• I spent about $7,700 taking my family of five to Disneyland for three nights this past winter.
• Although they get expensive, Disneyland trips have become a family tradition for us.
• For us, staying on the property and booking three nights instead of two was worth the added cost.

Disneyland has always held a special place in my heart.

I grew up in Orange County, California, and every summer night, my family watched the Disneyland fireworks from our back patio.

I visited the parks as a teen, then with my wife when we first got married. Once our son arrived, visiting the Disney parks became our family tradition.

Eventually, he got "too old" to hang out with mom and dad. For many years, my wife and I continued to visit Disney parks just the two of us, but we missed sharing the experience with loved ones.

Now that our son has his a wife and child, though, we've brought back the tradition of visiting the parks as a family — and Disneyland has become one of my favorite places once more.

Winter trips to Disney have become a new family tradition

For us, December Disney visits have become a fairly new holiday tradition.

For the second year in a row, we had our son, his wife, and their kid fly from Washington state to California so we could treat them to a Disney trip. It's a treat for us, too, because we get to spend time with them and our 3-year-old granddaughter.

My wife and I are snowbirds, so the trip is also a chance to see our family in the winter without having to face the colder temperatures and snow in Washington.

We always try to learn from our past trips

Last time, we did a two-night Disney trip but it felt too short. This time, I booked four days and three nights instead.

The extra night allowed us to check into the hotel and enjoy its amenities without taking too much time away from the parks. It was worth the added cost.

On our last trip, we booked a Costco Travel package to save money. This time, I chose to book directly through Disney so I could better customize our longer trip.

Although staying on Disney property can be more expensive than staying at nearby hotels, it comes with several benefits, like getting early access to the parks (and a short walk to get to them).

So, we stayed on the property again this year. I wanted to book a two-room suite at Disneyland Hotel, but none were available when I made my reservation in August.

Instead, I reserved two connecting rooms for $4,456. However, just three weeks before our trip I checked the Disney website and saw a suite was available.

First, I'm glad I kept regularly checking the Disney site — you never know when someone else could cancel and the room you want will open up. This could work for hard-to-get meal reservations, too.

Second, I'm grateful I called guest services to change my reservation. The staff member even helped find me a promotion that would save me over $1,300 on the listed suite rate.

In the end, our stay cost $4,571 — so I paid just $115 more to upgrade to the suite.

The trip is never cheap, but it's worth it for us

After booking the hotel, we also paid for parking for two cars ($240), two-day tickets with admission for one park a day for four adults and one child ($1,630), food, drinks, and souvenirs.

All totaled, our trip was about $7,700. This time, I was also able to cover about $1,100 of the charges using rewards dollars I'd earned with my Disney Visa card.

Throughout the trip, we were able to just enjoy time as a family whether we were going on rides, watching a parade, or swimming at our hotel.

It was a lot of money, but the memories we made once again made the cost worth it. I'm confident we'll be back as we continue to cement this as our family tradition.

• I returned home after my first military enlistment while I was in college.
• I didn't move out permanently until I got married.
• Most of my friends from high school lived at home for several years after high school.

Recently, I was catching up with someone from high school. He mentioned that he still lived with his parents in Orange County, California, while in college, even though he had a good job in law enforcement.

That got me thinking about other people from high school who didn't leave the nest right away, including my best friend, who was also a police officer in his mid-20s before he moved out. Many of my friends, except for stints in the military or those who went away for college, continued to live with their parents for several years while attending college or saving up to buy their first home.

The Pew Research Center estimated that 57% of young adults ages 18 to 24 live in their parents' homes, up from 53% in 1993. The rising home prices, inflation, and the lack of a living wage have all been presented as causes. But based on my experience, I don't see this as necessarily bad for adult children and parents.

I lived in a multigenerational house

I grew up in a house with my mom, aunt, and grandfather. I joined the military from high school but returned and lived at home while attending college. I worked part time while going to school and paid my own expenses.

I didn't move out permanently until I married, nor did my wife.

