Once upon a time there was a pregnant mommy that wanted to join her prince in a far away land but in order to do so she needed to get on an airplane with a 20 month old during his nap time...
Or so my story begins.
Let me just tell you- my trip was nothing they would put into a fairy tale but I did learn some valuable travel tips that any one can use next time you are traveling with young children.
Trip #1- Flying
To begin, Sawyer and I flew out of GJ around 1PM which is normally when he goes down for his nap.That was something that I wish we wouldn't have done because I honestly think he would have been more well behaved if the flight would have been earlier in the day and not close to or during his nap. We boarded out first of two flights- the first lasting about an hour followed by a 45 minute layover and then our last flight which lasted 1 hour 45 minutes. I brought the iPad loaded with tons of his favorite shows but kind of like I expected he just wanted to try and get down and walk around which wasn't happening because the first flight was on a small plane that you can't get up on (seat belts fastened the entire ride) so my pregnant butt had a 28 pound little man strapped in on my lap because there were any extra seats to steal. Fun times is all I have to say. What I learned on the first flight was that even fun new foods can't really compete with brand new surrounds that have fun new things you can play with like the vomit bags, sky mall magazine, and the safety card information. I simply let him grab at whatever he wanted and try to push out of my mind all of the germs he was touching. Over all if I had to give him a grade for that flight I would give him a B-. He did pretty good and did try to break free from his seat much that flight.
Once we landed I let him run around as much as he could in contained areas but I honestly think he knew we weren't done traveling yet and he wasn't excited to get trapped on another airplane. Right before boarding the last flight is when he kinda started to melt down. He didn't want to listen and wasn't interested in anything. Once we got on the flight I discovered we had the aisle seat and middle seat available for our use which was awesome. He got buckled in and then made fast friends with the woman next to him. She informed me she was on her way to visit her nephew- bingo! Someone that I knew had an idea what little kids could be like! As the flight continued and the meltdown began to ramp up she was extremely kind and helped keep him occupied and even had him sit on her lap at various times so he could look out the window. She was great but there was only so much the two of us could do before he had had enough. With about 45 minutes to go, Sawyer decided to begin crying and nothing in this world would make him stop. We were forced to stay seated on this flight too because of turbulence so walking him around was not an option. He was fighting sleep so hard which made the duration of the trip a nightmare. He finally fell asleep after my constant rocking for 20 minutes (something he normally doesn't let me do)! Mind you, he fell asleep with about 1 minute of air time left but then sleep until we deplaned. Over all I would say pray you can walk up and down the aisles and hope you sit next to someone as lovely as the lady we had the privilege of sitting next too!
Finally after landing, Daddy picked us up and we were out of there!
Trip #2- LONG Road Trip
While we were in Portland we purchased me a new car so we drove home instead of flying which honestly I prefer. Sawyer is more aware that while in his car seat he can't go anyway else which helps a ton. Due to day light savings time we woke up in Portland at 8 AM local time, piled into the car and were on the road by 8:30 AM.
Some of the tips that I have for you are the following but please note that we do not have a child that is potty training or potty trained so we don't have to take into account bathroom breaks by anyone other then Tice and I.
Tip #1
Only stop when you need gas- This helps because everyone in the car knows to look at the gas gage to indicate when you get to stop again. This helps lessen the amount of non drive time. Once we do finally stop, we gas up, change diapers, use the restroom, run around outside to stretch our legs, and grab something to eat. We accomplish everything that you might stop multiply times for in one stop
Tip #2
Bring an iPad. Sawyer isn't totally into electric devices yet but there are times when a quick 10 minute break watching something helps and then makes looking out the window fun again.
Tip #3
Start them young- Sawyer was 6 weeks old when we took him on his first road trip, which was from Portland to Colorado (the same trip we just completed again) and he did great. He slept a lot more on that trip but starting them at a young age enabled him to know that for our family road trips are the norm not the exception and to get use to it now!
Overall the car was much better then flying and it will be interesting how the trip goes when we head out there again in September, with not one child but two!
Thanks so much for stopping by!
XO,
Bailey
