Last week I read a posting about an "Emergency Bag" that wasn't really for the typical emergencies, but for the little kid, non-medical kind of emergencies. That got me to thinking about what we have done over the years to make life easier with twins. I am sure that there is a LONG list of suggestions, but I chose to write about our "Keep'em occupied on the plane or in the airport" solution.
We have a bad track record of getting stuck at JFK airport for long layovers while traveling to or from France. Over the past 3 years, this has gotten to be less of an issue as the girls have gotten older, and their attention spans have gotten longer. We started this adventure using a very large, backpack style diaper bag full of snacks, diapers, extra clothes, cups, Loveys, and a few games and books. Over the years, the pack has slimmed down and carries more of the entertainment type stuff than diaper and clothes stuff. Here are some of the things that our girls enjoy, and I think are great plane/car/church/whenever items:
*Sticker books - I can find books here that have 400 stickers in them. Each page has a topic, a few sentences, and some questions. The girls get to indulge their sticker fascination while Mommy feels good about the fact that they are learning something.
*Coloring books and activity books
*WaterWow Doodle books - these use refillable water pens or brushes, and can be "colored" again and again without mess. I ordered our last batch from Amazon.com.
*Stencils and a pad of paper - for when the coloring books just isn't cutting it. This year's addition was a set of stencils centered around Princesses.
*Kids' menus from restaurants - for something different. It also helps that they are generally lightweight and varied depending on the restaurant.
Those are a few of the things we keep in our Airplane bag. Of course we also keep the usual wipes and snacks handy.
If you would like to read about some other things that "Work" check out Rocks in My Dryer.
3 comments:
Those are great ideas, thanks. I find having things like this ready makes everything go so much easier.
I'll definitely keep that in mind for the next time we fly. However, if my husband has any say in it it won't be for another 10 years if kids are involved. We had a two hours delay last time we flew with our daughter (she was about 21 months), and I kept waiting for his head to explode. :)
Fabulous ideas. Us traveling-by-air moms must be on the same wavelength. You have great ideas though that I hadn't included in our packs, but will now!
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