Flying with two sets of twins, new three year olds and eleven month olds, from PDX TO ATX, for my sister’s wedding shower, seemed like an eternity! We planned it out for months. We needed a huge rental vehicle at the other end (4 car seats!) It was a like poetry in motion and complete craziness all at once... we did survive.
Here's how: We did all of our panicking and worrying ahead of time. We brought lots of quiet toys in the big kids' backpacks.
We had (grandparent) help on the way to the airport and from the airport.
All four had access to suck on the ascent and descent. The bigs had small baby bottles with water and the littles had breast milk, pacifiers and a bottle with breast milk for options. This is so important for the pressure change on their little ears! We gave in with a movie for the bigs on the flight home. We used these awesome, kid-friendly headphones. We tried to stick to our regular schedule and routines as much as possible. We picked flights around the babies' schedules. It made a HUGE difference but I know this is of course not always possible. The flight home was after bedtime and the littles slept for most of the four hour flight. We were extremely nice to the flight attendants and passengers onboard. Everyone was so kind and helpful when they saw we had four babies between the two of us. One flight attendant even held a baby in a pinch when we had to maneuver switching seats. She called him "a tank" which we still laugh about, today. People really do give the positive energy back, most of the time. What we did wrong: Underestimated how long packing would take and didn't get enough sleep the night before. We brought the wrong kind of snacks. We have a hard time finding snacks that everyone likes so I tried to bring as much variety and plenty of everyone's favorites. What I didn't think about ahead of time was how inconvenient and messy they would be on a plane! DUH! We were so grossed out by the squished bananas and puffs container that ended up completely dumped out by a baby! We learned that choosing easy, non messy snacks on a plane is extremely important! Haha... such a rookie mistake! Some snacks that work well on a plane are:
Items to bring (I used to travel light!):
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AuthorKathleen is a mom of three sets of spontaneous twins. Archives
November 2023
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