Flying With Children

Fake Instagram post #2

Fake Instagram post:

Our successful two hour airplane trip with four kids under 8.

It was a very successful trip, and I took note of the following helpful tips to enable you to emulate my ability to travel successfully with four small and wild children.

(Imagine a picture of my family, smiling and posed in front of an airplane.)

By successful, I mean that we did not end up in the news. Not to brag, but my husband and I were calm, joyful, and loving the entire time, and we always looked put together and well rested. The stewardess commented that she had never seen such well behaved children in clean and matching clothing for an entire flight. She took our number to give to future parents on airplanes.

And the two young couples seated in front of my kids told me that they had been deciding whether or not they wanted to have children at all. After seeing what is possible with four children, they have decided to have five.

The truthful part ended when I started bragging, but this is Instagram, isn't it?

(Imagine our 7 and 5 and 3 year olds smiling at each other over a game of Uno)

I'm sure you are wondering- how do they do it? While I have opted to share my travel hacks for families of small children here, there is even more valuable knowledge available to you, if you only take my 3 day course, "How to travel with kids and not feel like a mother goat". For the next week, I am offering it at the all time sale price of 800$ instead of the usual 1000$, but only to my loyal readers.

So, here are my hard won tips:

1. Prepare your children in advance. Allow them to air any questions or anxieties they may be experiencing about air travel. Reassure them that plane crashes are extremely rare, and that mile for mile, airplanes are actually safer than cars. They can trust the TSA to prevent hijackers, terrorists, or kidnappers from ever getting onto an airplane. Coronavirus and monkey pox and other diseases are rarely fatal in first world countries. As far as we know.

Sometimes kids will surprise you with what they want to know. My seven year old wanted to know if the airplane would have seltzer, Lego, or a trapdoor that would destroy the plane and everything in it if he opened it. Share what YOUR kids said in the comment section!!

2. Take a morning flight, and ensure your children barely sleep the night before, so that they will sleep on the flight. Or take an evening flight, so they will be primed to fall asleep. Just avoid the midday flights.

But also, make sure they are well rested so they are at their best behavior. We creatively combined these two ideas, as our kids stayed up the entire night prior to our 5 am flight, and were exhausted but not asleep on the plane.

3. If your 5 year old is kicking the seat in front of him, and the person sitting in it asks you to stop him from doing that, take his backpack and use it as a footrest so that he can kick the backpack instead.

This will work until the flight attendant comes along. She will say that the backpack needs to be flat under the seat at all times. In that case, you attempt to explain that the person in front of him complained about having their seat kicked, and this is working. She will respond that it is a federal law that backpacks must remain under seats. Apparently there is no federal law that you can't kick the person in front of your seat. This is useful to know when traveling with children.

4. Explain to your children, prior to the flight, that nothing in the airport is for playing with. We neglected to do this, and it was my one regret the entire trip.

During a 30 minute wait at terminal B19, my children discovered that the ventilation system for the entire airport is located about two feet off the floor. It has grates which are easily removable. Even a 3 year old can remove it. There is a hole underneath the grates, presumably for dropping the grates into.

We tried watching the planes, as an alternative activity. You can see a lot of things out of the window at the airport. There are planes landing and planes taking off. You can stand on top of those grates and get a really great view. Forgive the pun. I'm very tired.

5. Dunkin donuts, which sells coffee, is more popular than all the other stores in the airport put together. The other stores, for some reason, have not considered selling coffee. Maybe it would be unfair competition. But you'd think anything that has a 100 people lining up waiting for it to open would just open earlier or perhaps be open 24/7. Capitalism clearly doesn't work.

6. Have your kids sing songs to keep their spirits up during delays. This is the silly song my kids sang: Moo moo moo a chicken is chasing you. This has a deep meaning that I am too tired to comprehend. Please comment with your kids original travel songs!

7. Food is very important on long trips with kids. Make sure to pack enough quantity and variety that your kids will actually eat something, which will prevent them being cranky. But also don't pack too much, because then you will have very heavy load to carry and you will be cranky. Balance is important.

8. Airlines do not expect babies or small children to exist, ever. So M, aged 1, got an apple juice bottle from the stewardess, since they don't stock milk.

F: Is apple juice healthy?

Me: Sometimes.

F: But is this apple juice healthy?

Me: What do you think?

F: I think it is healthy. Is there any protein in apple juice?

9. Children are naturally curious. Allowing them to ask every question that occurs to them is an intellectually stimulating way to pass the time. For example:

5 yo: Mommy, do our eyes grow?

Me: No? I don't think so.

5yo: What is the reason that they don't grow? I don't know.

Me: I don't know either.

5yo: Let's ask Abba (father). Abba, why don't our eyes grow?

Abba: They grow a little bit. 1 yo's eyes are smaller than my eyes.

5 yo: Why do I have itchy spots in my hair?

Me, afraid of lice: I'll look when we get home. Maybe you'll get a haircut. (I looked. Nothing. He just hadn't had a bath for several days.)

5yo: I think it's mosquito bites. (Scratches his head like a little blonde gorilla)

Me: I'll look when we get home.

10. Visit friends who are understanding:

At the W home, F takes a cookie.

F: Why do they have sprinkles?

Mrs W: Because I like sprinkles

F: Mommy, could you tell me the bracha for cookies? (Blessing before eating them)

Me, in Hebrew: Blessed are You, God, Our God, King of the Universe, who made complex Carbohydrates (translation with commentary)

F: Plessed Par Pu, Ping...

Me, explaining to Mrs W: This little darling, F, insists that his native language is P language, which involves replacing random consonants with the letter P. His brother C has a similar native language, except it's called Guagua and random consonants are replaced with the letter G.

(C nods enthusiastically)

Mrs W: I understand.

See, it's important to visit supportive and understanding friends.

11. Pack light. Please view our luggage family picture, attached, for an example of how this can be done.

The largest, double stroller and red suitcase, is in the back, with the black suitcase holding only dirty laundry in between. Our four backpacks are seated in front, and my pocketbook is nestled between them. Truly a beautiful family. Imagine if someone stole the suitcase with our dirty laundry. They would feel so guilty about it, they would wash, dry, and return it to my house folded tomorrow. I would generously forgive them their lapse and not report them to the police. Not to give anyone any ideas.

The shoes go on the kids feet before you leave the house, so there is no reason to carry them.

Liked my helpful tips? Sign up for my 3 day course at a real bargain - $800! Comes with a babysitter, a wheeled duffle, a car seat, and the right to ask me any question you like about traveling with kids, though I don't promise to answer honestly.

Safe travels!