Need a vacation but don’t have the time or funds? No problem! With a little legwork and creativity, you can plan an escape right in your own home or backyard. You’ll create happy memories for the whole family without the hassle of packing a single suitcase. Consider these innovative ideas.

1. Host a spa day.

You don’t have to spend hundreds of dollars to unwind. Recreate that tranquil environment in your own home: First, declare the day tech-free and turn off all televisions, computers and cell phones. To add spa-like touches, fill pitchers with water, cucumber slices and mint leaves, playing a peaceful soundtrack, such as the “Spa Suite” channel on Pandora.

Then schedule “treatments” with your kids: Set up a manicure station where they can paint their nails (don’t forget to keep tissues on hand in case of smudges) and a
makeover area where they can experiment with makeup. You can also apply facial masks or draw aromatherapy baths.

Extra splurge: Invest in plush robes to wear all day, or contact a local spa for a masseuse or manicurist that makes house calls for an at-home treatment.

2. Go camping!

Set up a tent in your backyard for a campout. During the day, go on a hike at a local park or nature preserve, complete with trail mix. In the evening, gather around the campfire to roast hot dogs and make s’mores while telling ghost stories.

Extra splurge: To make the experience more comfy, use an air mattress inside the tent. You can also spark your child’s interest in nature with a guide to flowers or small camping kit.

3. Create a backyard waterpark.

Waterparks are classic summer fun, but they’re often expensive or too far away. Set up your own version in your backyard: Fill up a few inflatable pools with water, and get some water guns and water balloons. Then invite your kids’ friends over to play. They’ll spend hours splashing around with the toys.

Extra splurge: Create a healthier version of the concession stand by setting up a table full of drinks, fruit slices and other healthy snacks. Finish the evening with a barbecue or pizza party.

4. Have a luxury vacation (on a budget!).

For a fun spin on a big-city vacation, plan a day full of cultural adventures. Print out an itinerary of the day’s events for your family: Start with a breakfast of croissants at a local park. Then check out a new, unusual museum or cultural sight in the area that your family hasn’t yet visited. Follow that with a meal and dessert at one of the fancier restaurants in town, or serve up dinner at a table decorated with candles and fresh flowers in the backyard. Then finish the evening with a classic New York-centric movie, such as Breakfast at Tiffany’s. For a luxurious touch, place a gourmet chocolate on everyone’s pillow to find at bedtime.

Extra splurge: Give each child a certain amount and let them pick out a souvenir throughout the day. It will serve as a token of their fun family staycation!

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Your medicine cabinet is stocked with acetaminophen, throat lozenges and saline spray for your little one’s next cold. While that can help with symptoms, they don’t do much to comfort and soothe -- that’s our job!

To help your child feel comfortable as she recovers, I recommend a few smart parenting strategies. Here are a few of my must-have items to keep your little one content and comfortable through the worst of cold and flu season.

1. Activities
Rest is key, so it’s helpful to have options on hand to keep them occupied while in bed or on the couch. Have them read, draw, color, make a craft or watch movies. I like to keep some new books and movies tucked away for sick days. To make the day as fun as possible, you can also spread out blankets on the floor or set up a tent in the family room.

2. Popsicles
To ease the ache of a sore throat, whip up a batch of popsicles with your own mold. Let your child pick out their favorite 100 percent fruit juice flavor. Not only will the chilliness soothe the pain, but the treat will also deliver some much-needed vitamins and minerals.

3. Fun foods and utensils
When they’re sick, most kids don’t have much of an appetite or can’t keep much in their bellies. But what kid likes to eat plain, bland food? My parenting strategy: Give them something to smile about by serving them in fun dishes, or using a crazy straw in their smoothie or soup. Consider using food coloring to make a smiley-face in their applesauce; get creative!

4. Touch
Research shows that touch can rev up the immune system, according to a study in The Journal of Complimentary and Alternative Medicine. And that may help speed up your little one’s healing process.

To give your child physical contact and affection -- without exposing yourself to germs -- write on her back. While you spell out letters with your fingers, have her guess the letters or spell the words. When I was a kid, this was my favorite sick-day ritual. Write out special sayings to comfort your child like, “feel better” and “I love you.”

Help make your little one’s sick day a little better with some creative touches you can both feel good about.

