Last year we took two 5,000 mile trips. This year, we're cutting back to one.

Seriously, though, 2 trips was more a one-time thing. Son and I have been taking long car trips since he was little, because I want him to see the world, not just the inside of a classroom. This year might be our last, though. (He'll be 15 in November. gulp.) He's going to online high school this year, and will probably have a job in the fall (he's already a bat boy for a minor league baseball team, but that ends in September). So, he's going to start having a real life, without me, boo hoo, and so I don't know when we'll find the time to just take off and go like we're used to doing.

Gas prices have already curtailed many weekend trips.

I looked at hotel rooms outside NYC last night. (We're going to Vermont in September and we're going to see the Yankees play in Yankee Stadium since we'll be "in the 'hood".) Those hotel rates are a big ouchie and now I don't know what I'll cut out of the trip (4 weeks long) to make it work. We usually camp out at KOA cabins, to afford these trips. Gas will really take a bite out of things.

But, he only has one childhood, and I don't plan on cutting much else out of this trip for that very reason. It may be our last rodeo.

Karen