"I'm a mom traveling with my kids.  For me, this is not a vacation. It's a business trip."

-Claire from "Modern Family"

So very, very true.  

Vacationing with Littles couldn't be more different than my pre-children vacations.  No more stacks of books to plow through between naps on the beach.  Instead, the day-to-day needs of my sweet ones are intensified by unfamiliar surroundings.  Sleep is disrupted, meals are not on time, tantrums result.  

I long to be that zen Momma who rolls with the punches, projects calm in the storm, never snaps at her husband, and keeps her cool when the sugar demons take over my sweet girl's body.  In reality, I become to easily unnerved and rattled.  I'm unhinged long after the tantrum has passed.  I grumpily wonder if this is a vacation at all. 

And then I remember... I'm not really on vacation.  I am out of the "office" and traveling with my work.  And it is the best, hardest, most wonderful job there ever was.  And man-oh-man are these smiles it worth it.