How do people travel with young kids?

[Anonymous]

IME experience families with 3+ kids just don’t travel that much. Cue the posters saying they have 5 kids, 2 nannies, a seven figure income and 6 weeks a year is PTO, but in reality it just doesn’t happen that much. If you have 3+ kids, by the time the youngest is fun to travel with, the oldest is in activities they don’t want to miss and parents are seeing college tuition looming.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:IME experience families with 3+ kids just don’t travel that much. Cue the posters saying they have 5 kids, 2 nannies, a seven figure income and 6 weeks a year is PTO, but in reality it just doesn’t happen that much. If you have 3+ kids, by the time the youngest is fun to travel with, the oldest is in activities they don’t want to miss and parents are seeing college tuition looming.

To be fair a lot of families in America generally don’t travel beyond to see family, and certainly not to instagram worthy destinations.

[Anonymous]

We travel - 3 kids here. We often do very long road trips. We've just done it since they were all infants, and they are used to it. We usually stay in an AirBnB. We try not to fly because it is hard, but we've flown and just had to deal with the lack of control. There isn't a magic answer here. We just do it because we enjoy it and it is worth the effort - to us. We do not travel with help, so it's just us and the kids.

[Anonymous]

I travel often with my kids on pretty big overseas trips. My oldest just turned 6. We usually have two strollers (ALL of my kids want a break sometimes so the oldest two switch off. Yeah I get that they're too old for a stroller, but whatever) and the kids just nap on the go. When we're in museums or touring castles, I just put the baby in the carrier and she sleeps on me. I pop puffs or cheerios in her mouth if she's fussy. We had a toddler carrier too, but we stopped after kids turned 3. I do have ipads, but they pretty much only get them on planes or emergencies or sometimes when they need downtime (like at a restaurant and it's going over 2 hours!). Yes there is whining, but I think my kids by now know that whining doesn't get them anywhere. Once they realized that, they started to enjoy things. DH and I really, really love to tour and see things, so our interest is contagious. We also try to make it interesting for the kids. And yeah, the littlest ones go to sleep in their strollers if we aren't home yet by 7:30. They just have learned to roll with it.

DH and I always have snacks, sandwiches and drinks for the kids. They melt down if they don't have lunch and we make sure that happens for them regardless of whether we've found a restaurant yet. My mom calls my vacations "the hunger march" ha. Mostly because we're active and she likes to sit down in restaurants for 3 meals a day. My kids can only really tolerate one restaurant a day and basically hate them.

Who knows- maybe my kids will grow up and do nothing but sit on a beach for a week as their vacations.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:3 kids. We took a grandparent with us to Europe so she could stay behind with the three year old for naptimes. We started doing trips on our own when the youngest was five. We tend to do airbnb apartments so everyone can spread out and go to sleep at different times.

I actually found it easier to travel when they were young compared to now when my two oldest kids are teens and whiny, want to sleep in, less adaptable to time changes.

Well it’s really easy to travel when you treat your mother like the help.

LOL are you kidding me? She practically kicks us out the door wanting alone time with a grandkid! We loved making family memories through travel and of course she got time to herself as well. I can’t wait to do the same for my kids when I have grandchildren.

NP. You’re very fortunate that your mother is willing and able to do that. Neither my mother nor my MIL would.

[Anonymous]

3 is hard. It'll be better when the little one is 3+. We have two snd traveled last year and this. Stayed st rental houses so fewer restaurant meals and can keep naps for the toddler. We are also routine based but kids are up at 6 so we have long morning adventures. Toddler could do a dar nap every couple days. We only did one big outing a day. So beach in the am, home for lunch and nap. Take older (6 year old) out for ice cream or shorter adventure while other kid naps. Evening walk/playground for everyone and dinner and bed at 8:30. We traveled with other families with kids so it was fun to just hang out with them.

[Anonymous]

We vacation a lot with my parents when we go overseas or to South America. My parents are DONE by 7/8pm and so are my kids, so it's a win. DH and I can go out later once we've put the kids to bed. We get adjoining rooms with my parents so my kids can be asleep and my parents watch TV in the other room. To date, my kids have never woken up once for my parents, so it's not extra work on my parents.

[Anonymous]

Most people don't. Or they have less than 3 kids. Or they bring help. Or they have a miserable time and just don't post about it.

Me personally, I have one 7 year old, and still don't take big trips. I love to travel and did so extensively before. But, even with just one kid, it's just not worth the time, energy and effort to me. We do things like go to the beach or the lake and hang out in an air bnb for a few days, but that is the extent of our travel. We've only flown as a family once.

Kids that need structure and aren't go with the flow are not fun to travel with. You can't really force it. You can either choose to live with it and travel anyway, or you can change the way you travel.

[Anonymous]

I used to travel a bunch with my little kids, including solo road trips, but they were super easy going and stopped napping young. And even then, mostly after the youngest turned 3. They’re older now and it’s super easy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:IME experience families with 3+ kids just don’t travel that much. Cue the posters saying they have 5 kids, 2 nannies, a seven figure income and 6 weeks a year is PTO, but in reality it just doesn’t happen that much. If you have 3+ kids, by the time the youngest is fun to travel with, the oldest is in activities they don’t want to miss and parents are seeing college tuition looming.

Eh. We have three kids, zero nannies, and not that much PTO (or income). We take a few vacations a year, mostly to driveable destinations where we rent an AirBnB. We have fun. Kids are 10, 8, and 6. Our kids understand that they may miss things for vacations and don't complain. There is such a thing as taking your kids' activities too seriously.

[Anonymous]

OP I have six I have always traveled with mine. My first took her first steps to a stewardess in the 1980s.
My kids are schedule driven as well however kids must learn spontaneous and that life doesn’t always follow the schedule

This is your issue not theirs

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We bring our nanny.

Disgusting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We bring our nanny.

Disgusting.

Lol

[Anonymous]

I mean, I can sort of understand having a nanny because you need or want to work and need help with the childcare. But when you can’t even go on vacation and take care of your own kids without bringing your nanny it just makes me wonder why you even bothered having them. It’s just so odd.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We travel - 3 kids here. We often do very long road trips. We've just done it since they were all infants, and they are used to it. We usually stay in an AirBnB. We try not to fly because it is hard, but we've flown and just had to deal with the lack of control. There isn't a magic answer here. We just do it because we enjoy it and it is worth the effort - to us. We do not travel with help, so it's just us and the kids.

I replied earlier about the trips we've taken with our three kids, and same. No help, no nanny. We aren't on a budget per se but certainly not all-inclusive or luxury. We have flown to the southwest and west coast with three, but typically we take very long road trips. I reiterated that our kids are not "easy" kids. They mouth off, are poky, complain, push back when they don't want to do things. But they are also very fun, adventurous, and full of joy in the moment. DH and I aren't super meticulous planners or particularly resilient, either, so it's good practice for us, too. So we do it because it's our one life and we don't want to spend it not doing anything.