Flying with 17 month old, tips on making her comfortable?

[Camping Griswalds]

She will have her own carset, and will stay strapped in . What tips do you have for ear popping? How about keeping her entertained? Thanks

 

[the kabuki]

Don't know if she's still drinking from a bottle or sippy cup, but definetely have something for her to drink. Be sure not to let her drink from it until the moment you're actually taking off(unless of course she's really, really thirsty). She'll be filled up and not drink it when she needs to. If she uses a pacifier, make sure you have a couple on hand.

Portable DVD players are great. We got ours at Walmart's for about $130 and just love it. Have gotten a ton of use out of it for long car rides. Worth the price for a hour of quiet.

Stop at the dollar or toy store and get some new toys but don't let her see them until you're on the plane and then only one at a time. I'd stop at the dollar store for mine, load up with about $20-30 worth of stuff. Each toy kept them occupied for at least 10 minutes and if we lost them, no biggie it was only from the dollar store.

Bring on a variety of her favorite snacks. I've even brought a small soft sided cooler on board (that could be her carry-on) and had yogurts, cheese, juice, etc.

Don't forget to bring a small bottle of childrens' Tylenol , or Motrin. With kids' , they always get a fever at the worst of times. My DS was 3 yrs when we went to WDW one time and even though he wasn't sick before we left, ended up with a fever on the plane (found out it was an ear infection). It came on pretty quick, and I'm glad I had some meds with me for the 3 hour flight.

Favorite blankie/stuffed animal would be good too.

 

[bunnysmum]

We took a trip with dd when she was 15 months old and a very, very active child who was not terribly fond of sitting in her car seat at that time. We flew from Minneapolis to Anchorage with her.

I did a LOT of planning ahead b/c I knew this would be challenging. At that time, the portable DVD players were not so big, and we didn't have one.

I had read a lot of trip planning boards/advice on traveling with little ones. They did recommend some small toys but they said that "with toddlers, novelty is everything. So, go for lots of little inexpensive things rather than one more expensive new thing. One great suggestion that didn't cost much was to get McDonald's Happy Meal Toys (the Toddler Toys, not the "big kid toys"...most were being made by Fisher Price at the time we got them) and wrap them individually. Put them in your carry-on and you can bring them out as needed.

Of course we packed juice, different kinds of dry cereal for snacks, etc. I would HIGHLY recommend putting an extra change of clothes in for you and your child, as I spent the majority of our trip with the bottom portion of my body soaked with apple juice.

I put the Toddler Toys and some of her favorite books, other toys, a small unbreakable mirror, even a roll of scotch tape (she loved to play with it... I even taped her hands lightly together and let her have fun figuring out how to get "out"...I wouldn't have done it if she didn't like it, honest!).

Good luck, and have fun.

 

[southjerseymom]

Lollipops are good for take off. I brought lots of little toys, playdoh, "wonder" coloring pads, small books, etc. DH sat with DS and DD and I were in front of them. Atantic City to MCO. Half way down I looked back to find DH and DS sound asleep! Meanwhile I tried to keep DD occupied. In the end it all went well although I did tell DH (when he finally woke up) that "this plane better land soon because I'm running out of toys?" I think I followed that with something along the lines of "you owe me!". In the end it wasn't too bad. I've flown again with DD when she was 27 months and we will do it again in Feb when she is just past three. I do reccomend the carseat though...even with the extra expense....I knew my daughter needed to be in that seat - for all of our sake's!

 

[Alicnwondrln]

we are going in december and we are concerned about keeping ds19 months busy
he is under 2 so DH didtn buy him a seat as the last time we flew he was only quiet when he was sitting with me or my ds6 of DH
he heated being in the car seat
so DH was like why pay for hte seat if he istn gonna use it
i am not happy about this and am looking for some insight

 

[Camping Griswalds]

Our thought on buying the extra seat, there fore being able to put our DD in the carseat is this...If we drove I wouldn't let her out of the carseat and it would take 18 hours. So putting up with her complaining in the carseat for 3 hours is nothing! Besides when we flew with our 2.5 DS many years ago, he just sat in the carseat and ate for the 3 hours!!! All of these other kids were running around, parents VERY stressed etc. We felt like we LOVED the extra 200 or so bucks we spent . Reall only a hundred each way if you look at it that way!!!

 

[Kahana-ri]

When we flew with our 14-month old son to CA then to HI and we brought many things to keep him busy: snacks, toys, stuff toys and we had our lap top that we were able to play his DVD. It was a very long trip for our son and his ears did hurt. We had a tough time with his ears, but the airlines we nice enough to let us walk around with our son as much as possible to try to calm him. One of the flight attendants even took him around the plane herself. This trip we found out that our son also gets motion sickness. Just another reason why the flights were difficult. We fly again to WDW in December, but thank goodness its N/S to Orlando-it'll only take a few hours this time.

 

[magiroux]

I rec'd the best advice for traveling with children from a Dr at the Naples, FL Emergency Room. This is the trip where my DD (18 months at the time) got hoof-in-mouth and we were at ER twice. It was literally 5 days of the worst Hell any parent can imagine. IT was a crash course for this clueless Mom who found out the hard way just how gross traveling thru airports and planes really is.

Anyway, the fluid that is in the ears (you know, the fluid that causes the pain on take off and landing) is especially suseptible to bacteria in a child's ear due to the draining mechanism (for lack of a better term) is not fully developed. This is the reason why children get so many more ear infections than we adults do. In a plane, you are basically in a flying cootie machine and that's why children often get ear infections after traveling on a plane.

The Dr says whenever children travel on planes to give a dose of Bendryl one hour before taking off. This will a) Dry out the fluid in the head and make take off/landing less painful and b) there is no fluid for the bacteria to settle in which will reduce the chance of your child getting an ear infection. Make sure you have planty of fluids since it will also make your child more thirsty. If your child tends to get "hyped up" on Benedryl, give a half a dose and it should have the opposite effect

One more thing, my DD gets motion sickness and Benedryl works for this too.

As far as keeping your child occupied, coloring, books small toys are great. I wouldn't recommend the Play-Doh thing since it is so messy and rolling it around can only pick up and spread cooties to you and your kid.