Traveling Baby

We took our first official long vacation with both of our children last month.

While we are seasoned professionals packing and traveling with our 10 year old, remembering how to pack a baby was something we had to reach into the far corners of our minds to grab a hold of.  There are so many things to remember like diapers, wipes, baby formula, bottles, bottle brush, diaper bag, teething rings, snacks, etc.

Hopefully some of the lessons I learned will help others as they head out on vacation.

There is a huge difference between packing for a baby boy and a baby girl.

Baby girls have accessories and lots of them!  So to keep them all together, I packed her clothes and hair bows/headbands together in Ziploc bags by outfit.  This served two purposes:

1. allowed us to easily keep the coordinated outfits together while the contents in the bag shifted around

2. as she wore the outfits, we had extra Ziploc bags on hand to place her used/clean baby spoons in for travel to and from restaurants or the beach.

We know we head to the beach every summer with family, so this year, we opted to go for a beach tent that has a “floor” in it to keep little ones off of the sand.  This tent also has the option to open vents to allow the ocean breeze to come through without letting the sunlight in.  I would definitely recommend this.  I did take a while to set up, but once we did it did let me relax more knowing she was not getting a handful of sand in her mouth, and it allowed her to nap on the beach in a comfortable area.

Do not over pack!  We make this mistake everywhere we go.  For some reason, we think every vacation destination we pick is frozen tundra and we will not have access to a supermarket or neighborhood grocery store for miles.  While you should definitely pack enough for emergency situations, do not over pack so much that you little room for things you should be taking instead.  We realized we had to leave items behind that we wanted to take because we were basically packing for a zombie apocalypse and this was unnecessary.

What have been your best tips learned from the vacation trenches?

Happy vacationing!

Janet Fragle works in customer engagement for innovative technology solutions at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Plano and is Mom to a 10-year-old boy and 8-month-old girl.