Before I get to the kids-entertainment list, I will just tell you what I learned about the wheelchair experience first.
I brought crutches, so my carry-on was a backpack. I didn't even bother with a purse. We checked our bags and car seats at the curb. (HIGHLY RECOMMENDED) but be ready to tip. Request the wheelchair the second you get there. At both airports, we had to wait for a while for someone to bring one. Be sure to have more "tipping money" than usual. The sweet girl who pushed me around even took my sandals off for me at security. This required her to touch my bare toes. (I felt that act alone deserved a good tip.) And for heavens sakes, take a pair of socks!! Nothing gives me the heebie jeebies like walking barefoot on an airport floor. I kept the socks in my pocket and slipped them on quickly when I took off my shoes. When boarding the plane, I gave one crutch to the flight attendant, and used the other to hop down to my row. They stored my crutches for me after I sat down. After the plain was in the air and the attendants weren't so busy, I asked them for a bag of ice. The bag they brought me was thin and started to leak quickly, but luckily I had a gallon zip-lock bag I slipped it in. It stayed cold the entire flight. The attendants suggested we wait for everyone to get off the plane before we did. It was a great suggestion because we could take our time getting everything together, and I could hop down the isle as slowly as I needed to. A large cart would have been nice for our luggage, but my husband was a genius and somehow latched the suitcases and car seats all together in one large moving pile. (I was fascinated)
So now, I am going to share the list of tips I have for traveling with kids.
1- If you have a portable dvd player, charge it the day before! (I forgot, but then again, I was busy spraining my ankle) Ipads and Ipods are amazingly helpful too, but if you are a parent, you have already figured this out, I'm sure.
2- Bring a set of headphones that your child is comfortable wearing. The ear-buds just don't cut it with my girls. They fall out constantly. We found sets for $5 at Walmart that go over their ears.
3- Pack EMPTY sippy cups. This will get you passed the security point without any problems. You can fill them up with water at a café by your gate.
4-Bring Snacks, and lots of them. I filled quart sized Ziploc bags, with cheerios, but only a third of the way full. This helps with less spilling because the bag is so tall. Other snack ideas were cheese sticks, fruit leather, mini packages of teddy grahams, vanilla wafers, cheez-its, pretzels, suckers, granola bars, raisins, and/or fishy crackers. We also love the peanut butter sandwich crackers because they are a little more filling. We put all of our snack items in a gallon-zip lock bag so that it didn't become a big mess in our carry-on. If someone needed a snack, we just grabbed the bag.
5-Bring coloring books, activity books, and a small bag of crayons. We only gave them 4 crayons each. I didn't want to pick up spilled crayons the entire flight. At the dollar store, they have activity books for preschool-aged kids. My twins love them just because there are so many pictures that they can point to and talk about. I also recommend the flash cards with colors, rhyming words, and counting. These saved our flight home.
6- We flew with Delta, and they had a kids tv station. The episodes were $1 to watch, but once you bought it, you could watch it over and over. I bought a show for each seat, then the girls switched around to watch each other's.
7- Antibacterial wipes are a must if you are a germ-a-phobe like me. I couldn't believe all the gunk that came off the little tray tables that pull down. Yuck! I sanitized the seat belt buckle, the arm rests, even the tv screen. If it actually removed all the germs, who knows- but I was able to relax a little while flying.
8-Bring a light-weight blanket for each child. This relaxed them, just having one over their legs. and when they were tired, they just bunched up the corner and used it as a pillow. I had them pack them in a small back-pack carried by my 5 year old.
9- For parental sanity, my husband and I listened to the comedy station on the Delta "Listen" section. The entire radio section in the Delta Entertainment is free. It made the flight a little more pleasant.
10- Distract the kids during landing, and turn up the air vents above you. On the first flight, one of my girls got motion sickness and another was scared. The second time around, I gave them a sucker, looked at flashcards together to keep their minds occupied.
11- Luggage: Ziploc bags. Buy a whole box and organize your suit cases with them, labeled. We only took 2 large cases because Delta no longer does free-checked bags. I put socks, undies, and tanks in one bag for each child. Swimming clothes also went in one bag. I even organized my stuff that way. The suit cases were filled with bags, but I couldn't believe how organized we stayed while living out of them for 7 days!
12- Borrow pack-and-plays if you can. We have friends in Georgia, so my mother-in-law was able to borrow some for our trip. We were SO grateful. This meant $100 less in luggage checks.
13- Last tip: I used to buy the diapers when we arrived to our vacation spot. But now I say to pack them. As we used up the diapers, we then had room for our souvenirs and random items we were purchasing on our vacation. We didn't have to worry about added weight.
Few! That's a lot more than I meant to write. It's good to be prepared though, because it means a more relaxing vacation. (As relaxing as it can be with little kids).
Enjoy Your Flight!
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