Published on January 4th, 2014 | 1019 Views

Finding the best time to travel with baby

One of the reasons I booked so many trips before Baby Girl was born was because I was worried we would be over thinking it once we’d had her.

And I’m pretty sure I was right on this one.

In my experience, there are pros and cons about travelling with baby at every stage of the development, and if I’d tried to find the perfect time to travel, I’m still not sure I know exactly when I would have wanted to go.

But here’s an overview of the pros and cons of the long-haul holidays we had in the first six months:

4 months:
When Baby Girl was 18 weeks old we went to Florida for a week.

Cons:

She was learning to roll around, and before going I was worried she wouldn’t get enough tummy-time on holiday, so we bought her a big play mat for travelling
We were still pretty dependent on baby equipment, such as a steriliser, as we had to sterilise dummies and the syringe we used to give her medication for reflux
When we came back to London after a week, she seemed quite jet-lagged and it took several days for her to adapt to the time difference again

Pros:

She quickly adapted to the time difference when we arrived in Florida, and she slept very well in the evenings there, making it easy for us to have her sleep in her buggy next to our table at dinner-time
Her routine, which at this point included a morning nap, made it easy for us to have a late breakfast at the hotel while she slept in her buggy next to our table
We used a baby carrier regularly, and took her out for short walks
Baby Girl didn’t object to wearing a sun hat or sunglasses for sun protection
She was fully breastfed, so we didn’t have to worry about what she would eat and drink
Going back, we had an overnight flight and Baby Girl slept in my lap on her SkyBaby mini-mattress – now advertising on Mummy in the City – for the duration of the flight (she woke up 20 minutes before landing)

6 months:
When Baby Girl was 6 months old we went to Dubai for a short week.

Cons:

Baby Girl needed more entertaining, and Daddy T hadn’t really realised how this would affect his usual video-marathon on daytime flights
We had tried introducing solids early because of her reflux, and hadn’t had much success, and before going, the thought of having to deal with this on holiday stressed me out
Baby Girl didn’t adapt as well to the time difference this time, and she was more difficult to put to bed in the evenings
She also seemed very jet-lagged when returning to London, and it took several days to get back into her normal routine

Pros:

We decided to stick to baby rice while on holiday and continue introducing her to new tastes when returning to London, as it had been a mistake to start solids earlier. It was easy to pack a new box with baby rice and I hand-expressed breast milk every day to prepare her food
If we’d wanted Baby Girl to eat fruit and vegetable purees, the hotel we stayed in would have been able to accommodate us
She had started baby swimming several weeks earlier, and we felt comfortable taking her in the pool and had a great time as a family

Tags: Dubai, Florida, Flying with baby, Four months, Play mat, Six months, SkyBaby, Steriliser, Travel with baby