Traveling with Kids: Supplies that Make it Work

Posted on April 21, 2010 by Robyn

Traveling with Kids: Supplies that make it work!

I wanted to include one more post about packing, or more about some of the super cool things that I brought along to make the trip go smoother.

Sleeping arrangements for 9! We brought one pack-n-play and two little collapsible cots . The cots have worked perfectly for my 2 year olds, providing them with a consistent place to sleep every night. They wiggle and squirm all over their cots, but they have not been getting up and they are elevated from the floor a little. Ownership for little ones is a big deal, and these beds have been theirs alone. The rest of my kids are pretty flexible when it comes to sleeping arrangements. They have had fun figuring out where they would make their “nest” at each place we have stayed at. I also brought some small waterproof bed pads, just in case!

Eating arrangements for 9! Fortunately, all the kids but the baby are able to sit in normal dining chairs without too much trouble. And for Nicholas – one of my favorite pieces of travel gear…The Sit Seat, a wonderful, small little device that attaches to any chair and makes it a safe seat for a baby. That little Safe Seat has been golden for us, and it even folds up and fits into the diaper bag! I also bought the TakeNToss cups and spoons – useful and worry free. Although I am nursing the baby, I bring a bottle with formula for the van when we are traveling. If we do not want to stop and feed him, I can give him a bottle en route, this has saved us numerous hours (because one little stop for us always turns into a big, long stop). I also keep TableTopper disposable placemats in my diaper bag.

I would be remiss if I discussed baby and child feeding and I didn’t mention our Bandette waterproof reusable sippy cup and baby bottle labels. These help us keep track of which cup belongs to which child and ends fuss and cup confusion.

On-The-Go supplies for 9! I know that I have mentioned this before, but I can not tell you how much Gripsterz has been the BEST for our trip. We just could not have done most of the things that we have done without that monkey on a rope. Call it a walking rope, call it an alternative to a child leash, call it a stayalong (my preference!) – whatever you call it, it is a wonderful thing! Museums, city streets, parks, sidewalks, small villages, ferries, subways, hotels, anywhere and anything is possible with Gripsterz!

We have two light umbrella strollers with these Prince Lionheart attachment pieces that make the strollers into one, We also have a baby front pack carrier that keeps the baby very, very content. I stock a supply of lolli-pops in the diaper bag, for those times when food is not near and we need to push on just a little further. Lollipops make everyone happy, even if they are hungry!

Potty arrangements for 9! In my diaper bag I keep a Neat Solutions disposable Potty Toppers and a plastic potty cover that I got from Right Start magazine. These are for all public bathrooms. While driving, I put our three year old back into a diaper – she has the tiniest bladder and this situation is solved with the traveling diaper plan. I have a travel potty for the van, that I also purchased from Right Start. And, in a pinch, I will slip a diaper on any of my kids and have them use it for emergency potty times (after all – the astronauts do it and they are super cool!). There is also the infamous cup/bottle or side of the road for the boys – if needed.

Another of my favorite pieces that has been so great is our Pop-A-Tot! The Pop-A-Tot is a collapsible exersaucer. One of the main issues that occurs when traveling with a baby is the problem of where to put the baby down. The Pop-A-Tot is the perfect solution and it is sooo portable!

Traveling with Children: Managing Expectations

Posted on April 10, 2010 by David

(Blog post by Dave)

I tend to be a typical engineering-type, detail oriented person when it comes to traveling, while Robyn and her family are more laid back about plans. This includes times, dates, places, etc. They are much more flexible and last-minute in their social planning.

Type A planner For several years, this bothered me, with my New-England upbringing. I was used to calling ahead, planning ahead, etc. It wasn’t until the last couple of years that I tried a new approach that has saved me much internal anguish. When it comes to planning the part of the trip where we visit Robyn’s home town and meet her friends and relatives, I don’t ask for the itinerary or for any details. I let Robyn do the planning and take it all as a surprise as it comes.

This way I don’t stress about getting to what I would have considered ‘appointments’, and if a time or place changes, or if we wind up not meeting up with someone she had originally planned to meet I am not upset.

This point was driven home to me on this trip when Robyn had mentioned ahead of time might meet up with some cousins, but their plans had changed, so we couldn’t meet them. My oldest son, with a somewhat driven personality similar to mine, was very upset that we didn’t get to see them because it failed to meet his expectations of what was going to happen.

It helped me to verbalize my own situation and coping mechanism to him, so both of us could solidify how we should avoid building expectations based on tentative plans. We both are learning to roll with the changes.

At the same time, I pointed out to him to notice his own reaction and think of how to apply that to business. Wouldn’t he think a customer would be upset if he created an expectation in that person and then failed to meet or exceed that expectation.

