It's taken me a long time to start writing posts about our summer holiday this year. There was a lot jam packed into the three weeks we were gone and frankly, I had a bit of the PTSD up until now from flying over 30 hours with two kids. And two car seats. And two strollers. And four suitcases. And three carry on's. And a good thirty pounds of allergy friendly foods that don't exist in Cyprus.
A bit about traveling with two toddlers on long haul flights: don't do it.
I kid!
Sorta.
Leading up to our departure day, C had numerous questions - "How long are we going to be in the airplane?" "Where will we be when we land?" "Where will I sleep?". Very cute. N on the other hand ran around pulling everything out of the suitcases I had just packed. He's so helpful.
I'll now leave you with a few pictures from day one and two...
And then we flew for ten hours. The kiddos slept for five of those ten hours. The other five hours went something like this:
"What can I dooooooooooooo mommy?" -- C
"N! Stop pressing on C's controller!" -- Me, then A, then Me, etc.100x
"N! Stay still!" (aka, please stop trying to grab things off the tray of the quadriplegic man they sat next to us -- he was a good sport.) -- Me, me, me, me, me, basically all of N's waking hours.
And of course....
"How much longer until we get there?" -- C, then me, then A, then all of us.
And then we finally land! Loaded our carry-on's on A like a pack mule (the least of which included 3 laptops and 2 iPads), shove N into the Ergo and off we go. To baggage claim. Then we realize we have no idea how to get 2 toddlers, 2 car seats, 2 strollers, 4 suitcases, 3 carry-on's and (now) 25lbs. of food to terminal 5, where our hotel was located.
Thus we started our version of jenga...the baggage cart version. We were VERY good at baggage cart jenga by the end of this trip. C agrees because it meant he got to sit on top of the suitcases on one of our carts. Super safe.
We start the precarious journey through customs...the throngs of people in the arrivals area...a quick stop for soy hot chocolates...and then convince a black cab to take our piddly fair over to terminal 5.
We kick off our arrival at the hotel with C slow motion falling out of the cab, hot chocolate in hand. He was CONVINCED he could jump out on his own. Poor guy. Hot chocolate all over the walkway to the hotel. The cab driver was even more impressed with us at this point.
In our room, we summon our last thread of energy and shower the kids, throw on PJ's and basically all four of us pass out for three hours. That was so awesome. I felt almost human again when I woke up. So much so I was like "yeahhhhhh, come on guys, let's go to Paddington Station for dinner!"
Thus we adjourn our travel adventure to England. Next up, we wake the next morning and do it all over again for our flight to Cyprus (wince).
I'll now leave you with a few pictures from day one and two...
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| Departure day! They are convinced they can see our plane from their bedroom window. This bought me a good 20 minutes of extra time to pack {traveling with toddlers, aka TWT, tip #1} |
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| C doing his part to help carry our baggage. This lasted all of two minutes before we heard "um mom, this backpack is SO heavy on my back." We had been at the airport a total of five minutes at this point. {TWT foreshadowing moment #1} |
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| Check-in line. Guess who's smiles are genuine and guess who's are hiding complete panic. |
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| Post check-in and clearing security. Dear TSA, thank you for family dedicated security lines. |
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| Ooohhhhh plllaanneeess. |
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| Settling in for flight #1. Water, check. Paci acting as protection against ear issues, check. Parents sweating due to stuffing carry-on's into awkward overhead bin space, check. |
"What can I dooooooooooooo mommy?" -- C
"N! Stop pressing on C's controller!" -- Me, then A, then Me, etc.100x
"N! Stay still!" (aka, please stop trying to grab things off the tray of the quadriplegic man they sat next to us -- he was a good sport.) -- Me, me, me, me, me, basically all of N's waking hours.
And of course....
"How much longer until we get there?" -- C, then me, then A, then all of us.
And then we finally land! Loaded our carry-on's on A like a pack mule (the least of which included 3 laptops and 2 iPads), shove N into the Ergo and off we go. To baggage claim. Then we realize we have no idea how to get 2 toddlers, 2 car seats, 2 strollers, 4 suitcases, 3 carry-on's and (now) 25lbs. of food to terminal 5, where our hotel was located.
Thus we started our version of jenga...the baggage cart version. We were VERY good at baggage cart jenga by the end of this trip. C agrees because it meant he got to sit on top of the suitcases on one of our carts. Super safe.
We start the precarious journey through customs...the throngs of people in the arrivals area...a quick stop for soy hot chocolates...and then convince a black cab to take our piddly fair over to terminal 5.
We kick off our arrival at the hotel with C slow motion falling out of the cab, hot chocolate in hand. He was CONVINCED he could jump out on his own. Poor guy. Hot chocolate all over the walkway to the hotel. The cab driver was even more impressed with us at this point.
In our room, we summon our last thread of energy and shower the kids, throw on PJ's and basically all four of us pass out for three hours. That was so awesome. I felt almost human again when I woke up. So much so I was like "yeahhhhhh, come on guys, let's go to Paddington Station for dinner!"
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| Terminal 5, making our way to Heathrow Express. |
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| I'm so tired, I really have no idea why I'm smiling, but I'm on a train, so I'm going with it. |
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| Proof that N smiles. |
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| Paddington Station. |
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| Food photographer I am not, but damn I had missed good ol' fish n' chips. And...mushy peas!! |
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| For posterity, only (there will be a lot of these, my apologies in advance.) |
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| I have no idea where they got these flags, but jet lag makes toddlers do funny things. |
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