There is no shortage of celebrations in my family in the month of May. From birthdays to Mother’s Day and Masters graduation ceremonies, I truly just feel so lucky to celebrate all of my favorite people under the sun in the span of one month.

This May my mom and I put our heads together and decided what better way to celebrate all of the things than a girls’ trip? The idea stemmed from the graduation of my little sister, Livi, from a Master’s program in speech pathology. We planned a sunny weekend away with the help of Hard Rock Punta Cana; and before we knew it, we were on our way from Philadelphia. The trip was planned so perfectly, we actually traveled during both my mom’s birthday AND Mother’s Day, packing in even more celebration.

Airport Bloody Marys and mimosas were a must before taking off and landing in sunny Dominican Republic. The hotel set up private transportation to the resort, which was easy to navigate, followed by V.I.P. check-in and an escort to our room. The resort is truly massive. I don’t know that I even saw all of it during our trip, but I can tell you one thing, I saw plenty of ocean and sand, which was the ultimate goal.

Each day was filled with hours of pool time — we tried out three or four of the pools for different scenery but ended up enjoying the “guitar pool” most for the music and drink service. We also enjoyed the all-inclusive restaurants around 7:45 p.m. each night. The casino made for a fun after-dinner activity before the sun-sleepies kicked in and we rested up to do it all again the next day.

For more on our trip, check out my full review of Hard Rock Punta Cana in Global Traveler’s July issue, coming soon.

— Haley Fogarty, vice president of sales