Traveling with a Baby? Tips for Success...

1.  Stickers are a good distraction.  They also take up very little space in your bag.  Inflatable toys are also good for the same reason.

2.  Don't fly on ATA or the flight attendant may charge you $10 for a blanket.

3.  Take some new snacks that your baby will like.  I generally don't give Logan sweets, but when you are operating in less than 12 cubic feet of space, all rules are out the window.  Suckers and sugar cereal were my best friend.  Mind you, wait until the end of the flight to load the kid up on sugar.

4.  You can take your stroller and car seat up to the gate.  Check your stroller there, and it will be waiting for you when you disembark.  Even if you are holding your baby on  your lap, they will let you take the car seat on the plane if it is not full (i.e. a free seat for the baby).  If the flight is full, they will check it at the gate.  It is worth a try!

5.  Sucking on a bottle helps their ears during takeoff and landing.  When we couldn't get Logan to take his bottle, we just fed him so he would keep swallowing.

6.  Benadryl helped somewhat.  I hear it is great for some kids. Try it before you fly to make sure it doesn't make them hyper.

7.  Bungee cords were very helpful when traveling within the airport.  We could attach the car seat and extra baby stuff to a rolling suitcase to free up our hands.

8.  Baby food and formula are allowed even though they are liquids and powders.  Keep them easily accessible in your bag, because you have to take them out and have them inspected at security checkpoints.

9.  Mom and Dad should get enough to eat and drink lest you become short-tempered.

10. If the baby fusses too much, lock yourselves up in the lavatory.  

Sucker Glorious Sucker!

Ten days in Hawaii is a welcome delight in the middle of February when there are 48 inches of snow in your front yard.  We had a lovely time visiting Oahu and Kauai.  I particularly liked Laie, a quaint little town in northern Oahu where we enjoyed the Polynesian Cultural Center, beautiful beaches, turtle watching, and Matsumoto Shave Ice.  

This wonderful trip required 7 plane rides where we were accompanied by our one year old son, Logan.  Among other small disasters we had to:

1.  Run to catch three of our flights.*

2.  Endure a 4 hour delay on the ground (in the plane), which made for a 9 1/2 hour flight from LAX to Honolulu.  Logan courteously took one 45 minute nap.

3.  Utilize every item in our carry on luggage and every item within reach of our seats to entertain Logan.

4.  Employ Benadryl for our comfort as well as those around us.  It didn't work.

5.  Trying to tolerate our inattentive flight attendant who had the nerve to try and charge us $10 for a blanket for our infant who finally fell asleep after hours of crawling all over us.

6.  Go through heightened security checks to make sure we weren't carrying any explosive devices disguised as gerber bottles.

7.  Discover after 13 hours of traveling home that all 5 pieces of our luggage were lost, including our car seat.

At one point (Flight 6, 4 hours in) when I was sure that I couldn't make one more stupid face or climb over the poor passengers sitting by us for a walk up the aisle, I locked Logan and myself in the bathroom so we could both have a good cry.  In my moment of despair I had a glorious recollection!  Hidden in an obscure pocket of my carryon I had two suckers.  Logan and I emerged from the lavatory puffy-eyed, but with a renewed sense of determination to survive the last 4 hours of travel home.  The sucker worked marvelously!  Logan lovingly licked and caressed his tasty treat for the next hour.  I didn't even mind that he ran his sticky little blue fingers through my hair in an attempt to show his gratitude.

*Please feel free to create a mental picture of us running  through the airport with our squirming child in arms, our carryon luggage, stroller, and car seat.