Up until Ariah was born we were traveling what seemed like all the time but since she arrived we have been staying close to home. This was our first out of town trip with our Cupcake and we had a ton of fun and learned a lot.
The first and most important lesson learned: Do not travel in the middle of the night with an infant. If you are trying to figure out why then you have never tried it. My thought was that since Ariah is always asleep at midnight then she would sleep through the shuttle to the airport, security, boarding and the entire flight. WRONG. Ariah went to sleep at the standard 6:30pm and we woke her up at 10pm. She stayed awake until 3am. At 3am she took an hour nap and didn't nap again until we got to Granny's house and tucked her in for a 3 hour nap. Ariah was not the problem here. The problem was that by the time we got to New Orleans I had been up for 26 hours, straight. At one point in the flight when I was sitting in the middle seat, trapped on one side by an "isle sitter" and the other side by a "window snorer", I lost it. I plunked the baby on Kyle's lap knocking over his Ipad and unplugging his head phones and told him in my quietest, most controlled crazy voice to "hold her!" Once I was in the isle I took her back and I rocked her by the bathrooms until she fell asleep. Ariah did far better than I did with the flight and even though she wasn't sleeping she was a joy to travel with, giggling and smiling the whole time. She never even cried.
The second lesson learned: always have starfish on hand. Starfish are what Kyle calls the little melt-in-your-mouth cereal bits that Ariah loves. Any time she would fuss, papa would give her some starfish and she was fine. Before we boarded the plane she knocked the tub of starfish out of his hand spewing them across the airport floor, at which point we both considered picking them all up and blowing them off in case there was an "emergency". I would like to say the shear disgustingness of the airport floor kept us from doing that but really it was all the witnesses. I know before I had a child I would have judged someone for doing something like that. Now, however, I would probably get on my hands and knees and help.
Lesson number 3: Accept the kindness of strangers. We had a layover in Houston and from there it was an hour-and-a-half flight to New Orleans. Kyle and I decided to both take isle seats catty-corner from each other and the woman in front of me, across the isle from Kyle, was very friendly. She was traveling with her teenage daughter and Ariah was having a lot of fun smiling and babbling to her. After chatting for a bit she offered to hold Ariah so that I could rest. My initial reaction was to say no and then I remembered we were on a plane and there was no where to go. Kyle and I both got an hour nap and it was wonderful!
The final lesson we learned on the flight home was to always carry on the baby's luggage. Nana Georgie gave Ariah her first piece of luggage and she is also the one that gave us this advice. I thought it was a little over zealous until the trip home. Somehow the baby was given straight prune juice instead of watered down juice before we left. On board I smelled a little something and then realized it was the baby in front of us. We all slept on the entire trip home and when we de-boarded the plane I thought I should change her even though she was all snug in the baby carrier and I couldn't smell anything. Our ride was almost there so we decided to wait until we were home which is only a five minute car ride. As we were waiting for our friend I peeled Ariah off of me and OH MY GOODNESS!
There was poop on my shirt which had traveled through her footed pajamas and onesie. We ran for the ladies room and as I laid her down on the baby changer I said out loud that I had never seen anything like this, it just sort of slipped out. A lady in the restroom brought a roll of paper towels and laid them out as a landing for dirty baby wipes. There was poop everywhere. I was afraid to take her onesie off because I did not want to get poop all over her face. Once I managed to get everything off I threw away the onesie, there was no saving it, and wrapped up the pj's. Of course I didn't bring her luggage in so I had to wrap her in just my fuzzy vest. She traveled home in just her diaper and I spent the ride home cleaning myself with baby wipes.
Did I mention that Ariah never really cried through any of this?! She was a wonderful traveling companion.
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