We just got back from a week in Florida...more on that trip shortly I promise! But first, I wanted to share a few tricks that we've learned (some the hard way) about traveling with little ones. It occurred to me on our flight home from Florida that we've done
a lot of flying with the kids- after a quick tally we came up with 12 cross country flights for Jack and 10 for Miles. I know a lot of our friends and family are headed out on trips of their own this summer so maybe some of the tricks that work for us will make your family travel a little smoother too...
1) If you can time your flights with nap or bed time, then by all means go for it! If the kids are tired and recently fed, the drone of the airplane almost always sends them to sleep. On this most recent trip, we also bought each of the boys one of those neck pillows and they really helped with the in-flight sleeping. Jack used his around his neck and we propped Miles' pillow against the window for him to rest on. You might even get to crack open a magazine!
2) This is the perfect time to indulge in snacks that the kids don't get very often at home. Our personal favorites are fruit snacks (the boys love them and because they're a treat I can use them as a bribe..."Sit down and buckle your seat belt and then you can have your fruit snacks!"). We also have good luck with the individual boxes of cereal. They're not messy, the box is it's own little container which you can then toss, and they can take a long time to eat. Fruit loops, which we never have at home, went over really well on our Florida trip. I also like to bring granola bars, small packages of nuts, peanut butter crackers, and goldfish (I do try to balance the treats with a few healthy things). I avoid anything with chocolate which tends to melt and get messy.
3) We bring a water bottle for Jack and a sippy cup for Miles. We keep them empty through security and then fill them from a big bottle of water that we buy before boarding. That way the kids can have a drink without waiting for the beverage cart and we can refill them whenever they run out.
4) Before a big trip I buy each of the boys a small (4x6 size) spiral notebook. They're less than $1 each. I put these in a large ziploc bag along with lots of stickers (Target and Michaels usually have big books of stickers for $1), a box of twistable crayons, and 2 pencils. Miles is content to fill page after page with stickers or to scribble with a crayon. Jack likes the stickers too but also fills the pages with tic-tac-toe games, drawings, letters, words, etc. Keeping it all in a large ziploc keeps me from digging through the backpack for a pencil. Plus, once we arrive at our destination I put the whole ziploc into our diaper bag backpack and we use the same supplies to entertain the kids in restaurants. Cheap and easy.
5) iPad. Best travel aid ever. The kids can watch a movie, play Angry Birds, do a match game, practice letter tracing etc. This keeps them quiet and happy. For hours :)
Happy travels!
Miles spent a good part of our flight watching Megamind on the iPad.
Jack is ready for an in-flight nap. Mom is too :)
We didn't think about getting a picture of the kids until after they had eaten PB&J for lunch and played in the sand for 2 hours. You can kind of tell by looking at their dirty faces...but we sure had fun :)
