Toddler on a 4 hour flight!

[jcox]

Hi ladies,

I wondered if any of you had any advice or tips for me. My husband, me and our two daughters are going on holiday next week. The flight is 4 hours long....I am absolutely TERRIFIED of how my youngest daughter (20 months) will be during the flight. She can't sit still for 5 seconds and literally has a melt down if you try to make her do so. I'm fairly confident my other daughter who is 4 will be as good as gold as she is quite happy to sit and play games, watch films, drawing etc but it's the little one I'm worried about. Has anyone flown with a fidgety toddler and can offer me some advice so I don't go completely insane?! Thanks

 

[Tonks82]

It's fine!!! Since a baby we have flown to Turkey twice a year with our now 3 yr old.
When the aisle was reasonably quiet I let my son just run up and down. He wanted to stand up on the chairs too and annoy the people in front and behind which I just let him do most people are friendly.
I packed his favourite foods too to bribe him with and his favourite toys. We gave him the phone to play with as well but all this only works for very short periods!
I found on the last flight they seem to sit all the families with young children together. At one point he couldn't get out the chair and he had a meltdown I literally had to pin him down on to the seat but I didn't feel too bad there were different kids crying at some point the whole flight? He went to sleep in the end think he was just tired. But yeah she might sleep then it's bliss!!

Good luck you'll be fine xx

 

[Phoenix85]

Colouring books and crayons/pens, magnadoodle things are handy too. Or travel aquadraw.

Could maybe get a new toy for the flight to hold her attention. We tend to buy something from the toy shop in the airport.

Depending on the time of your flight you may be able to get her to nap for some of it.

Also I wouldn't bother with a toddler meal but take lots of snacks that should occupy her too.

Good luck!

PS I'm sure it'll be fine, we've flown to Greece or Tenerife once or twice a yr from when my youngest was 5 months old and always been fine. When she was 3 we flew to Florida (8hrs!) and it was fine too.

 

[jcox]

Thank you both so much! Great ideas on the toys aswell so will definitely do that. I think I've convinced myself that all the other kids will be angels and she'll be the only one screaming her head off! Pretty sure that won't be the case! Thanks again for your advice xx

 

[Lucyboo]

Take loads of food,toys, ipad/dvd player, try and wear her out in the airport. When the crew have done the main service let her stretch her legs in the aisle. Going my.lg slept most coming home was awake the whole flight. Good luck x

 

[Kiagirl]

We took my LO to Egypt at 13 months. She was fine even though we were stuck on the plane for nearly 7 issues (stuck on runway for a couple of hours) we took a trunki on and I filled it with stuff, lucky bags, colouring books, new crayons, books, sweets, lollies, CBeebies magazines. I also took a few of her fave toys away a few weeks before and put them in. She didn't miss them but was surprised to see her teaset in there.she just loved to people watch tho. She's now 2 and we did Ibiza this time and having her own seat was fab! She didn't move as was very happy to watch everything. We also always get the meals/order from the menu as it fills time. X

I do not let her up and down the aisles at any time. Nor do I let her stand up and annoy the people in front or behind. I hated it when that happened to us as a childless couple so I don't let her do it to others. I get so many nice comments from flight attendants and other passengers about how well behaved she is. If you have enough diff stuff to occupy them it's not too bad.

 

[Tonks82]

Its either them listening to a screaming toddler and us having to pin him down in his seat or him peering over the seat looking at them (or annoying them) both are bad but what can you do if you don't have the perfect child?

 

[Alrm198]

Bump isn't here yet but I have been reading up on aeroplane travel recently as we may be travelling to Oz at some point in the near future for my sisters wedding.

Here are some articles I've read so far which I found useful; especially learning about reserving bassinets for flights!

Jack & Jill see the world blog - All things Airplane

Flying with a Baby blog - Ex-Flight Attendant's guide to travel and Mum to 2 internationally travelled tots

Hope this helps!

 

[mummywanabe]

Took my son away on a similar length flight at this ages I got him a load of cheap new toys and books and kept them for the flight so every 15 mins or so he'd get a new one, just got them in pound shop so didn't cost much but entertained him for s good portion of the flight

 

[Tigger87]

We did a 4 hour flight with my 23m old toddler last year. We bought him some headphones and downloaded every peppa pig episode we could to his tablet, along with some of his favourite snacks. He fell asleep after about 2 hours, and was a massive pain in the bum when he was awake, but we managed to keep him in his seat (he's super busy ALL the time!). That was a 7am ish flight I think, the way back was even earlier and he was as good as gold and slept for the majority of the return because he was so exhausted!