Epic Travel Mistakes that Ruined our Vacation

This list is a public service announcement so no one makes the same mistakes as we did, on our vacation to visit family in NC.

We made some serious mistakes - one after another - that resulted in a botched vacation.

It appeared that we had planned everything perfectly. We were flying direct. We packed tons of toys and downloaded enough movies to keep us all occupied for a week. How wrong we were...

Epic travel mistakes that ruined our vacation:

Note: We traveled from Colorado to North Carolina to visit Dan's family over New Years (6 day trip). Remember that we were traveling with a 7 month old and a 2 year old (that just turned 2 on December 1st.) Also that there is a 2 hour time difference from here to there.

Mistake #1: Flying during winter. Chancing a connecting flight is suicide this time of year. No flight leaves on time from December to March unless you are on the first one in the morning. There was only one flight from Denver to Raleigh that flew direct. The departing time: 5:45pm. Inevitably we were delayed. After a delay and de-icing, we didn't actually depart until 7:00pm both kids' bedtime.

We were thinking this time would be great. The kids are used to going to bed so they would drift happily to sleep on the plane. NOPE! The toddler was awake the whole 3.5 hour flight and was NOT interested in watching a movie. She wanted to sleep but couldn't so instead she cried and squirmed and screamed the whole flight. The baby? He slept on and off, but the second half of the flight he had a terrible time trying to fall back asleep and instead decided to cry extremely loud so we could feel his pain.

Make no mistake, it wasn't just our kids. Every kid on that plane from rows 20 on back took their turn wailing from exhaustion.

Mistake #2: Flying too late. Even if we had left on time - 5:45pm (mountain time) - that still would have put us in NC at about 11pm (eastern time) and at our hosts house at 12:00am. Sleep deprivation in children, proves to be torture for parents.

Mistake #3: Rental car. We booked a rental car, not knowing some rental car companies actually close. So by the time our delayed flight made it to NC, the rental car company had closed and we had to seek another option at 1 o'clock in the morning.  The toddler was STILL awake at this time. The rental car we had booked was non-refundable.

Mistake #4: Testing the bedroom situation. We never had both kids sleep in the same room before. They each have their own rooms at our house and we usually don't stay overnight anywhere because of the dogs. We had no idea what we were in for... 

We arrive at our accommodations at 2:00am. I hurry up and feed the baby a bottle to get him to sleep. The toddler is up walking around the room talking in her not-so-quiet voice. The baby wants to sleep but keeps waking up from her. We finally got her settled into her bed and she spent another 30-45 minutes singing. We eventually all fell asleep around 3am eastern time on Tuesday morning.

The baby was up at 9:00am eastern time (or his usual 7am mountain time). Naturally the toddler woke up too and the day began, after only 6 hours of sleep. This is a stark contrast from their normal 12 hours of sleep every night.

Mistake #5: Figuring out how the kids will fall asleep. After that shit show, we needed these kids to nap. The baby napped with no issues, but the toddler isn't much of a napper. At home we put her in her room and sometimes she naps, but mostly she just plays quietly for an hour while her brother sleeps.

I brought the video monitor with us, so we set it up and put her down for a nap. Which resulted in her walking around the room, crying, banging on the door, and touching things she shouldn't. On Tuesday we had her nap in the car as we drove to visit family, but there had to be another way.

The real test was getting both kids to sleep that second night. After an hour of both kids crying and keeping each other up, I decided we would let the toddler fall asleep first and then put the baby down. Again, she wouldn't fall asleep in a new location. We ended up putting her in the infant car seat with her blanket and bear. At some point she fell asleep and we could put the baby down much later than normal.
 

Yup... that's about it.

 Mistake #6: Bringing too much stuff. I thought we were traveling light. I had formula and diapers sent to our destination. However, as usual I packed too many toys, too many pieces of clothing, and we are drowning in bags at the airport. We checked 2 car seats, 2 giant bags, and 1 carry-on.  We gate checked a stroller, and carried on 3 back packs... one for me, Kenzie and Dan. P90X had nothing on that arm workout. I should have assumed that relatives would be giving our children gifts of toys and clothing, especially since Christmas was only 1 week ago.


Mistake #7: Thinking the toddler would eat normally away from home. The second day we went grocery shopping so we could have all of her normal eats. Naturally, in true toddler fashion, she didn't want any of it. I think she ate a meal or two collectively over the 5 days we were away.

Mistake #8: Not taking enough with us on an outing. I am very controlling with my kids schedule when we are home. I call the shots, and that's it. I had no idea that we would be going on, what I thought to be a short trip to say good-bye, that turned into dinner and socializing for several hours. My kids were starving, I didn't pack any meals, bottles, or pouches, and we were again, approaching bedtime. Sigh...

Mistake #9: Flying too early. There was only one direct flight from Raleigh to Denver and it left EARLY in the morning. As we got up at 4am mountain time (6am eastern) we quietly tried packing up while the kids slept. Which lasted a whole 10 seconds before both kids were up and crying because they were still tired and cranky from 6 days of massive sleep deprivation. They whined and cried for the next 6 hours, until we were back in our car driving home from the airport. That was probably the best part of the trip. The 120 minutes of silence from the airport to home.

Hmm... I'll have to remember this for next time.

Mistake #10: Misplacing the parking ticket. Let's just top this crap cake with an icing of stupidity. Dan couldn't remember where he put the parking ticket, so we spent another 20 minutes scouring the car for the tiny stub hidden in the back of the console. Yes we found it, but not without a healthy dose of fear and anger.

So for those of you with tiny tots that have enough time to print up little poems and make up treat bags with ear plugs for the random strangers on your flight, you will probably just shake your heads at me... and please tell me about how wonderful your life is...

If you or someone you know is traveling with children, particularly a toddler and baby, please send them a link so they can better prepare themselves for the coming storm.