This month, we took the girls on our first flying trip as a family of five (say that ten times fast). Travel is important to us. When it comes down to choosing how to spend our time and money, I will always choose to have experiences over things. I want to impart that on my kids. When we had baby #1, we certainly didn’t have much in the way of things, but we were on the go all the time. By the age of two, that girl had logged more frequent flyer and road miles than probably many adults. I was smug about how easy it was to get out and around, how silly it was to use kids as an excuse to stay home. Let me be honest, I was terribly smug about a lot of things when it came to parenting. I had it all figured out. Noooo problem.
Then we had baby #2. Insert the sound of screeching brakes. Suddenly everything was exponentially harder. I’ve had a couple of friends comment that since I chose to have a third, the transition from one to two must have been easy. Not true. I’m just crazy.
But I digress from the topic of travel. Air travel, as a family, slowed down to almost never. Road trips have been limited to two states or less. There have been other extenuating reasons why we’ve left home less, but the number one has been laziness, or maybe fear. It is WORK to take young children through airport security, with carseats, and diapers, and enough snacks and diversions to get you through the longest possible flight delay. It’s exasperating to try to find a clean bathroom to take your toddler into when you’re in the middle of nowhere on the interstate, not to mention taking 50% longer to get to the destination than it does without kids.
Now here we are with three wonderful, precocious, high-energy, high-maintenance little girls. Thankfully, going from two to three has been much smoother. And we have decided that enough is enough. We are going to get back to getting out. Not just to Atlanta, which we love, but to explore what else is out there.
Thank goodness, I can report that the trip was successful. We managed to fit in a lot of activity and time with family, and had zero MAJOR meltdowns. Small meltdowns are to be expected, dealt with, and forgotten. We are a family with four females. Realistic expectations are key. I couldn’t be happier and am feeling empowered about the BIG trip that we are setting our sights on in the near future (more on that later).