Hellobee

We came back from a family trip to San Diego and Los Angeles about a week ago. The beautiful backdrop and weather of San Diego started our vacation off almost picture perfect. Unfortunately, the girls  and I caught the flu midway into our vacation. Nonetheless, we still managed to have some fun for the remainder of our time in California.

While it’s only been a year since the last time we traveled as a family on a plane, there were some notable changes that made our flight experience different from the last time. There are frequent changes being made with airline companies, so I highly recommend checking with your specific airlines and airports so that you are up to date with their current guidelines, especially when flying with children. In the fall, I flew out of O’Hare airport by myself and remember seeing signs around the airport about how only the newest version of the Illinois driver’s license would be accepted for domestic flights. I had already renewed my driver’s license, but Mr. Pizza hadn’t so it was a relief to find out online that there was a grace period of a few years before the change would take into effect.

When we went on our family trip last year, we ended up taking the BOB double stroller because we thought it would be useful in the PNW. We were able to take the BOB stroller all the way to the gate without any issues. We took a different major airline for this trip and was told to check in our Joovy double stroller because of the 20 lb limit.  I don’t know how much the stroller weighs, but I was surprised that I needed to check it in since it is considerably lighter than the BOB double stroller. Although I was nervous about the idea of walking to our gate with two young kids, they did perfectly fine. It helped that the flight to California was early on in the day when the girls were both in good spirits. On our return flight, which was later in the day, I did wish we had our stroller because I ended up carrying Gracie all the way to baggage claim. If using a stroller to navigate around the airport is especially important to you when traveling with multiple kids, it might be helpful to invest in a light umbrella double stroller to avoid checking it in. I don’t think you would run into many problems with most single strollers but once you are using a double stroller, it is helpful to know the guidelines for the specific airline if you do not want to check it in.

This was right before we were told that we needed to check in the stroller.

I didn’t realize until the day before our flight but I had bought basic economy tickets for myself and the girls. This meant that we were each only allowed to bring one bag that could fit under the seat. Thankfully the rolling luggage I had for the girls were the perfect size.  I ended up bringing a backpack on the flight for myself. Mr. Pizza (who needed to purchase his ticket separately) had a regular ticket, so he took a backpack and a rolling luggage into the plane and checked in my rolling luggage. In addition to the stroller, we also checked in a convertible car seat and a booster which was much easier to handle taking to the car rental shuttle than when we’ve had two convertible car seats in the past. The girls, who are now 5 and 2.5, did a pretty good job walking to the gate. Lil’ Pizza helped push her own luggage for part of the way and the other luggage stacked up securely on top of my husband’s luggage. Do all children’s luggage have this option because it is a definite plus!

Baby Pizza made herself real comfortable while we waited to board the plane.

The other big difference was that this was the first time we bought a ticket for Baby Pizza, which also meant that it would be the first time we wouldn’t all be sitting together in one row of seats. We decided it would be best to have one row of seats with the girls and myself and Mr. Pizza close by. I wasn’t given the choice to choose our seats ahead of time, so we just hoped that it would still work out for Mr. Pizza to be near us.  Thankfully for both flights, Mr. Pizza was able to switch seats and sit right across from us. The girls were engaged with their activities during most of the flight. And when Baby Pizza did get a bit more restless, Mr. Pizza sat with us and played with Baby Pizza on his lap which helped.

We are ready to board and get this vacation started!

The changes overall didn’t seem to negatively impact our flight experience.  I was actually pleasantly surprised at how smoothly things seemed to go this time around. Perhaps now that they are both older, we have turned a corner and traveling has gotten easier and for that I am so thankful!