Traveling

Traveling with a 15-month-old who is very stubborn sucks. Big time. We recently flew to Oklahoma City for a wedding. After careful considerations of naps and bedtime, I picked an 11am 3.5 hour flight to Chicago, followed by a 2 hour flight to Oklahoma City landing at 8:30pm. Perfect timing. But perfection, though often desired, is rarely achieved.

We made it to the airport on time, but forgot our carseat in the car, meaning we now needed to rent one from Budget. Unfortunate, but not terrible. The Babe was awake the whole flight, 3.5 hours, until our descent into Chicago. Though rarely crying, she was a wriggly wiggly demanding toddler the whole flight. Her dad and I took turns wrestling with her and convincing her to watch Sesame Street, to eat, drink, and to play with anything and everything. Then she fell asleep as soon as we began to descend, but only slept for 30 minutes in the airport. Our flight out of Chicago was then delayed two hours, finally putting us in OK at 10:30pm instead of 8:30.

To add to our already sunny disposition at that point, Budget only had an infant seat and a booster seat for the van we were renting, so we took the infant seat and crossed The Babe's legs so she would fit. The situation became unbearable on day two of the trip, and I managed to track down a forward-facing seat on Craigslist for the duration of our trip, as well as finagle a refund from Budget for the infant seat rental.

The Babe has become what I affectionately call a "whirling dervish". She does not stop moving. Ever. At home, this is easier to manage because I know where she can go, we've locked the cupboards she should not open and we rarely go out to eat. On vacation, this becomes infinitely harder. Dinners are often out, as we like to explore local food and culture. However trying to explain to the The Babe that Mom and Dad are eating and would like to finish out food, is like trying to get Lance Armstrong to admit he doped ALL the time. A waste of time and energy. So we end up taking turns walking around restaurants with her, apologizing to servers as she stumbles in front of them, or strategically blocking her from entering the kitchens and off-limits offices.

However, on day three of the trip I discovered a park nearby the house we were renting. With a massive playground and three baby swings. It became a saving grace, somewhere to go when the house became boring and somewhere The Babe could explore with less instances of me saying, "no, not for baby!".

All that being said, I cannot envision traveling again until the Babe is at least a year older, maybe more. It is just more work than I can handle, and I would rather the next time be sometime that she can remember. Or at least when she read quietly for short periods of time ;)

~ H