Big Papa, Baby Bird and I recently took a trip to the east coast to visit our families and introduce them to Baby Bird. We got to experience a lot of air travel with a toddler: two flights to Syracuse, New York; two flights to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; and, two flights back home to Seattle. Yes siree Bob, six airplanes plus one squirmy baby.
Granted, this trip was not Baby Bird’s first on a plane. She has more mileage than some adults, having flown all the way from Yerevan, Armenia through London, England to Seattle, Washington at the tender age of 11 months. However, on that flight, she was still a babe in arms, not a walking, constantly moving, impatient, and sometimes 110-decibal screaming 16-month-old.
We were really worried how it would all pan out and I’m here to report, one week after the fact, we survived. It wasn’t always easy. Okay, most of the time it wasn’t easy at all. But we did it. And, we even made a few new friends in the process. Yes, you read that right.
What’s our secret? Well…we took the advice of a couple friends and put together a “Goodwill Kit” which included ear plugs a lifesaver and a picture of Baby Bird that read:
“My name is Baby Bird. I am 16 months old. Airplanes are new to me, so thank you for your patience if I make too much noise.”
We handed out the Goodwill Kits to passengers sitting in the rows in front of us and behind us, adjacent to us, one TSA agent in Syracuse and occasional random travelers. We did this on all of our flights except the last flight home which…ahem…might have been short-sighted on our part since this was the 110-decible flight.
People LOVED the Goodwill Kits. They chuckled, they shared stories of traveling with their own children, and—thankfully, oh-so-thankfully–they put up with whatever shenanigans Baby Bird tossed their way.
stacey says
I love this idea. I wish I would’ve thought of this when we flew to Hawaii with the kids and Miles was about the same age and he screamed the whole 5 hrs from Oahu to Oakland. It was awful. We had one drunk guy next to us tell me “if you don’t shut that kid up, I will” and then later he said ” I’m going to get the pilot back here to shut him up”. I was so mad that I got upset with him, his wife was telling him to shut up. It was the longest 5 hrs ever. Poor Miles was having ear issues that we didn’t know about. We even gave him benedryl but it didn’t help at all. I see the other passengers point of view and having a screaming kid aboard a long flight can be hard but at the same time, what could we do once we were in the air? It made me think of a story about one of the leaders of the LDS church years ago. He was on a flight heading back to utah and a woman was on the flight with two kids and one was a baby that kept crying and crying. He went back to ask the woman if he could hold the baby and walk the aisles with her. Of course the mom said yes and was relieved. I think if people ask if they can help instead of getting upset, that it would be so much better. I love your posts Beth.
Beth Shepherd - Pampers and Pakhlava says
It did help, though we should have handed them out on the last flight…that’s the flight where she screamed the most!
Just One Boomer (Suzanne) says
Been there. Done that. Both as a mother and as an adult traveling without children. I was moved to blog about both experiences.