While our parents did insist that for us to live at home we had to either be paying rent or in school, it didn't feel like we were going to get an eviction notice with our stuff on the lawn. It was more a way for them to encourage us.

There can be many advantages, financial being one of the top. Some 64% of adult children living with parents report a positive financial impact. Parents also benefit, with some 72% of young adults contributing to family expenses.

My brother-in-law also lived at home while attending college. He paid his own way through school, and because he lived at home, he had no student debt. He married the month after he graduated. He and his wife moved into an ADU that he built at his new father-in-law's house. They lived there for seven years rent-free to help save up for their first home.

The support I got helped me later in life

As a parent, I knew that one day my kid would leave the nest; he had to start his own life at some point. And I don't deny that some parents may have to give their kids a little nudge to do so.

But who is to say when we have to nudge them and how big a nudge that should be? Just because they are legally adults when they turn 18 doesn't make that a magic number for leaving the nest. I believe that if you've raised them right they'll have learned how to function on their own long before they are 18.

I got a better start in life because of my family. My wife and I moved into a condo the week we were married, and a few years later, we bought our first home. Two years after that, our son was born. None of that would have been possible without the support I received.

Today's young adults remaining in the nest after high school aren't a "failure to launch" trend. They are just the next generation of nestlings waiting until the right moment to spread their wings and soar, just like my generation did.

• I had enough airline miles for two round-trip first-class tickets from Los Angeles to Orlando.
• We enjoyed the experiences and our time together and reconnected as a couple.
• There would be no penny-pinching on this trip, unlike our first as parents.

Being from Southern California, many would ask why I'd want to spend the money to go to Walt Disney World in Florida when I had Disneyland in my backyard. I would say that if you ask that question, you've never been there. It is a magical world unto itself.

Our first trip was in 1987, and my wife and I made annual trips until 1993 when we found out we were going to be parents.

Anyone with kids knows that life changes. We waited until our son was old enough and returned as a family in 1998. It was even more magical with children. By the time he was 8, we gave him a walkie-talkie and let him run around the hotel as long as he checked in with us.

At the time, I never thought that one day, we would return without children.

My son didn't want to go when he was a teenager

Life is all about change, especially with kids. The next two decades saw many family trips to the magical world in Florida. When the economy changed in 2007, we switched to driving across the Western US with our camping trailer, but always as a family. Being a dad wasn't just something I did; it was who I was.

But life changes; children don't stay children forever. As a teen, it was no longer cool for my son to go on trips with Mom and Dad. Then, the inevitable happened: high school graduation, college, and the Army. We had officially become empty-nesters.

By 2017, our financial situation had improved, and I was once again working as an executive. I felt secure and decided it was time to reward ourselves. It would be our first trip to Disney World without kids in decades, and it felt weird. We had originally planned for September, but Hurricane Irma had other plans. We rescheduled for February of 2018. We'd never gone in Spring; we'd always gone in August to close out the summer before school started.

We hit all the parks when we went by ourselves

I worked late the night before answering final emails. Then I clicked "save" on my out-of-office message. I was officially on vacation. I had years of airline miles accumulated and had enough for two first-class round-trip tickets.

We headed first to Universal Studios and a two-night stay at the Royal Pacific Resort Hotel. We did all the parks and all the Harry Potter attractions. We even got a Butter Beer. But we'd come to Florida for another reason.

On our third day, we drove to Disney's Wilderness Lodge. We've stayed at a half dozen resorts on the property over the years, but this is our favorite. The architecture is reminiscent of the great national park lodges. A pine forest surrounds it and overlooks Bay Lake. There is even a geyser (artificial) that erupts regularly. Our room overlooked the lake, pool, and geyser. Every nigh,t we watched the Bay Lake Electrical Water Pageant from our balcony.

The trip brought back so many memories

Being at Disney World just as a couple brought back a lot of memories. We were a little older, but it was as if no time had passed at all since that first trip as a young couple all those years ago, except that I had less hair. One of my favorite photos of all time is from this trip. It's a selfie of us at the Universal Hotel, me in my Disney polo shirt, her auburn hair gently resting on her bare shoulders.

