Blog Tour: Holiday Inn State-Cation

Mom Central asked me if I wanted to participate in the Holiday Inn State-cation blog tour, so here I am! :)

If you've hung around my blog for any length of time, you know that we really like to seek out fun (and cheap!) things to do locally. We've taken short trips locally to visit a puppet museum, visited a local museum all about Kitsap County, and even visited a fun museum practically in our back yard all about Port Orchard. I can't let that history degree go stale - I have to seek out new things to learn about. ;)

Fall is the perfect time of year for stay-cations. (A stay-cation is visiting a local place, usually under 200 miles away, and sometimes staying overnight. You can relax, and have fun doing things close to home - just pretend you're a tourist!) Many places tend to offer discounts to keep traffic coming in, and of course with the harvest time, many You Pick farms have a bounty of fresh fruits and veggies ready to be picked - not only can your kids learn where food actually comes from, and how it's grown, but you can have a fun time and knock some grocery shopping out of the way at the same time! (We personally can't wait to go pick out the first pumpkins of the year!)

If farm picking isn't up your alley, how about a historical spot, or window shopping trip? If you're lucky enough to live in an area of the country where the leaves are changing colors, there's another idea - just fill up your gas tank, and drive through the countryside for an hour or two. Stop wherever something catches your eye! I know when we went to pick up the dogs, my DH and I were surprised at how many neat things we could have stopped at, all within a 2-3 hour drive radius. Pack a lunch to keep costs down a little, and just have fun as a family. (If you want to plan ahead, surf the internet for coupons and deals to keep the trip as cheap as possible!) Many places have children under a certain age free, so that helps too.

After all the stress we've had over the last couple of months, my family (alright, *I*) could really use a break. The thing is, we're just a little tight on cash as most of you know. One of the things my DH and I were talking about a few weeks back as the moving truck was being loaded: there's a lot of things in Seattle we still haven't done, even though we've lived here over 3 years! Both of us really want to visit the Space Needle, and DH has been dying to finally go see the EMP. Last night I remembered Holiday Inn was part of this blog tour, so I took a peek at the cost of a room in Seattle. I was actually really surprised to see that the cost was just $93 a night! Usually, hotels over here are a lot more expensive than that - a couple of years ago pre-munchkin when we visited Seattle to stay overnight, I remember paying over $100 a night, and that was using Priceline! (and the hotel wasn't very nice, either)

Plus, a jacuzzi suite is just $127. I'm thinking it's time for a staycation for Momma alone.... LOL! Seriously, I think this stay-cation might be just in our price range - I'm adding up the costs, and it's not that bad. The EMP offers free admission on the first Thursday of every month - so if we wait and do this next month, not only do I have time to cut some corners to have the cash, we can already save a bit there, plus the munchkin is free everywhere. Of course, we are starting into the rainy season here, so we may end up walking from the hotel to the Needle and EMP in the rain, lol. I'm getting excited just planning this!

And the usual:
“I wrote this review while participating in a blog campaign by Mom Central on behalf of Holiday Inn. Mom Central sent me a gift card to thank me for taking the time to participate.”