Returning Home From Vacation: 4 Tips That Will Make Your Life Easier
Coming home from your travels can be quite the downer. It’s a weird mix of feelings somewhere between disappointment and relief. Disappointment that your journeys have come to an end – or a temporary pause. Relief that you get to lie back in your own bed after a long day and not live out of your suitcase anymore! Whether you’re returning from a week-long vacation in the Caribbean or have been on a 5-month sabbatical venturing around Southeast Asia, coming home is definitely a bittersweet situation.
While it’s completely natural to get the holiday blues post-vacation, you can definitely do some things before your trip to ease yourself back into being home after your travels. Here are our top tips to take the future stress out of returning home and make your welcome back be as blissful as can be!
Clean Up Before Your Trip
While it can be tempting to pack and go and leave a mess for when you arrive back, coming home to a house that has been upended or has dirty dishes languishing in the sink will just make you feel even more miserable than you already do. Whether you spend an hour or two cleaning up pre-departure or hire a cleaning service to come in before you come home and freshen up the place (a good idea for those who have been away for a little while), make sure you come home to a clean house.
I will NEVER leave our bed unmade or our room with things on the floor. Jason can attest to that! He gets annoyed when we’re supposed to be out the door already. But I just have to make sure everything is visually in order prior to leaving for our flight or road trip, even if we’re running a tad later that we had planned. It makes for a peaceful homecoming when we’re back and mister rolls-his-eyes-because-I’m-tidying-up-things-that-don’t-matter has never once complained about it!
Set Your Bed With Fresh Sheets
There is nothing like climbing into bed when you have just put fresh sheets on. The scent and touch brings me at ease every time! A good tip before you go away is to change your bedding or have fresh bedding ready to put on your bed when you arrive home. That way, you can sink in comfort knowing you are going to be getting a good sleep regardless of how many time zones you had to cross to get back home.
It sucks if you’re already so busy planning and packing for your trip, and you’ve got an early morning departure. What we like to do is change the sheets the day before, we leave, that way they’re still quite fresh when we get back, and we don’t have to worry about the bed if we’re settling back home late at night.
Meal Prep or Add Long-Life Foods to Your Kitchen
This trip won’t work so well if you are travelling for long periods; however, having some healthy pre-prepared foods for your arrival home can help you to find something to eat without having to worry about going to the store. If you’re going away for a week or two, find some foods that can easily be stored in the freezer and be reheated in a few minutes. You can make something quick like this brownie recipe from PreppyKitchen for your sweet cravings. Or a casserole to whip out and reheat in the microwave to give you an easy great meal without having to order in when you get home.
Alternatively, choose to stock up on long-life snacks and foods such as cereal bars, nuts seeds, canned fish or meats, pasta, tinned sauces, and more so you have something to grab and prepare that you know won’t have gone out of date upon your arrival home. It always sucks to come home to expired foods in your fridge and pantry, and nothing to make after a long day of travelling!
Don’t forget to chuck out those short-lifespan dairy products before you leave if you don’t have time to finish them! Last thing you want is to come home to a stinking fridge with wretched things growing in it. Blegh!
Of course, this is not to say that if you want to eat out or order in when you get home that you can’t. Sometimes, however, after a long travel day, you might not have the luxury of getting takeout or food delivery depending on the hour you get home. If you do want to head out though, maybe search for something like a local kid friendly restaurant that you haven’t yet tried!
Take A Day
When making your pre-travel plans, allow yourself a day or so after coming home to acclimatize and get your footing. While you might feel the need to jump right back into your work life, take some time to process your trip, think about the amazing experiences you had, and let it all soak in before resuming normal life. Whether you spend it hitting the gym, searching for your next vacation, sleeping or watching TV, or loading up the washing machine with dirty holiday outfits, allow yourself this time to decompress and adjust before getting on with life.
This is particularly important if you’re coming home from a drastically different timezone. I don’t know why, but we’re always hit with the oddest jetlag when we come home but never at the start of the trip! When I was working my 9-to-5 job, we made an effort to book our returning flight home to arrive on the Saturday or Sunday morning to give myself that extra day. It makes a world of a difference!
Returning from vacation isn’t fun for everyone. And while it is nice to connect with those you left behind, it can still take some adjustment. These tips can help you have a smooth return and make things at least a tad bit easier on yourself!
