Friends,
I have been thinking a lot about hotels and what actually makes a stay memorable. Not from the perspective of marketing or rankings, but from lived experience, especially when traveling with family.
We wrapped up our final hotel stays of 2025 recently, and I was struck by how excited my daughters were to be back at a hotel. One is five and the other is two and a half, and for them, hotels are still full of novelty. New spaces, new views, different routines. It is all an adventure.
We stayed at a newer hotel in Houston (review to follow), and while it was beautiful in all the expected ways, the thing my girls cared about most was not the view or the room size. It was the bathtub.
They took multiple baths in a single night and treated it like an event. It made me laugh, but it also stuck with me. Earlier in the month, the same thing happened again on a quick stay at DFW airport. Big room, great upgrade, fun pool, but what they wanted to do after swimming was take another bath.
It turns out that bathtubs, especially nice ones, are a much bigger deal than I ever would have guessed.
This is not something I would have listed as a meaningful hotel perk before traveling with kids, but now I see it differently. It is not the bathtub itself. It is what it represents. Space to slow down. A break in routine. Something that feels special simply because it is different from home.
Loyalty programs and perks absolutely played a role in these stays. We stacked credit card benefits with hotel status and ended up with upgrades and credits that made the experience much better than what we paid for. Those things matter and I enjoy figuring out how to do them well.
But the real takeaway for me was simpler.
The things that end up mattering most are often not the things we plan for. They are the small details that create space for joy, play, and memory. A bathtub. A view. A quiet moment after a long day of travel.
I also find that photos help preserve those moments. I take a lot of them while traveling, often just for myself. Flipping back through them later feels like reliving a small piece of the experience, and that has become one of the quiet gifts of travel for me.
As we look ahead to more trips this year, I am excited not just for big destinations or long flights, but for those smaller moments that end up defining the experience. Travel has a way of pulling us out of routine and reminding us what matters, especially when shared with the people we love.
If you are planning a trip this year and want help thinking through hotels, loyalty benefits, or how to make it all come together, feel free to reply. I am always glad to help.
Thanks for being here and for sharing in the journey.
Fly well.
