Photo Friday: The Family Traveler’s Handbook winners and a look ahead

Tommy and the Incredible Hulk say congratulations to the five winners of a signed copy of The Family Traveler’s Handbook. Thanks to everyone who entered and to these five family travelers for sharing their travel dreams:

• Elizabeth would like to take her family to The Maldives.
• Sarah wants to visit Spain with her two kids.
• Lisa says “I would love to take my kids all over the world but a realistic location would be Washington DC. They are the right ages to understand the history and beauty.”
• Jennifer would go to “Greece and Turkey and Australia and New Zealand and everywhere else.”
• And Allison’s dream? One word: “Hawaii”.

The photo in this post is from the Toys “R” Us in Times Square. I took it earlier this month on our trip to New York City and I’m really looking forward to sharing the story of that trip over the next few weeks. We tried a very successful experiment of staying outside the city in Tarrytown and packed a lot into a long weekend. This was also one of the first trips where I really felt conscious of the fact that Tommy has fully entered into tween-hood. I look forward to telling you about what we did and also my reflections on what it’s like to travel with an older kid.

What else is coming up? Of course, next week is American Thanksgiving, a time for gratitude and giving back as the annual travel blogging fundraiser Passports With Purpose starts on Monday evening. This year we’re working to raise money to build schools in Mali with buildOn.org. I can’t wait to share my prize with you. Look for much more about that in the weeks to come.

I’ll also be writing about skiing, zip lines, and other winter fun and will be making a big announcement about a new blogging gig that I’m super excited about.

I hope that there’s something in there to tempt your interest to come back. I also hope that you’ll consider subscribing to The Mother of all Trips via email; I’m looking at making some changes in how I deliver information and stories to my readers, and this will be the surest way for you to stay on top of all the latest developments.

Have a great weekend!