Worth it to vacation with a toddler?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We took our DD all over when she was a toddler - and still do. At 14 months we took her to Cuba, 18 months to Scotland, 24 months to Switzerland. Here are two huge pointers (one you can do and the other you may not be able to do) 1) readjust the time as little as possible. The nice thing about going to Europe and basically staying within about four hours of EST is that she can go out to dinner with you. 2) if you have a nanny - bring her with you! Invaluable.

LOL of course bringing a nanny on vacation with you makes it easier. Then you don’t really have responsibility for your kid. DCUM, you never disappoint. Hot travel tip!

Do you think people with nannies aren’t parents?

OP it depends on what you want. I had three in three years and didn’t stop traveling- now on ES we have amazing trips because they are mature and experienced travelers. Put in the work it takes to be able to enjoy life more. Just my .02 and everyone’s different, but it worked for em.

What are you referring to here? Putting in the work before having kids to be able to afford a great nanny to bring with you on vacations?

[Anonymous]

My 2 cents. I have almost 7 yo twins. Traveling with children 0-2 was much easier than traveling with children 2-4 yo. From 0-2 they will enjoy themselves as long as they have you, the parents. They can have fun climbing up and down a park bench or running in a field wherever in the world it may be. You can plan what you, the adults want to do, and bring them along (as long as it is child-tolerent; you aren't going to be bringing your toddler into the Louvre). However, when they are 2-4, then you need to plan some destinations that are child-oriented, because they have advance enough to appreciate those things that are designed for children and to become bored of things that are not designed for children. When our kids were under 2, we got to pick our destinations based on where we wanted to go. When they passed 2, we had to be more careful of our destinations and ensure that we planned some regular kid outings to keep them from getting bored. The problem with them getting bored was then we'd have out-of-character behavioral issues. But if we planned regular kid-stops, even short ones, then the behavior stayed manageable. At 5+, they are easier to handle. You can plan for events and let them know that "we're going someplace Mommy and Daddy want to see today, but we'll go someplace you'll enjoy tomorrow" and they're more likely to put up with it.

I would try to plan a vacation as soon as possible before your child gets too much older and you have to work harder to entertain them when traveling.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We took our DD all over when she was a toddler - and still do. At 14 months we took her to Cuba, 18 months to Scotland, 24 months to Switzerland. Here are two huge pointers (one you can do and the other you may not be able to do) 1) readjust the time as little as possible. The nice thing about going to Europe and basically staying within about four hours of EST is that she can go out to dinner with you. 2) if you have a nanny - bring her with you! Invaluable.

LOL of course bringing a nanny on vacation with you makes it easier. Then you don’t really have responsibility for your kid. DCUM, you never disappoint. Hot travel tip!

Do you think people with nannies aren’t parents?

OP it depends on what you want. I had three in three years and didn’t stop traveling- now on ES we have amazing trips because they are mature and experienced travelers. Put in the work it takes to be able to enjoy life more. Just my .02 and everyone’s different, but it worked for em.

Of course people with nannies are parents but OP is talking about tips for traveling with kids- of course bringing along your nanny is the easiest way to travel with kids. It’s such a tone deaf response and so unhelpful. Presumably if OP could afford to travel with help she wouldn’t be asking this question. Traveling with a nanny to watch your kid is not the same as traveling with your kids.

[Anonymous]

My DC1 was great on the plane, DC2 Isa nighmare so depends on the children's personality.

[Anonymous]

We did Vancouver and the Olympic Peninsula at that age and it was a good trip. Lots of outdoor time running around.

[Anonymous]

It totally depends on YOU and YOUR baby.

I follow a family on instagram that hiked the entire appalachian trail with their 12 month old (was 18 months when they finished.) Meanwhile, a day trip to a farm stresses me out.

It's really up to you and your mood!

[Anonymous]

Gah traveling with a nanny is not the same as two parents traveling with their toddler. It's not even a helpful comment. My equally helpful comment is just to leave the kids at home with grandparents- that's the easiest way to travel with a toddler! Much easier than traveling with a nanny.

We have one set of grandparents we travel with who are super helpful, the other set hinders us with a toddler (they can't eat at normal times and want to eat at like 9pm with a toddler and brunch at 11).

[Anonymous]

You don't have to do either extremes - no vacations or go to Paris

Can't you do a child friendly vacation? A cruise? A great beach trip?

[Anonymous]

Start small (florida, carribbean) and work up to Europe or destinations that require bigger time changes. We prefer to use VRBO and rent houses so that we aren't trapped in a hotel room when our 2yo goes to bed. Florida is great, especially if you rent a house with a pool.

[Anonymous]

I agree, that it is easiest in the 0-2 age range...even then, we somehow managed to plan in advance to do Scotland, Greece, England and Costa Rica by age one. I'm so glad we did, because then it became just grandparent travel for awhile. We did a beach/all inclusive around age 2.5yo and a very low key trip (homestay) to some tropical locations around 3...and then nothing from 3-6yo beyond domestic flights. I think our DD is well behaved, but the crunch for vacation time seeing the grandparents, and knowing that we wouldn't really be able to travel the way we as adults wanted to...we haven't done it. We're probably just about ready to start up again now at 6.5yo. We could likely plan to do one museum or historic type site a day, plus ample time for meals and meandering and push DD to stay up till 8 or 9pm on most nights as long as the days weren't too jam packed with site seeing.

[Anonymous]

We just got back from a week in Cancun with our 20 month old.

