything in suitcases of certain size and number or waiting for the cab to show up or to worry about missing the plane, running through the lines of security and having to throw baby milk as if it would explode! (Having done that for our quarterly business trips to India, we had enough already.)

Anyways, I bumped into the listings of Cambria which I had never really heard of. Not all listings had the calendar online so I copy pasted the standard email that I had written. It started of saying, "Your house is beautiful.." I was trying to impress the unknown reader to give me a chance. So long story short, we got this beautiful home in Cambria. Its a (did I say beautiful already?) gorgeous 3 bd 2.5 bath with view of the ocean and newly built! (My nightmare was going to a house not half good as my own and paying for it too.)

The interior is asthetically done with all the necessities including a pack and play, crib, castle home, hide and seek tent, booster chair and walker for the kids. Anoushka was thrilled to see all the 'new' toys and Sania got hers along so both of them were very happy. I wake up with the usual steaming hot cup of ginger tea with toast. Anshu can bath for an hour in the jacuzzi tub and has plenty of room to throw his clothes around in the big walk-in closet. so everyone feels at 'home'. :-)