Travel With Children…On the road again: 7 states + DC, 9 children, 2 adults one van, 27 days!

Posted on April 9, 2010 by David

We are embarking on a major journey with our children that will last 27 days. We will be visiting family and friends, as well as visiting many historic sites along the Eastern US as a culmination of studying 2 years of American History with the children. Travel with children-in the van

We will pack 9 children and 2 adults, with enough clothing, supplies, and provisions for 4 weeks into our “Connestoga wagon”: an 11-passenger Ford E-350 XLT extended conversion van.

We will be starting from Charlotte, NC and traveling North. Many stops have historic significance, and several are significant for visiting family. Our itinerary will include the follow ing:

Virginia: Richmond, Jamestown, Gloucester (birthplace of Pocahontas; Robyn’s hometown)

Pennsylvania: Gettysburg, Mount Joy (staying on a working farm) and Amish Country

Massachusettes: Old Sturbridge Village, Boston, Lexington and Concord, North Andover, Plymouth

Connecticut: New Haven, Trumbull (Dave’s hometown)

New York: New York City, Scarsdale, Blauvelt

Maryland/Washington DC: DC, Owen Mills

back to Virginia: Fredericksburg, Richmond, Gloucester

return to Charlotte, NC.

There is no guarantee we’ll be able to make all those sites, but that is our game plan. If things get rough we’ll scale back a bit.

We will keep you all posted of our progress. Our blog will not be real-time, however, in order to give us time to be with family and not have to stress about publishing in too timely a fashion. Who knows, by the time these get published we may be home already.

Traveling with kids: Planning our Road Trip

Posted on April 5, 2010 by Robyn

Washington_Crossing_Deleware-public domain image I love to travel. I like visiting with friends and family, meeting new people, seeing new things and just the general thrill of doing something different – broadening my horizons. I even like traveling with the kids. Yes, it is a lot of work, but you know…it is a lot of work at home too! At least when I travel, I get to visit lots of cool places while I work!

We are currently on a BIG road trip. We are traveling in our van for a month long sojourn along the East Coast. We are visiting family and friends and lots of American History sites. Homeschooling gives us the great advantage of being able to travel like this – what a cool ending to our two years of American History studies. Paine_Thomas-public domain image

I will be posting more about how we do it, how I pack for a month long trip, how we travel with 9 children, how we visit major sites, what we do and how it works with so many little ones. This post is about the planning.

I probably started mentally preparing and planning the trip about 2 months in advance. Thinking about the people that we wanted to see and the main sites that I didn’t want to miss. I did not do anything formal, just started putting things together in my mind (while I was doing the laundry!). Jefferson_Thomas public domain image

I was thinking about the ages of the kids, especially Nicholas, and what capabilities and sleeping patterns they would be at. These are critical points to consider for how the trip would go. How would each child be sleeping, how much walking could they do (especially the 2 -4 year olds), and how would everyone be eating. Again, most of the concerns would involve the baby and the littlest ones. Washington_portrait_on_horseback-public domain image

Based on those thoughts, I decided to make sure that we did not encourage Nicholas (9months old now) to crawl, that I should start him on bits of table foods (so he could ”last a little longer” on a drive or busy day), and that I would not get him overly settled into a daily nap routine. A quick note about crawling babies: if avoidable, you do not want to travel with a crawling baby, you never know what is on the floors you will be visiting and a crawling baby has a taste for self mobility that really makes him/her intolerant of inactivity. So, if I could keep Nicholas from learning to crawl and get him feeding himself crackers or biter biscuits (and hopefully taking a sippy cup) all would be golden for him and the timing of the trip. Bunker_Hill public domain image

My thoughts and plans then lingered to the smaller children, how would things look for them and what could I do to make anything better. Main thing – put off potty training…diapers are great for trips! I would even consider putting my 3 year old back into diapers, actually all of them back into diapers! There is nothing that can fluster me faster than everyone or some of them having to go to the potty at a bad time! Gettysburg_Address public domain image

We then started working on drinking from a regular cup and sitting in regular chairs (for those times that we would be visiting with people that did not have “toddler friendly” ware. Of course, I also planned to bring some travel sippy cups, but I like to be ready for anything!

For all the kids, I started working hard on manners and general obediance. I tell the kids often that if they want to do fun stuff, they have to obey. We can’t go places and do things if they are not able to do what we tell them to do. I can’t even imagine how awful it would be if they all were routinely disobediant and didn’t follow our requests. We would definitely not be able to safely go places. General_Stonewall_Jackson public domain image

I also started talking to the kids about eating different foods and how to avoid some embarrassing situations (topics, questions, etc.)

About a month before the trip, I really started looking at the dates and pulling the schedule together. We started notifying friends and family and figuring out who would be available for visiting. Robert_Edward_Lee public domain image

To be continued….