Have you ever flown with small children during the holidays? Can you detect my sarcasm in that title? Are you ready for this?
1. Stay up until midnight making sure everything is packed.
2. Go to bed wearing your clothes for the next day because let’s face it, you won’t want to bother getting dressed when you wake in 3 hours.
3. Wake up at 3:00am and load all your luggage into your friend’s car and buckle the car seats in. Take a mental note to try to bribe your friend to drive your van next time to skip this step.
4. Haul sleeping children into the car and pray they sleep through the transfer.
5. Drive to the airport an hour away because well, TF Green doesn’t fly everywhere yet.
6. Have friend drop you off curbside while you scramble to unbuckle car seats and shove them into their gate check bags while you juggle the half asleep children.
7. Pray the curbside check-in and bag drop is open so you don’t have to drag all your stuff inside.
8. Have the curbside clerk take your bags but tell you that you have to go inside anyhow to get your infant boarding pass.
9. Head inside the brightly lit airport and get in the line for the inside clerk with your fully awake and disgruntled monsters children.
10. Proceed to wait at least 45 minutes in a TSA line because it’s the holidays and seems like everyone in the world is flying TODAY. Silently groan as you watch people ahead of you try to smuggle liquids in thus causing major line delays.
11. Finally get to the front of security. Unload everything off the stroller, pray that the kids don’t run off into the crowd as you toss all. the. things. onto the belt.
12. Have hands swabbed for explosives due to babywearing. Awesome. Oh wait. The formula powder that spilled in the diaper bag counts as explosives. Have complete pat down and all bags emptied many times, ruining your perfect organization.
13. Run like crazy to the gate because who knew security would take almost two hours. Do roll call to make sure you didn’t lose anyone.
14. Roll the stroller down the ramp and unload it so you can gate check it.
15. Pretend you have a handle on your life while you wear the baby, juggle a car seat and diaper bag while husband has arms full of who knows what.
16. The toddler has a complete meltdown in front of you, no longer interested in following daddy to row 28. Plead with the flight attendant to just scoop your kid up and haul them to your row.
17. Try to shove all. the. things. under the seat and into the overhead bin. Finagle the carseat into the row and buckle it.
18. Try to take your toddler who suddenly hates you back from the flight attendant. Proceed to buckle flailing toddler into seat.
19. Collapse into seat from sheer exhaustion and buckle yourself in all the while wondering why you bother.
20. Praise God you booked a direct flight and watch the excitement on your children’s faces as they run into their grandparents’ arms, squealing with delight.
Ah, yes, it was worth the hassle of flying during the holidays. But maybe next year, bribe the grandparents to come to you.
