After taking buddhababy on his first adventure to Disney I realize that traveling will never be the same. Just taking our toddler to the store is something I avoid whenever possible, so imagining that vacationing with a toddler would be easy is just silly. This is unless you are one of those parents who has a go-with-the-flow toddler and in that case, I don't believe you. I would believe you more if you told me that you gave birth, unmedicated, to a unicorn. We have a toddler: a real, emotionally turbulent, adorable, outgoing, cranky, unpredictable, loving toddler. Those are a lot of adjectives and all equally true. This makes situations impossible to control. While I cannot control what happens I can do my best to set my child up to succeed. We do this as much as possible by putting him in situations that encourage the best in him. Sometimes it is awesome and sometimes it is a fail, that is parenting.
I have had a lot of people ask me about how the trip went, how we survived and if he enjoyed the "Disney Experience." I am happy to report that our trip was fantastic! This was a mixture of luck, planning and perspective. Buddhadaddy and I have not had a vacation in over two years and so we were simply happy to be out and we had no expectations or feelings about what we had to see or do. This helped immensely because having a toddler means that you are on someone else's time and their mood can change in an instant. We saw a lot of families tending to meltdowns and a lot of parents having meltdowns. I am not saying that we were perfect, but we were able to roll with most of the punches. With all the questions I have been getting, I realized that everyone wants to go on trips but, like us, they are worried how things will go now that there is a tiny human along for the ride. So how does someone have a good time at a theme park with a toddler? I have no idea BUT here is what worked for us:
1. Do not try and convince yourself that your toddler cares about Disney, Hawaii...insert whatever destination you choose. This trip is for you and it is up to you whether you can enjoy it with your child in tow.
Buddhababy had a great time... because WE had a great time. He was excited because we were excited. You know what he really loved? The best part? The BUS. Yes, the bus rides between the parks and resort. He is 18 months old. The parks are crowded and loud and frankly he just doesn't care about that stuff. But getting to ride on a real life bus, which is essentially a huge truck to him, that is awesome! He got excited every time. He was excited watching the buses pass by that were not for us. We were not so excited about those.
2. For my fellow nourishing foodies meal planning is a must. Give yourself a day before travel to prepare all meals.
This may have been the hardest part for me but it was so worth it. We eat a specific type of food and especially buddhababy is not going to be eating subpar quality food in the name of vacation. I spent a few hours the day before our trip preparing all our food and snacks. We eat things like grassfed local beef, pastured chicken, cultured foods, organic fruits and veggies, etc. I am not going to fill us or bubbhababy with junk food for three days (or even one day). This isn't just because I am strict about his diet, which I admittedly am. It is because if I want him to be in a good mood then he has to feel good and junk food is not going to make him feel good. This also saved us quite a bit of money... bonus! In the end, it was worth all the planning and work and I will do it every time.
3. Have a good quality, lightweight and comfortable stroller or be prepared to pay $40 for a rental.
We have the Britax B-Agile stroller and it is a wonderful on-the-go stroller. It is easy to get around and Buddhabby loves it. With that said, we wore him most of the trip but were still glad we had the stroller to carry our diaper bags and for the hour total that he sat in it.
4. If your child likes to be worn, have a very comfortable and supportive carrier.
Buddhbaby spent most of the time in the three parks in our Tula toddler carrier. This kept him comfortable, helped prevent him from getting overstimulated and even scared. Yes it is scary for a child to be bombarded with thousands of people rushing by and not being close to mommy or daddy. This also allowed me to breastfeed on demand without having to stop what we were doing. He breastfed through the entire Monsters Inc. show in tommorowland and nursed/slept through the Candlelight Processional in Epcot and a lot of the day in the Animal Kingdom.
We swear by the Tula or Ergo carrier for a child as large as ours (a wrap for smaller if you prefer). I never recommend the dangling carriers and especially when your child may spend hours in it, it is not good for the hips and pelvis. Make sure you have a carrier that supports the body in the "M" or "W" (depending on what you think it looks like) position.
5. Do not try and do everything in one day.
I know this goes against what most people plan when they go to Disney. We all want to go and squeeze in every ride and every show that we can in this tiny window of time. I would argue against doing this whether you have a baby/toddler in tow or not. I cannot tell you how many family meltdowns we witnessed. Grown adults yelling at each other, in public, because they are too exhausted to hide their inner toddler. We all have a tiny toddler inside and Disney seems to be a prime place for people to let him or her out in full force. If adults act this way when exhausted how do you expect your real tiny human to act?
Finally,
6. Know your child and help them to succeed.
What I mean is, know what triggers your child and do you best to avoid that. This may take a little forethought but it is a good idea no matter where you go. That does not mean it is always going to work or prevent bad situations but it will help.
An example of this is how we never let buddhababy walk when we first get somewhere. On our first hiking "adventure," buddhadaddy and I took buddhababy to a quiet trail without a lot of foot traffic (THANK GOD). It was his first hike and he was really excited so we thought we could just let him walk along with us.... big mistake. There were no guard rails on this trail, just trail and woods and spiders and who knows what. He took off running and wanted to touch everything. I began running around after him inspecting everything to make sure it wasn't poison ivy or poison oak. We tried to get him to hold hands and that resulted in him flinging himself to the ground screaming. We tried to keep him on the trail, more screaming. How about in the stroller? Screaming. In the Tula? flinging and screaming. We ended up turning around, practically running out of there holding him while he screamed all the way out. We passed the only people we saw and I am sure they thought we were horrible parents but there was so much screaming that I couldn't think about it for too long. When we got back to the car we just looked at each other, both worried that we would never be able to do anything fun. ever. again.
What seemed like such a horrible trip turned out to be one of our greatest learning lessons. The following weekend we went hiking but used what we had learned. We started him in the stroller and gave him something he loves to entertain him. When he became tired of that we put him in the Tula on the back so he could see everything we saw. We let him walk just as we were getting ready to leave but only because there was a baby proof rail on the side. It was awesome and our faith in future adventures was restored!
The point is, through trial and error (a lot of error) we have learned the best ways to keep our child content in varying situations. It doesn't always work and sometimes there is nothing you can do but we try our best to create an environment we all thrive in regardless of where we are.
The last thing I want to mention is that upon returning home we immediately reinstated his routine. For three days he went to bed HOURS after bedtime, only napped on the go and had virtually no routine but as soon as we got in the door we began bedtime routine as it always is. Seeing how he napped until almost 5pm I knew he was not going to go to sleep on time but I behaved as though he should. This meant almost 3 hours of nursing and rocking in the dark, which is so tedious, BUT the following day all was restored. I learned that day just how much our child depends on his routine. When I said, "nap time boobies?" he literally ran and climbed into the glider eager to know what was expected of him and what was coming next.
I am sure that everyone has there own method that helps them and I would love to hear what other people do while traveling with their little ones. This was simply what worked for us... this time. :)
