Travel with Three Under Three

We recently made a 2.5  hour plane ride away trip to visit family for a wedding for a week. My first major perk of not working anymore was that normally I am the last to arrive and the first one to leave vacations due to work time. This time I got two days of travel plus five days of vacation. That has been so rare in my life the last time was while I was on maternity leave with the twins.

I am proud to announce that I packed all of our stuff for seven days time into only two checked bags. I put all their outfits together ahead of time into separate ziploc bags (thank you pinterest) and stayed up on laundry while gone. For the plane each twin took their own bag that had a blanket, their Kindle with new movies on it, headphones, a bag of special snacks and a clipboard that had paper, stickers and markers attached. They were very well behaved. I also took my purse, my breastpump supplies and also a diaper backpack with Butterball's bottles, a change of clothes just in case for each child, diapers and my own snacks.

For security purposes, I put all liquid items separate so I could easily pull it out without anyone running away.  I also did not bring their carseats to install in the seats. I know that is a sanctimommy no no, but I really can't imagine hauling all three of the seats through, plus Butterball was a lap child anyway.

Everyone told me not to bring our BOB stroller or our other stroller, it's too much hassle. This was my biggest mistake. Have you tried walking with two slow, easily distracted toddlers through an airport? It was no bueno.

I must say, everyone did awesome! The twins have always been such good travelers I have been waiting for it to bite me in the butt one day or I thought for sure the Butterball would be my bad traveler but he did great too.

Another thing to remember is to expect the unexpected. On our way home, we got their about an hour and a half early and checked in at the curb. Another family was travelling overseas and there were 7 of them and all of their bags were overweight and it screwed up everyone else, it took forever to get them sorted out! We hauled to the security line which was also out of control. Once we got through that we made a bee line to gate which seemed like miles away. We got all the way there and our flight was delayed by an hour. We laughed it off and decided this was a great opportunity to feed the kids because they were hungry. My grandpa went to get something to eat and while he was there they made an announcement that our gate changed clear out of the terminal we were in. We were all so tired! I got a wheelchair, put the baby in a wrap and we went on our way. For some reason we crossed path's with my grandpa and didn't see him so I took all the bags while my grandma went to help him with the lunch. I looked ridiculous! The baby was started to sag and people were staring. A very kind little old lady came and helped me all the way to our gate. All of this made me really wish we had shown up two hours ahead of time instead of one. I even made fun of my sister for getting to the airport so early, but now I'm going to have to eat crow because I wish I did too!

We got to the gate and ate. Ocean had a tantrum and then they both decided they needed to pee. We went to the bathroom and got all sorted out. I had pull ups on over their undies just in case so that took some maneuvering. Osh started freaking out so I looked down and there was his monkey swirling around in the airport toilet! Osh is very serious about his stuffed animals so I stuck my hand down in that nasty thing and pulled monkey out. He got a harcore scrubbing with soap in the sink and I wrapped him in paper towels and assured him that we would throw him in the laundry at home and he would be good as new. I felt a moment of panic, but then laughed seeing that stupid monkey swimming in the airport toilet. Gross. And funny. We can't even go to the bathroom without shenanigans.

That's the way we roll! I had initially booked this trip to go by myself and now I am so very thankful that my grandparents came along for an extra set of hands. I think I would have ended up in a bathroom stall crying my eyes out if they hadn't. Or possibly on the news. I will say that I am so happy with how the kids do on the plane though. I am super fortunate for that. There was a woman in front of us with a child who was out of control and loud and this lady next to her was so rude. I felt terrible for her (and thanked my lucky stars that wasn't me).

Airplane pics!