This morning we took our first flight with two, two and under. Jack is 25 months and Harrison is seven weeks old. With all of our experience traveling, we managed to really pare down our belongings and only carried on the essentials. We also brought along Grandma — you can never stress enough how valuable an extra set of hands can be when you’re in unfamiliar territory.
The 3 hour and 20 minute flight was a success. To keep the toddler occupied, we brought along new stickers, colouring books, play doh, a few small (dollar store) toys, videos and snacks. He barely made a peep and was excited about getting to the beach more than anything else.
Every time a flight attendant spoke or an announcement came on, we told him the Captain was instructing everyone to be quiet and play nicely. Jack (our toddler) always listened to the captain so that trick helped. Also, having to buy another seat (although costly) is actually really nice. We finally had room to spread our versus the past two years of travel where we always had someone one our lap and no room to do anything. It’s actually worth the cost when taking long flights.
For the infant, it was all about comfort. We carried on a plush blanket and the Flye Baby flight seat. We fed him during the ascent and decent and all was good there.
The key to these types of firsts is to prepare — know your kids and prepare. We know what will motivate our toddler to keep quiet, calm and still (most of the time) so we just made sure we had a lot of ammunition on hand.
Easy excursions such as this makes us even more excited for upcoming adventures because we know we can DO it!
Happy Travels!