Feed a Cold

Sick kids don’t always want to eat, but it’s important to make sure they get enough nutrients. Make a game of it by playing restaurant: Give your child a menu of healthy choices, write his “order” down on a notepad, then deliver the meal on a tray. Keep it fun with foods like “orange smiles” (oranges sliced into smiles); toast cut into fun shapes with cookie cutters; or chicken soup served in a thermos. To soothe a sore throat, Amy Clark, founder of MomAdvice.com, suggests fruit-juice popsicles or a fruit smoothie (a mix of ice, yogurt and fruit in a blender). For a fun, fizzy drink, mix a colorful electrolyte juice with ginger ale and serve in a fancy glass -- don’t forget the silly straw!

Make a Sick Day Special

Keep a few special items on hand that you only pull out for sick days. Clark suggests hitting a thrift store to buy a small, inexpensive suitcase. Decorate it with brightly colored buttons and bows, and fill it with some special items: pajamas with your kid’s favorite cartoon character on them, a mug with a family photo on it, and a few toys, games, coloring books, puzzles and art supplies reserved just for sick days.

Try a Spoonful of Sugar

Get little ones to take their medicine by mixing liquids or crushed pills with something sweet, like a smoothie, pudding, applesauce or fruit-flavored yogurt. (Just be sure to ask your pediatrician or pharmacist if it’s OK first, and make sure your child takes the entire dose.) You can also make liquid meds fun by using a medicine dropper instead of a spoon -- let your child squirt it into his own mouth one drop at a time. 

Soothe Aches and Pains

For a fever, congestion, or aches and pains associated with the flu, a little TLC can go a long way. Try massaging your little one’s aching neck and shoulders. Clark also suggests filling a tube sock with rice and freezing it to use as a cold pack. Help to clear a stuffy head by enclosing yourselves in the bathroom with a steamy shower: Clark recommends letting your child wear his bathing suit for a “day on a tropical island,” and for a special touch, adding bubbles and tub toys.

Create a Comfort Zone

Kids need to get a lot of quiet rest when they’re sick. Create a space where they’ll actually want to relax by pitching a tent in the living room and filling it with a sleeping bag, pillows and a flashlight, as well as some favorite books, stuffed animals and quiet activities like puzzles and board games.

Play Doctor

Keep a toy doctor’s kit on hand, and with your kid, practice looking into each other’s ears, giving pretend shots and listening to each other’s coughs. Be the nurse and come in to check on your “patient” often. Fluff the pillows, take his temperature and listen to his heartbeat.

Go Old-school

Skip the TV, video games and movies, and instead take advantage of some quality quiet time with your child. Play a few rounds of tic-tac-toe, I Spy, Go Fish or charades. Make up stories, cut out paper dolls, sort through old photographs, or pull out some old board games, puzzles and coloring books.

Reach out

When you’re away from your sick kid, Clark suggests keeping in touch by using a baby monitor -- many of the newer models offer two-way communications. You can also give your child a bell, a walkie-talkie or a cell phone to get your attention when you’re needed.

Turn the Lights out

Help your kid get into “rest mode” by pulling down the shades, turning off the lights and playing some quiet activities together in bed. Carole Kranowitz and Joye Newman, authors of Growing an In-Sync Child: Simple, Fun Activities to Help Every Child Develop, Learn and Grow suggest a game of ceiling flashlight tag or shadow puppets on the wall. Stick some glow-in-the-dark stars on your child’s ceiling and make wishes. Tell ghost stories (not too scary -- you want your kid to fall asleep!). Or just lie down, cuddle up and take a nap together.

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‘Tis the season for out-of-town guests, dinner parties ... and stressed-out women. But the holidays don't have to be the craziest time of the year. To help you breeze through the season, we asked a chef, decorating guru and stress-management expert to share their smartest and simplest tips. Not only will you look like the perfect hostess, but you'll do it all with time to spare.

Decorate in Minutes
Having a dinner party? There's no need to make a trip to the florist or to glue together an elaborate tablescape. All you need for a festive centerpiece is a glass garden cloche, a bell-shaped cover for outdoor plants that's sold in gardening stores, says Jenn Andrlik, holidays and crafts editor for MarthaStewart.com. Turn it upside down and fill it with it ornaments or pinecones from your yard. Then invert a plate over the open end and turn it back over.

If you have leftover [holiday decorations] or you're swapping in new ornaments this year, this is a nice way to still keep the old ones on display," says Andrlik. "You can put any holiday decorations you have laying around in there and make them look beautiful.”

