What I learned about Flying with Kids 2008 Edition

A couple of years ago I wrote here on Noodad.com about what you need to know when flying with kids. My experiences at the time were small potatoes compared to the planning and fine tuned execution needed to pull off this one. Now I had 3 kids: a 5 year old girl that thinks she knows everything, a 3 year old boy that is potty training, and a 1 1/2 year old boy that does not like to be pinned down in a car seat.  All this with a cross-country flight from Raleigh, NC to San Diego, CA with a layover at a little airport called JFK in New York.

Here’s what I learned from our trip. This list is not in order of appearance, only order of traumatic impact.

Always bring a change of clothes for you and your kids
Just when you think your 3 year old has mastered the “i need to take a piss and dump so I’m going to tell someone” this comes along. My 3 year old decided to not tell us that he peed in his pullup. 4 hours later his pee soaked pullup started trickling out onto his shorts and onto the plane seat. Then before realizing this fact, I sat him on my lap thereby soaking my shorts with his piss. Now we are faced with a decision of humiliating the poor kid for the duration of the flight and the layover by making him walk around in a pullup or having him sit in his pee-soaked shorts for the rest of the flight. We chose the latter. Good times.

Diapers: Think of what you need. Then double it.
My wife and I had it carefully planned. We would bring a few more diapers than usual for the flight. What we didn’t count on was a thunderstorm induced multi-hour delay on our connecting flight at JFK. This resulted in the depletion of our diaper stash and the subsequent rape of my wallet as I had to buy new diapers at the airport store. Me = wearing a huge happy hat.

Don’t Fill the Sippy Cups Before Takeoff
Here we were being all proactive and buying some juice for the kids before the flight. We filled up their sippy cups with orange juice and packed it in their backpacks. Imagine our surprise when we opened it up a half hour after takeoff to see Mount Sippy Cup spewing orange juice all over the inside of the boy’s backpack.Then imagine my further happiness when inspecting the bag while on my lap, feeling a stream of orange juice drip onto my shorts. Yippee!

Avoid Sharp Objects
Sounds simple right? That falls right behind “wipe your nose” and “don’t run with scissors.” But when a flight attendant gives your 1 1/2 year old plastic wings and he stops crying, you tend to just go with it. But then when he proceeds to poke himself in the face narrowly missing his eye, you start to second guess your parenting skills.

Nasty Looking Meat is Nasty Tasting Meat
Airlines don’t serve food anymore. This is fine when you are flying on a 2 hour flight. But a coast-to-coast 6 hour flight with just Munchies Mix just won’t cut it. I decided to go to one of those insanely priced gourmet flight meals to buy some supplies for the long flight. I found a vacuum-packed container of cut salami and cheese slices. It looked, “ok.” but not much better than that. Still, I figured, it coudn’t be half bad and the finger food style might be fun for the kids and better for the cleanliness factor. That was the rankest collection of sliced meat I have ever tried to consume And those who know me, know that is a big feat. < sarcasm >Good thing it was only $8.95.< /sarcasm >

Warning: Airplane TVs Do Not Have the V-Chip
We flew Jetblue because well…I think Jetblue rocks! But the addition of TVs on the plane is certainly a plus for families with kids. The problem is those kids have access to basic cable channels they typically do not watch. And it is like the Nazis at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark, they can’t stop looking at it even if it melts their faces off. My unsupervised daughter managed to watch 2 full hours of Passions, Las Vegas, What Not to Wear, and an infomercial on the Super Auger. She then complained when my wife made her turn it to Spongebob. You know it is desperate times when you as a parent tells your kid to watch Spongebob.

So there you have it: what I learned about flying with my kids. Anyone have anything to add?