I could have chosen a very obvious word of the week this week and gone with “poorly” but I feel I have written more than enough on that subject already. So I decided instead to look on the more positive side, and to look forward. The rest of this week has all been about our “preparations,” because, we are going on holiday next week! Wahoo!! 🙂

As you can tell I am ever so slightly excited, and after the week we’ve just had we are very much in need of a break!

We aren’t heading to the most glamorous of destinations this year. We loved our all inclusive holiday in Majorca last year and loved the heat and the sun, but when we were planning this year’s holiday we were very much hoping that I would be pregnant and had to take a few things into consideration. While there is nothing to say you can’t go abroad when you are pregnant, because of the troubles I had with SPD in my last pregnancy (and ending up on crutches), we were wary of what was to come this time. As it is I am managing the SPD a lot better for the moment, but even then I cannot carry anything heavy, or push anything around. This would mean that at the airport it would have been up for Hubby to do everything, t0 push all the luggage and take care of Monkey. Neither of us fancied the thought of that much!

So we decided to stay in the UK, and initially I wanted to head south to Cornwall or similar. I love it down there and hubby has never been. I even thought about visiting the wonderful Coombe Mill. But, Hubby reminded me how much I suffered with car journeys in my last pregnancy, sitting for hours isn’t great with SPD either, so we eventually decided to limit the journey to only a couple of hours. I think a Cornwall trip takes over 5 hours from us and we decided that was just too far for a preggo me. A real shame but we will have to save that for another time!

After a bit of searching we found a lovely place on the east coast – I have been saying Norfolk but it is actually technically Suffolk. We are staying in between Great Yarmouth (Norfolk) and Lowestoft (Suffolk) so right on the edge of both. It’s a little 3 bedroom holiday home on a purpose built resort, so it has a heated swimming pool (under a cover so can be used in all weather), a big childrens play area, and is very close to a lovely sandy beach. We are hoping for a least a bit of sun some days, but also have a few days out planned in the areas nearby for what I feel are some guaranteed rainy days!

I had hoped to spend some of the bank holiday weekend getting organised for the holiday, but as that went well and truly out of the window I have been feeling a bit pressed for time to get organised and packed up! The good thing about taking the car is that we can load up with all sorts of bits and bobs, and lots of Monkey’s favourite things to help keep him entertained. My list for packing is a good few pages long! I will probably go overboard, I usually do, but I’d rather take things and not need them, than forget something and wish we had it with us!

Clothes are the hardest thing to plan for this holiday I am finding. As we don’t know what the weather will be we need to plan for all eventualities. Jumpers, jeans, raincoats and wellies,  plus shorts, t-shirts, sandals and sunhats! We are going in hubbies go – as though it is older and slightly less reliable, it does work, and it has a MUCH bigger boot than my car :).

I’m also thinking about taking some foody bits – as it’s self catering. We will probs eat out a bit though certainly not every mealtime and I also don’t want to waste time on holiday in local shops or finding supermarkets  and trying to figure out what to eat. So I may take some of the regular bits – the porridge monkey loves, a couple of tins of soup. I’ve been self catering before, we went a lot as kids, but I’ve never had to plan it all for the family and with a toddler to think about before and again I will probably end up taking too much!

If anyone has any useful tips for what to take, and what not to take, it would be very much appreciated!