We were on our way back from our honeymoon. Delay after delay turned a couple hour flight from San Francisco into almost a 24 hour commute. I was ill. And ending up on a red-eye flight from some city I wasn’t suppossed to be in back to Charlotte, all I wanted was some sleep. Instead of a nice engine hum to lull me to sleep, I got to close my eyes to the sound of a screaming baby.
I didn’t blame the baby. The poor thing couldn’t help whatever was wrong. And I didn’t blame the parents. I could see them trying to calm the baby to no avail. But ever since then I feared a plane ride with a kid. You just never know how they are going to react. And there is no taking them out of the public eye to calm them or changing their surroundings. You are just stuck. And there is no worse feeling to me than feeling completely.
So, anyway, the past week or so I spent making sure that I had plenty for Liam to do. I made sure I had enough activites (scouring Pinterest for cheap ideas), enough books, enough snacks, enough clothes, enough diapers…
But, none of that mattered if his ears started hurting or he didn’t like the way his belly might turn when we took off.
But the boy is a champion!!!! He was the best flyer I could have ever prayed for. He giggled and played and talked the whole time. A nap, unfortunetly, was out of the question.
The trip from Charlotte to Bozeman has one layover which I was also nervous about. I had less than an hour to make my way through the Dallas airport but we made it with 5 minutes to spare before boarding.
The first three hour flight he did wonderful. But with no nap and another three hour flight ahead of us I wasn’t feeling as optimistic. Especially when the pilot came over the intercom and informed us that the plane was too heavy and someone would most likely be kicked off this flight. We sat on the plane an hour and a half before we even began backing away from the gate.
When I realized it was going to be taking a while and he was already getting fidgety, we
started walking up and down the aisle. We certainly made a lot of friends that way. He just walked down the aisle waving and saying hello to anyone that acknowledged him (which was pretty much everyone). Eventually, they somehow managed to make the extra weight disappear and we were able to take off with all passengers aboard.
For the past month, I’ve talked to Liam about how he was going to get to go on an airplane. And every time he saw and airplane in the sky he’d shout “air-pane!” Needless to say, he was very excited to see the airplanes at the airport…and to get to ride on not one but two. I can honestly say the trip went very well…although I do not know how moms with more than one young child travel!
What Made the Plane Ride So Easy
1. He sucked on a Dum-Dum at takeoff and landing (and throughout the flight because why not). Whether this truly helped his ears or not I have no idea. But he was perfectly content with his “ucker”.
2. The Amazon Kids Tablet was wonderful. Although, I learned the hard way that not all the videos play when not on WiFi. I researched and found out that I have to download them from my account for it to work off WiFi. So hopefully that will work on the way back.
3. All the Pinterest activities I found were a hit. He stuffed pipe cleaners into an empty parsley container. He played with blocks made of sponges (which he threw at the lady who sat beside up so thankfully they were soft). He stuffed puff balls into holes in an empty container. And then of course he had small cars and other little toys to play with.
4. Coloring. The kid LOVES to color. We color and drew for a lot of the trip. And to spice it up we added stickers to our creations. The stickers themselves killed 30 minutes just sticking and resticking them to the paper, his shirt, his face, the chair, my arms…
5. This AWESOME lapboard that turns into a backpack was a lifesaver. I found it on
Amazon. It stored all of his coloring supplies which was good. But it folds out into a hard surface with sides so he was able to play with his cars, markers, crayons, animals and other little pieces without them falling all over the place.
The only thing I would have changed, honestly, is that I would not have brought our coats. I was already having the check bags anyway and I should have just packed them in there too. There was no need to carry them on the airplane or the airport. Now, if he would have taken a nap they would have made a nice pillow….
