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Showing posts from 2018

What to pack in a baby's hand luggage

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So you've booked your flights, you've got a fabulous holiday ahead... now what do you pack in your baby's carry-on luggage? By the time my son was 15 months old he'd been on 16 flights, from short 1-hr hops to 13-hr long-haul journeys, so here's my tried and tested list of what to take in your baby's hand luggage. Before we start: always check exactly what hand luggage you and your infant traveller are allowed: most airlines allow the baby to have his/her own hand luggage and you can then have your own bag too, but do check. Sometimes I try to put my own things and baby's things in the one bag to save having to manage two separate pieces (in addition to the baby!), but for the purpose of this article I'm including only those things I would need to take specifically for the purposes of travelling with a baby. Please note: the links below will take you to view the products on Amazon. If you click through there is no extra cost to you, but Amazon

Flying long-haul with toddlers: 3 ways to handle layovers

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We've flown from Australia to the UK with toddlers several times now, and we've tried various different ways to tackle the layover. (You can now fly direct from London to Perth, but we were always travelling from Sydney.) So I thought I'd write a post outlining how we got on with each one and what we find works best for us in the hope it can help other parents decide how to tackle these two-stage journeys. Please note: some of the links in this post will take you to Amazon pages. If you click through there is no extra cost to you, but Amazon will pay me a small amount on any purchases made.  As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. Layover type 1: straight through By this I mean plan for the shortest transfer time possible (usually just under 2 hours), sit in the departures lounge, and get straight on to the second plane. Before we had kids we used to take this option a lot in order to maximise our time at our destination. There are other advantages,

Top 10 toddler 'tainment on a plane

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By the time our son was just over 1 year old he'd already taken more flights than his age in months. Crazy but true! He's now about to turn 4 and our daughter is 2, and while the maths of course had to slow down, our love of travel has not: we're British; our kids were both born in Australia; and we've just completed a family gap year in which we flew to Canada and the USA on two separate occasions for long-stay road trips. So my husband and I are very familiar with the trials and tribulations parents face when taking toddlers on aeroplanes! So whether you interpret this post title as "enter"-tainment or "con"-tainment (or both 😁), here are my top tips to help you stay sane on a plane with a little person (or two). Please note: the links below will take you to view the products on Amazon. If you click through there is no extra cost to you, but Amazon will pay me a small amount on any purchases made.  As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualify

Nursery rhymes, with a slight Scottish accent

I like to sing to my kids at bedtime sometimes. It can be helpful when travelling to new places, or when one of them isn't settling for some reason, or heck, sometimes I just enjoy doing it. But there are times that I have a sore throat, or just don't have the energy, so last night I recorded myself singing a few tunes to my little two-year-old daughter as she was snuggling down into her bed ready to go to sleep. So if you're tired and need something to soothe your wee one, or if you don't like singing, or if you just think the novelty of hearing some familiar refrains sung by a Scottish mum - I do sing in that pseudo-American accent we all adopt when we sing but sometimes you can catch a sense of a Celtic lilt, I like to think - then here are three familiar favourites for you to play. There's no video to distract anyone (and it saved me having to find some cheesy pictures to display!), and each one only runs for less than a minute. Twinkle, Twinkle, Little S

Travel accommodation with toddlers: watchouts and workarounds

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"Um, where's the washing machine?" No way. My pulse started racing. I stopped unpacking the kids' clothes and grabbed my phone, hastily thumbing through the listing for this, our new home for ten days. And there it was: a blank white space where, no matter how much I willed it, the word "washer" didn't appear. Now, I've no problem with using a launderette. But we'd arrived in Toronto just as an ice storm had hit the city, and the thought of skating up and down a few blocks every two or three days laden with washing (we'd packed on the light-ish side as I planned to do a load of laundry every other day on average) suddenly seemed like a thoroughly tedious (not to mention treacherous!) way to spend our time. And then there was the prospect of suddenly having to turn round bed linen in a day if our 3-year-old had an accident overnight (I'd already ascertained there were no spare sheets in the apartment). Aargh! So, after quickly verify