Holding hands, we walked to the Magic Kingdom. For the next six days, we hopped from one park to the next. Exploring all the changes to the resort since our last trip. Enjoying all the rides, shows, attractions, and dining experiences. EPCOT was having its International Flower & Garden Festival. The park was filled with beautiful floral displays and unique food carts in every land. We rented bikes at the Fort Wilderness Campground and had a picnic lunch by the lake. Walked around Disney Springs and toured the hotels and the campground.

It was a perfect trip, but the one thing that I would do differently next time is not have a rental car. Though the Alamo rental was only $331 for the eight days, it was another $25 per day for parking at the hotel. And the traffic was so bad on the resort that we ended up just using the resort transit. The hotel cost for 8 days was $3,697. We also spent another $2,080 on taxes, dining, and souvenirs on our Disney gift card from our Chase Disney Rewards Visa.

Though I did have to take a couple of work calls and was "allowed" one hour per day to catch up on emails, it was one of the first vacations in a long time where I felt relaxed and refreshed. We didn't have an itinerary, no schedule to keep. We enjoyed the experiences and our time together and reconnected as a couple.

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• I thought I'd retire at 65 or 70, sell my house, and relax. Instead, I bought an RV at 57.
• My wife and I built a slab for our RV on my son's property so we can be near family when we want.
• But we spend a lot of the year traveling around the US. It's not what I planned, but it's great.

I'd spent years as an executive in Southern California, and I had a retirement plan in place for quite some time.

I planned to work until I was 65 or 70, sell my big house, downsize, and live off the proceeds of the sale, as well as draw my retirement income. I'd definitely do some gardening and catch up on a lot of television — maybe my wife and I would travel or move closer to my son.

Then, life happened. When my son came off active duty, he and his wife settled in Vancouver, Washington. Shortly thereafter, our granddaughter arrived.

Once I saw the smile on my wife's face when she held that baby, I knew everything going to change.

My vision for retirement didn't include living in an RV or moving to Washington state. But life — and my wife — had other plans for me.

In 2022, at age 57, I did both.

We stayed close to the kids for the first year of our journey and then hit the road

Once we had our RV, we built a pad on the side of my son's half-acre property, ran utilities out to it, and built a fence around the side yard to create our own space.

My son's house was a fixer-upper, so we helped out with all sorts of projects to help the kids make it their dream home. And, of course, we spent lots of time playing with the baby.

About every three or four weeks, we'd head out with our trailer for short one- or two-week trips around Washington and Oregon.

It was a lot of fun, but after 14 months of living with the kids, helping with construction projects, and watching the baby grow, my wife and I hit the road.

We cruised around Central and Southern California, revisiting campgrounds we'd been to in the past and seeing family and friends.

We had the kids fly down in December for a Disneyland vacation. From there, we headed toward Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Utah, and Nevada.

We watched the sun set over Lake Havasu, visited the UFO Museum in Roswell, showered in a natural warm spring in Nevada, and saw Bison poop in our campsite in Texas.

After six months on the road, we returned to Vancouver in time for our granddaughters' third birthday.

In many ways, we're living out our retirement dreams

So far, we've spent more than $150,000 on our 30-foot fifth-wheel trailer by Grand Design, truck, hitch, accessories, and customizations.

Our expenses average about $3,000 a month, roughly half of what we paid when we owned a home.

This includes gas, groceries, dining out, campground fees, Starlink internet, cellphone and streaming subscriptions, maintenance, and household items.

When we're back on my son's property, our expenses for gas and camping are far lower, but we spend a lot of the money we'd save on the kids — buying gifts for our granddaughter and treating the family to dinner out.

Our investment portfolio covers all of these expenses, which is great because I'm too young to draw any retirement benefits.

My wife wants me to officially retire and take Social Security at 62, but I want to wait until 70. I've committed to traveling for at least five years since I don't necessarily need to work but I'd kind of like to.

For now, we have time and money to both travel and spend time with family. We'll figure out the other details later.