Traveling With Tots

Have you ever tried to change a baby’s diaper on an airplane? Not a big jet, but a little, cramped airplane with a bathroom that is maybe, maybe nine square feet…including the toilet and sink. It’s not pleasant. Have you ever tried to change a two-year-old’s diaper in a teeny tiny airplane bathroom? IMPOSSIBLE. DON’T EVER ATTEMPT THIS. In fact, I don’t recommend changing diapers on airplanes at all, but unfortunately, our girls both decided to wait until a few minutes after take off to poo. They had a three hour layover to do this, mind you, but I do believe that they conspired together and decided to poo on the plane and see what mom and dad would do. So we had no choice, and after trying to change Addison in the gross itty bitty bathroom, we resorted to laying her in an airplane seat and doing it right there…sorry to everyone in the cabin with us. I brought at least 15 different toys/activities to keep her entertained…next time I will bring 30. 15 is not enough when average attention span lasts 2 minutes per item. That means she was occupied and happy approximately 30 minutes; Our flight was two hours and forty five minutes, which left over two hours in which she was trying to entertain herself in ways only a two-year-old deems appropriate: slamming her body into the seat back (the girl behind her was trying to read and was not amused); unlatching the tray table over and over again, letting it slam each time; crawling around on the floor yelling “scu-me!” (excuse me) to no one in particular; reading a book and each page turn, screaming at the top of her lungs, “SPLAT!!!!!” in a pitch I imagine a dying hyena might be able to match.

Ok now in all honesty, she was an amazingly good traveler. I know I just painted a nightmarish picture of our time on the plane with her, but here’s the thing: our flights got messed up and we ended up leaving way later in the day than we were supposed to (which meant getting to the airport right at naptime), we had a three hour layover instead of 45 minutes, and the last flight was loooong and obviously, there was never a time or place to nap. Taking this into consideration, along with the fact that she was confined to 6 feet of space for half of the day, seriously…she did good. (Notice Lily isn’t coming up in conversation. She was cake. If you have a baby, an Ergo is a must!!!)

Let me paint you a picture of the nicer part of traveling with her. We got to the airport and she was sooo excited to “ri da airpane”. She is terrified of loud noises, and we were so afraid she would freak out when the engine started up and we took off, but she loved every bit of it, and in fact when we lifted off the ground, she was laughing and waving bye bye out the window! She sat nicely and played, read books, listened to Brad’s ipod, studied everything around her in fascination, and looked out the window at the sights below. She entertained herself at the airport with anything and everything she could find, and did okay on the first half of the second (longer) flight from Salt Lake to Nashville. It was the second half of that flight that I was mentioning above. She was just done. Wore out, poor thing! All of our rules and manners and just everything I normally do or enforce as a parent went out the window for that hour and a half. The singular goal was do everything humanly possible to keep her from having a total meltdown.

Well, we made it, and four hours later we all got to go to bed and we slept in and I’m in bed with coffee and Lily, finishing this up (I started it on the plane during a good, calm few minutes!), and VACATION has officially started. SO. HAPPY. I need this.

Have a great weekend, and if you’re traveling with little ones, just give them whiskey and let them pass out before hand. Just kidding. :)