Flying With A Little Friend!

by Joan
(Los Gatos, CA, USA)

I travel frequently with my toddler; I fly with him for hours at a time about three or four times a year.

When I fly with him, I have found that the best thing to keep him entertained on a trip isn’t a portable DVD player, not a coloring book, a toy, or anything like that, it's me!

You are the best entertainment for your child on a long trip. Sure, watching a movie will kill a few minutes, but mostly they are not watching but looking out the window, or finding something to fidget with.

You are their biggest plaything and they have your undivided attention for the flight. When I am traveling with my son, I focus all my attention on him, because after all, kids are the most entertaining and fascinating thing to me! We make up stories, describe stuff that is out of the window, I answer all the funny ridiculous questions he has, sing songs (my apologies in advance if you ever end up on a flight sitting near me!!), and have all sorts of fun.

I always find that after a few hours of that kind of fun, they always pass out about half way through the flight.

When I first started flying with him, sometimes his ears would hurt due to the pressure changes. So I always made sure that I had plenty of small snacks, Goldfish work great.

Making sure to travel as light as possible always helps too!

My thanks to Lin Pernille @ flickr for the photo