The travel days were so tough that even though we had some beautiful, magical moments on vacation, I’m really not sure if it was worth it. We’ve cancelled all the other trips we were considering this year. It was just so hard and we spent all this money to be kind of miserable a lot of the time.

We took other trips domestically that were much more fun because Grandpa was with us and did a lot of babysitting. You really just need that back up so you can get a break.

I would avoid going somewhere you’ve been with your DH alone. We went to Cancun on our honeymoon and it made me really miss our pre kid life returning there with our DS.

I would also be very very very wary of people who tell you how AMAZING travel is with a toddler. I sometimes feel like there are people in some weird travel cult. Or maybe their toddlers are much easier than mine, or they are way more chill than I am. I felt kinda angry at all the people who were like “go go go! It will be an adventure!” It sucked a huge amount of the time, with a handful of shimmering moments.

[Anonymous]

I agree that it depends on your personality and your child's personality and also your budget. Our son is 16 months and we have traveled with him a bunch - many visits to see family scattered around the country, beach trips in the Caribbean, long weekends as a family of 3 in big cities, Europe. He isn't the most low key baby, but he is kind of adaptable, and naps in a stroller on our sightseeing vacations and we get a room with a balcony on beach vacations so we can enjoy the sunshine and read a book when he naps or goes to sleep for the night.

This is going to sound jerky and like the nanny comments, but if you have a larger budget, you can make travel a lot easier, like buying first class or main cabin extra or a seat for the toddler, membership to the airport lounge, TSA precheck/global entry, paying an airport porter to haul your bags, taking a car service from the airport right to the hotel vs. public transportation, renting baby equipment at the destination and having it delivered vs. carrying it around with you, paying for a suite or connecting rooms so you can have your own space at night, arranging a babysitter with the concierge after your child goes to sleep so parents can go out to dinner. We definitely did NOT travel like this when we were younger, so it has been an adjustment, but it does make a big difference.

Is it sometimes stressful? Sure. You have to strike this odd balance of being crazy organized but also going with the flow. Has it been worth it? For me, yes. He won't remember going to Paris as a baby but I will never never forget being with my husband on the banks of the Seine at night drinking wine in a plastic cup while our 9 month old baby looked up at the sparkling Eiffel Tower. Travel memories are some of my favorite memories, and I want to have those memories from all stages of my son's life.

[Anonymous]

From day one our daughter has come with us. Period. If we wanted to go to the beach, she came. Fly to Florida? She came. We incorporated her into our life, and as such she's an amazing traveler at age 6, incredibly patient, waits in lines, and is a blast to take everywhere.

You're starting late, so be ready for some bumps the first few trips, but if you want to take the trips then why not?

My brother and sister in law never take their 2 kids anywhere. I swear they rarely leave the house, and it's fine, their call, but when they did decide to take a vacation it was a headache and a bit of a disaster lol.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:From day one our daughter has come with us. Period. If we wanted to go to the beach, she came. Fly to Florida? She came. We incorporated her into our life, and as such she's an amazing traveler at age 6, incredibly patient, waits in lines, and is a blast to take everywhere.

You're starting late, so be ready for some bumps the first few trips, but if you want to take the trips then why not?

My brother and sister in law never take their 2 kids anywhere. I swear they rarely leave the house, and it's fine, their call, but when they did decide to take a vacation it was a headache and a bit of a disaster lol.

Truly happy for you that your daughter is like this. So is our first-born child. If we hadn't had a 2nd one, we would have made the exact same comments as you, and possibly attributed her behavior and demeanor to our parenting. Whenever we do anything with her, she is fun, patient, ready for almost anything.

Second kid? Not so much. Difficult from the start, can sometimes have a great time, sometimes not. Have mostly figured out how to structure things to keep him happy, but sometimes misfire.

You can certainly help your children learn and manage things at the edges. But the idea that you can drastically change their demeanor and response to the world just through your basic parenting does bear out through personal experience or that of people around us.

We had friends who bopped around Europe for 2 weeks with a 2 year old and a 5 year old, happy as could be. The two year old literally never made a peep even if he was up until 10 PM some nights. That's just who that kid is, has nothing to do with their parenting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:From day one our daughter has come with us. Period. If we wanted to go to the beach, she came. Fly to Florida? She came. We incorporated her into our life, and as such she's an amazing traveler at age 6, incredibly patient, waits in lines, and is a blast to take everywhere.

You're starting late, so be ready for some bumps the first few trips, but if you want to take the trips then why not?

My brother and sister in law never take their 2 kids anywhere. I swear they rarely leave the house, and it's fine, their call, but when they did decide to take a vacation it was a headache and a bit of a disaster lol.

Truly happy for you that your daughter is like this. So is our first-born child. If we hadn't had a 2nd one, we would have made the exact same comments as you, and possibly attributed her behavior and demeanor to our parenting. Whenever we do anything with her, she is fun, patient, ready for almost anything.

Second kid? Not so much. Difficult from the start, can sometimes have a great time, sometimes not. Have mostly figured out how to structure things to keep him happy, but sometimes misfire.

You can certainly help your children learn and manage things at the edges. But the idea that you can drastically change their demeanor and response to the world just through your basic parenting does bear out through personal experience or that of people around us.

We had friends who bopped around Europe for 2 weeks with a 2 year old and a 5 year old, happy as could be. The two year old literally never made a peep even if he was up until 10 PM some nights. That's just who that kid is, has nothing to do with their parenting.

Sorry, - does NOT bear out through personal experience.