This month my hubby and I celebrated our 9 year wedding anniversary! That’s so crazy to say! It feels like yesterday we were just planning our wedding. We’ve actually been together for 15 years though so that’s really a long time! We’ve pretty much grown up together and I wouldn’t have it any other way! We have so many amazing memories together over the years! Each year we try to do something special for our anniversary and this year we decided to do a weekend road trip somewhere we haven’t been before. Typically we would drive to LA or Vegas or even SF but since we’ve been to all those places so many times before we decided on Scottsdale in Arizona. Scottsdale is about a 6 hour drive from San Diego and that was about the driving limit for us for a weekend trip. We wanted to make sure we did something fun for Olivia this trip too since it seems like most of our vacations are in the cities and she’s stuck in her stroller most of the time.
Roadtrips to me are so much easier than flying when you have kids. You have so much more room to take anything you may need and you don’t have to worry about weight limits on bags or how many bags you can take. I was actually able to take my full size stroller and we took a cooler and snack bag with a ton of snacks and drinks for the trip. Olivia does so good in the car too. I had a few of her favorite toys in her carseat with her and we played some music that she loves including the Frozen soundtrack. My hubby was a good sport with that haha! We also made sure to stop somewhere half way for lunch and get out and stretch. By the time we got to Scottsdale and checked into our room we changed and wanted to go explore a little of downtown. There were so many trendy bars and restaurants to choose from! I couldn’t get over all the unique options. We are not a fan of chain restaurants so it was nice to have so many local options! After dinner we just walked around a little bit before heading back to our room for the night.
We decided to spend most of the day Saturday at the Phoenix Zoo so Olivia would have some fun and be able to walk around a little too. We bought our tickets right at the gate and I think they were only $20 per person, kids free of course. We packed lots of snacks and drinks in our bag so we didn’t have to buy much there. Food in the parks is always so expensive and it’s not a lot of healthy options either. It was so much hotter than we thought it was going to be. I think it was 95 degrees when we were there and it felt like the desert for sure. We stayed for a few hours walking around but a lot of the animals where hiding because of the heat, so once we got through the park we headed out. We planned on going to the pool for a little before dinner but after being in the sun all day we all needed a little rest in the AC. For dinner this night we actually had a gift card for Cheesecake Factory so we found one at the Kierland Commons outdoor mall. This part of the city was so much more kid friendly and there were so many good stores to go to. After dinner we walked around for a while and we all had icecream at one of our favorites, Shake Shack. Olivia made friends with some other kids that were playing and it was such a fun little family night. I highly recommend checking this place out if you have kids. There are also a lot of unique local restaurants here too.
I would highly recommend Scottsdale whether you are going with kids or not. There is so much to do! We can’t wait to go back. I would like to go a little earlier in the year next time so it’s not so hot. I think April is pretty much the cutoff before the weather gets too hot. All summer it’s over 100 degrees and that is just way too hot for us. There are a ton of really nice hotels close to everything and every sort of restaurant you can think of. There’s really something for everyone!
xoxo
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