It's Gonna Be a Hot, Hot Honeymoon!

Yes, in about 3 1/2 months, this is what Mr. S and I will be looking at:

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We're both getting really excited about honeymooning in Aruba! It was very important to me that we take a honeymoon immediately after the wedding...I wanted that feeling of just jetting off after the big day and being just "us" for awhile before real life comes back into the picture. But unfortunately, we weren't sure what we could really afford to do. In stepped the Stiletto parents, who never took a "true" honeymoon, and didn't want us to miss the opportunity. They ever so generously gifted us 1 week of their timeshare, ours to trade for whatever location was available for our desired week.

We looked at the Dominican Repulic (not the best location, we decided, for September) and I daydreamed about Thailand, Bali and New Zealand...however, even though the accommodations were covered, we still had to get ourselves there!

On one of my daily searches through the timeshare web site last November, Aruba popped up. I started talking to different people who had been, and heard fabulous things - clean, safe, hot (seriously, their only season is, you guess it, HOT!), and far south, outside of that pesky hurricane zone. Check it out, Aruba is WAAAY down there:

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We decided we needed to jump on this opportunity and book the trip...after checking flights, of course! We were able to get roundtrip airfare with short layovers in Miami each way for around $900 for the two of us. Fan-tastic! If we had waited until about now to secure a location, I'm sure there would have been many more options - timeshares are great for trading at the last minute. But I'm very glad we took care of this when we did. We booked our flights in December, so other than meals and activities (re: laying on the beach!), everything is paid for.

We'll be staying here, at Marriott's Aruba Ocean Club.

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We'll have more of a small condo equipped with a kitchen rather than just a room. There is a Marriott resort right by the timeshare, where we should have access to all of the amenities such as their pool, spa, and casino, should we want to gamble away our wedding gifts (I kid, I kid).

Mr. S and I are so grateful for my parents' generosity and helping us have a beautiful, relaxing honeymoon! At this stage in the game, it's also great to know that we won't have to shell out tons of money to make this happen...one less thing to be budgeting at this point. Plus...Mr. S has never been to the ocean before and it's been years since I've been! He was a wee bit hesitant about the trip at first, thinking we'd be bored. Now I think he's realizing that the "boredom" will really be "relaxation" and will be very welcome.

What part of your honeymoon are you most excited about?