Long trip awaits us

So we are planning a trip outside of the U.S. with our twins. I am so worried, and scared how it will all turn out. The trip will be about 11 hours-to Poland. Have any of you traveled on a plane with your twins for that long? How did it go? What should I expect? My girls will be 2.5 at the time. I'm worried about the entire trip overall. Also worried that their sleeping will change because of the time difference there. They are 7 hours ahead of us. They just sleep so gooood for me now that I wouldn't want that to stop. Any advice? Preferably from those who traveled with a 2 year old. I'm sure it's different going places with a 4 year old,

 

I will be back. Italy with two 9 month olds and then Italy again with 2 3.5 year olds and a 22 month old.

 

I've never done a long plane ride, but I have done long car trips with my twins. One trip was 9 hours one way, another was 18 hours when we moved. The only advice I can think of that would transfer over would be to just bring snacks and plenty of things to do. Handheld games were a huge lifesaver. One thing I've learned for myself is that they always do 10x better than I think they will.

 

Well we've done a 6 hour car trip with them before...but we took them in the middle of the night so they slept most of it. Also in a car you can always make stops whenever needed...not very possible in a plane :/

 

When my boys were that age I took them alone to California, we live in NH. The flight was 7.5hrs with one plane change. We didn't get to Our destination until 2am!! They were pretty much awake the whole time!!
I was really worried too, we had just switched them to big boy beds and they were great sleepers.

I have to say, they did amazing! I had a DVD player with a headset they wouldn't use. I wrapped a bunch of little toys in gift wrap, had treats and coloring books etc... We played games and ispy.
I think it helped that I was mentally prepared to go with whatever happened. I knew there was NOTHInG I could do if they decided to melt down.
The only small issue I had was Ryan would unbuckle his seatbelt, so for 20 min, I didn't react, I just rebuckled. Eventually he got bored.
All in all it went so well, I was really proud of all of us!
I hope your trip goes as well. We would love to take our family to Poland, that's where my husband's family is from.
Good luck, and know if things to south, you'll never have to see those people again!

 

:rofl: I am gonna keep this in mind when the time comes for us!

 

Thank you. I don't imagine doing it alone and I'm going with my husband yet I'm still worried :/ good job to you! And thanks for the reply. And you are right...I think I need to prepare for it mentally and gotta get through it somehow. Hopefully I'm just over thinking the situation like I always do and it will turn out much better than I think but aside from the plane trip, we will be there three weeks so that's what worries me as well. When it's day time here it's night time there (almost) so that's where I'm worried about their sleep ritual being mixed up.

 

My twins do nothing but travelling. We're European, kids were born in the States (9 hour flight, 6 or 7 hours time difference), now we're in China (12-13 hour flight, 6-7 hour time difference). Plus all the travel in between. They've flown the equivalent of about 4.5 times around the world (I am tracking their miles; sister has more than 7 times around the world under her belt). Sad, I know

We moved to China when the twins were 20 months old. Since then we've had no issues with them flying (hardest was between 6-18 months). They hardly suffer from jet lag, I stick to the same schedule, push them through the day and take them outside to re-adjust. I just wake them at their normal times, never let them sleep considerably longer as it will screw up everything. We've been lucky, they're very good. The flight itself is pretty smooth. They eat, sleep and watch lots of TV (the benefit of flying Asian carriers with proper in-flight entertainment programs, child meals and goody bags). I don't force anything as that has proven to lead to absolutely nothing, so if my twin girl decides to watch a movie and eat her child meal at midnight after getting on a flight, she'll do that. She'll fall asleep at some point. They all bring a bag with some toys (that hardly ever get used?!), I don't even bring lots of snacks anymore, they usually have plenty stuff , plus during the night they don't eat much anyway. They're usually down for about half the flight and up for about half the flight. Always bring a clean set of clothes for all of them, medication, socks / slippers to wear in the plane (cheap ones I can leave behind, but we usually get them as well), easy shoes, easy pants, etc. I take a handbag and a trolley, they each have a bag and that's it (I travel one way by myself, so they need to be able to carry everything). We usually have stop overs as there are not direct, last year in Istanbul, this year we're going via Dubai (visiting friends as well).

The more you make a deal out of it, the harder it will be. Take it easy, don't force anything, prepare yourself and just go. Two years ago I had my oldest vomit in a garbage bin at the airport (didn't make it to the bathroom) at 11 pm just before our midnight flight ... me with 3 kids, and a bunch of plastic bags but she fell asleep and woke up like nothing happened and watched TV till we got there.

 

We drove from Ohio to Florida when the twins were 2. I was surprised by how few stops we had to make. It was really smooth. Lots of DVDs, some naps in the car, and we were golden! We drove to Maine this past summer (about 19 hours) when they were 4, and we are heading out today to Florida again. If your kids are generally good on longer car trips, I wouldn't worry at all.

 

Thank you so much for ur responses mom2s&twins: what do you mean by you stick to the same schedule? US or china schedule?

 

The same schedule that you normally have at home. So in terms of bed time, naps, wake up time, lunches, etc.

 

Ok great thanks so much. Planning to do that. Hopefully it works out for us. Thank you

 

I just flew 13.5 hours with my girls on the 18th. We've had a bit of practice and this time I packed lighter on the plane than ever before. We only brought iPads, headphones and lots of non messy snacks. I also encourage them to stay awake as long as possible the first day in the new location to try to get the jet lag over over with