Keep Candles in Storage
Mood lighting is a must at festive events, but candles can burn out early. Instead, swap them for vases or frosted glass cylinders filled with white string lights, suggests Andrlik. Place them on a table near an outlet, and run the cord over the back lip of the vase -- or out the bottom if there's a hole. (Always check the label first to ensure that the lights have been tested for safety.)

Skip Shopping-center Chaos

Overwhelmed by the number of people on your gift list? Save yourself a trip to the mall and give presents that come from your heart -- and your kitchen. Baking may not seem like a timesaver, but if you can take an afternoon to churn out a few dozen cookies, you've got gifts for the whole family, says Colleen Covey, a chef and recipe developer (and new grandma!) in Orlando, Fla. Just divvy them up into pretty containers."We call my husband the "Cookie Man'," says Covey. "He makes 60 dozen in a variety of flavors.”

No time to bake? Buy some premade biscotti."You can dip them in melted white or dark chocolate to make them more festive," says Covey, "then put a few in a clear gift bag and tie them up with a holiday ribbon.”

Jazz up Simple Ingredients
To avoid extra trips to the store, look for ways to get the most out of the staples on hand, says Covey. She swears by herbed butter: a mixture of 2 teaspoons parsley, 1 teaspoon thyme, 1/2 teaspoon rosemary and 1/2 teaspoon sage mixed into 1 stick of softened, unsalted butter.

Covey cuts off half of the butter and rubs it under and on top of the skin of a raw turkey. She rolls up the other half in plastic wrap (twisting the ends to seal it) and puts it in the fridge to harden. Slice it into coins, and use it to make simple dishes seem gourmet."Mix it into gravy, place it on top of mashed potatoes, or melt a little over grilled steak," she says. The butter will keep in the fridge for seven days or in the freezer for two months.

Sneak in Some Silence
Part of what makes the holidays so stressful is that they seem to whiz by," says Kate Hanley, founder of MsMindBody.com and author of The Anywhere, Anytime Chill Guide: 77 Simple Strategies for Serenity. The cleaning, traveling, entertaining and cooking can run together in a blur.

No matter how busy you are, you can create a sense of calm by spending five minutes in silence each day, suggests Hanley. It could be the cup of tea you drink before the kids wake up, or the after-dinner time spent admiring the night sky with the family."Your kids may only last 30 seconds, but you'll be giving them the opportunity to learn how to quiet themselves," she says. "It'll also give you some time to savor the good part of the holidays instead of zooming from one thing to another."

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Photo: Corbis Images

It seems to happen when you least expect it: You pass a woman on the street who's wearing the same perfume your grandmother used, and you're taken back to being 8 years old and watching her put on makeup in her bedroom. Or you enter a bakery and the aroma of freshly made sourdough bread transports you to the kitchen in your childhood home, where your dad is cutting into a loaf.

You already know how certain smells can instantly call up long-forgotten memories, but you may not realize that there's a scientific reason behind the phenomenon. "The part of the brain that processes odors, which is called the olfactory cortex, is located very close to the hippocampus and amygdala -- two areas that are involved in storing emotional memories," says Pamela Dalton, an odor researcher at the Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia. "So when you breathe in salty ocean air with a hint of sunscreen in it, that whole section of your brain gets kick-started, which helps explain why you immediately flash back to the beach house your family went to every summer when you were younger."

The Scent-Memory Connection
In fact, a Swedish study found that smells unearth earlier memories better than any other type of cue. Researchers exposed elderly people to a word, picture or odor and asked them to identify their earliest memory connected to the prompt. While the word and picture brought up moments from early adulthood, the smell led them to think of a time before they were 10 years old.

And because their power transports you back to the carefree days of childhood, Dalton says scents can be useful for helping you feel less stress or anxiety. "People don't realize how easy it is to change your mood by purposefully smelling something associated with a time in your life when you felt happy," she says." For example, try keeping a little vial of your mom's favorite perfume in your purse or at your desk to take a whiff of when you feel overwhelmed or upset. The effect is instantaneous."

Create Your Own Comfort

How do you get your own children to connect certain scents with happy memories? Dalton says it's easy; you just have to be consistent. "Apply the same lotion every night before you go in your daughter's room to read her a bedtime story or bake an apple cinnamon pie for every special holiday," she says.

In their minds, those smells will quickly become associated with being nurtured or with festive occasions, and they'll always think of you and their childhood fondly when they get a whiff of it, even decades down the road." You can also use a familiar, soothing smell -- like eucalyptus or lavender -- to ease their stress or discomfort when they're sick or uncomfortable. It makes perfect scents!

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Photo: Corbis Images