How to Fly With a Toddler

Apr 18, 2019

5 min read

The Dashing family has just come back from a trip to Palm Desert to see all the parties at Coachella – I mean visit the in-laws. While Clara was disappointed she couldn’t show off her latest fashion trends and shake her booty at Coachella, she still managed to have a good time playing with her grandparents.

If you’ve ever flown with a toddler then you know how anxiety inducing it can be. We were fortunate that Clara was absolutely as good as she could be for our flights. We chalk this up to preparedness on our part and just plain ‘ole fashioned luck. Before we left, however, we did receive quite a few tips and tricks and some of them paid off handsomely for us, so I wanted to share with you guys how to fly with a toddler and all of the advice that made our adventure run as smooth as it can be.

Patience

This is both a no-brainer as well as the hardest one on the list. But there is a reason I’m putting it first and not just as a gentle reminder at the bottom.

I’m a generally anxious person and the thought of travelling by myself makes me want to panic let alone doing it as a small family. But making a concerted effort to not only BE patient but to show Clara how calm and relaxed I was (even if I wasn’t) I think genuinely made a huge difference in her demeanour. She was super pumped to get on the plane, got excited when we took off and couldn’t have been happier to sit for three hours, which if you read our tale of our road trip last year, you’ll know is amazing.

This is definitely easier said than done, but definitely worth the payoff and can be made easier by …

Plan ahead

I deserve zero of the credit for this as Dashing Mom did all the pre-trip planning. The extent of my planning was asking the internet what I should do with Clara on a plane and then passing that info on to Dashing Mom.

If you’re reading this article, then it’s likely you’re already planning ahead and that will make the whole trip easier. Depending on the time of your flight, you may need sleep supplies, toys, snacks or all three. Planning that all out, as well as how you’ll access it during the flight, makes the whole ordeal just that much easier.

Tire them out before the flight

This was suggested to me before hand, and I did a facepalm that I hadn’t thought of it myself. Airports are a great place to tire your kids out because they can run endlessly and/or play on playgrounds in the airport. Palm Springs has one of the best airports for kids ever, with an outdoor playground you can play on right up until you board.

Calgary’s weather makes such a playground impossible, but it does have one inside. If your child is anything like ours though, they will love the moving sidewalks more and will go up those, then run to the start to do it all over again, and again, and again.

Burning off as much of their energy as you can, gives you a fighting chance of them making it through the flight by napping, or at least not wanting to climb/run all over the place.

Bring your carseat

Now this idea may not work for all parents. You’ll definitely have to gauge how your own children do in their carseat before attempting it, but for us it worked great. We didn’t even know you COULD bring your carseat on the plane until about a week before our flight. We were bringing one anyway, so having it with us and getting Clara to use it seemed like a no brainer.

Because it takes some work to be installed, we recommend taking advantage of the pre-boarding option. I’ve seen it recommended that families wait till the last second to board to maximize burning off their kids energy, but for me that would just be a nervous breakdown waiting to happen as we franticly try to install the carseat, hold Clara and sit down while the whole plane waits for us.

Using the carseat worked wonders though. Clara felt familiar with it and happily sat for almost three hours without an issue. I also can not overstate how great it was to have her STRAPPED in and unable to move for hours.

Bring lots of snacks

No matter what time you’re flying, or how long your flight is you definitely need snacks. We also heeded advice from our friends at Off-Road Discovery who said no matter how many snacks you think you need, add more.

We didn’t discriminate here either. Clara loves red peppers so we put lots of those in, but we also let her eat airplane cookies and just about anything else she wanted to get her through it. Our sanity was worth more to us than a battle about eating cookies.

Palm Springs has the best airport ever, including this outdoor playground for kids. Perfect way to tire them out before a long flight home.

Bring an ipad/games/toys

Like bringing snacks, this one seems obvious. Colouring books, toys, books and a tablet are all great resources for entertaining your toddler on a flight. Our biggest piece of advice here is to make sure that they are all easily accessible. In fact, if you can, dedicate an entire bag just to your toddlers stuff and put it under the seat in front of them. If they’re strapped into their carseat they won’t be able to reach it and you can easily pull out whatever you need to.

Ultimately, how well the flight goes will depend upon a million little things that are outside of your control. If the flight is delayed, there’s a layover, it falls over nap, or your kid just happens to wake up on the wrong side of the bed, it could all go sideways. But with a little planning and a concentrated effort on exuding patience you’ll make it through it just fine.