Our Yearly Honeymoon - Guest Post by With Gratitude

Let me just start this by saying that this is my first time guest posting and for whatever reason I feel like I'm about to do a public speaking engagement so I'm a little nervous.

Over reacting a tad? Yes, that would be me.

And if you don't know me over on a little blog, With Gratitude, well then let me introduce myself.

My name is Courtney, I'm 25 {in a week, happy birthday to me!}, I've been married to my best friend for a little over 2 1/2 years and together we are co-parenting the cutest little Yorkie-Poo named Willow until {Lord willing} real babies come along someday. {Which I'm being told by impatient family and friends that we need to speed up the process. All in good time people...}

Hello!

And because I can't resist putting up a picture of above mentioned puppy, here's little Ms. Willow this past 4th of July. In case you were wondering, I'm only allowed to dress her up on holidays.

I'm addicted to chocolate, coffee, shopping, taking way too many pictures, shoes, blogging, my puppy and oh yeah... traveling. {But I PROMISE you I'm not as shallow as I just made myself sound.}

When Rose asked me to guest post about anything related to fashion or travel I was quite a bit excited because those two things are right up my alley and I knew I could actually talk about something I know rather than make things up on the spot. {Which I will still probably do by the way.}

My husband and I agreed back during our engagement year that we wanted to make traveling and vacations a huge priority in our marriage.

I grew up with a dad whose idea of a vacation was camping in the great Rocky Mountains or touring Mt. Rushmore 3 different times during my childhood {Yes, that's right. 3.} I love my father but if you know me in real life you know I am not a "camping-type" of girl. And this comes from a born and raised Coloradoan so don't believe everything you hear; we are not ALL out-doorsy type people. Another thing you shouldn't believe about us? We don't all like snow and winter and there are some of us who don't know how to ski even a little bit.

Anways, my husband, Jeremy, on the other hand went on vacations 2-3 times a year with his parents growing up. There's not a lot of places he hasn't been and it's his main way of relaxing now that we're older. He's a bit of a work-aholic and only takes time away from his lab when we have a vacation to go on.

So far in our 2+ years of marriage, we have been to Hawaii, Mexico, a Caribbean cruise and are currently planning a week long trip to New York next year with my in-laws.

Our Hawaiian Honeymoon

Our Mexian Dream

We have a thing for oceans ♥

Our Caribbean Cruise

Now... something I wanted to mention before you get the wrong idea about us; we are not rolling in money. Quite simply, we are experts on traveling on a budget. With a husband receiving a PhD student's income and me in social work, we aren't exactly raking in the dough right now. We make sacrifices in other areas of our life and have a portion of each of our paychecks that go directly into our "vacation savings account" every month to cover the cost.

Another tip? AppleVacations.com. Check it out weekly, look and research all the amazing deals and thank me later. Seriously, our trips would never have been possible without that little beauty and something I like to call 60% off when you strike at the right time. =)

{And go with the golden apple ratings, they've never been wrong.}

I would say the biggest theme on these trips are the death traps my dear husband always manages to talk me into somehow.

Whether it's a  Hawaiian helicopter tour of the island...

Zip lining and rock climbing through Mexican rain forests...

Or riding random donkeys to the tops of cliffs, he's lucky we're still alive.

And in exchange for these life-threatening activities, Jeremy has to take as many kissing pictures as I want in front of oceans and sunsets.
Skip ahead of you don't want to be grossed out.

Although, some of us take these pictures more seriously than others.

But before I bore you with any more pictures I'll just go ahead and wrap this up.

Bottom line? One of the most important things we have done for our marriage are these little trips together. I can't stress enough how important it is to just get away from the world for awhile! Even if you can't afford to fly somewhere, take the time to do something small even if that means just staying in a fancy hotel for a night or two. It's so easy to get caught up in the day-to-day stress and craziness and vacations are the one time when we have each other's undivided attention for days on end. It's like going on your honeymoon every year which I personally think should become tradition.

Who's with me?