Our First Family Vacation Booked!

We have spent a few hours, each of us, surfing the web, trying to figure out which hotel to book for our Minneapolis vacation happening in mid-July. However, because we are a larger family, you cannot just pick any hotel. You have to either find a hotel with a suite that accepts 7 people or you have to book 2 adjoining rooms. Sometimes the two rooms are cheaper, sometimes the suite is cheaper. Then, do we want just a pool or a pool with a waterslide? Which suburb do we want? Does it have a complimentary breakfast of sorts? What kinds of things are reviewers saying about the hotel? The most important (almost!) question is how far away is the Mall of America and Ikea from the hotel? Agh, so many things to think of. Well, a while ago I stumbled across a website (and had since forgotten) called sixsuitcasetravel.com which helps those with larger families of 5, 6, 7 or 8 find family-friendly hotels that will accomodate them. Jay found the website again and we found our hotel by using that site's recommendations. After reading the overviews of so many hotels nothing really popped out. Until this one! It is called GrandStay Residential Suites Hotel in Apple Valley, MN. I was so pumped when I read that they have a two bedroom queen suite which has basically three rooms - 2 separate bedrooms each hold a queen-sized bed and a TV and a "great room" which has a livingroom area with a full-sized sleeper sofa, wingback chair and a TV with DVD player plus a fully equipped kitchen offering a full-size refrigerator, microwave, 2-burner stove, coffee maker, toaster, and dishwasher including dishware. Check out the map below - isn't it AMAZING!!

This is perfect for our needs. 6 of us in beds and baby girl in the playpen - totally doable! We are planning to be gone from Monday-Friday so a fully equipped kitchen is wonderful. Plus, this hotel is completely smoke-free so no yucky smoke smell. They have a very lenient cancellation policy - cancel by 6pm on the day of arrival and no fees will be assessed! It does have a pool, however, it is a fairly small one. We will be travelling during the week so it may not be that big a deal. Complimentary breakfast is included and the hotel uses Bath and Body Works products! Man, that is luxury in and of itself! It is located 14 km from the Mall of America and 16 km from IKEA. The price for all this goodness? Only about $100 more in total than booking 2 rooms at another hotel for a very low price. We are willing to pay a little more for the convenience of everything. Of course, I will have to tell you when we get back how it actually all turned out. I am just glad we found something that we are excited about and will meet our needs.