{"id":5757,"date":"2016-08-03T19:43:34","date_gmt":"2016-08-04T02:43:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.westsidemommy.com\/site\/?p=5757"},"modified":"2016-10-07T16:21:19","modified_gmt":"2016-10-07T23:21:19","slug":"flying-with-a-toddler","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.westsidemommy.com\/site\/flying-with-a-toddler\/","title":{"rendered":"How My Toddler Stayed Entertained on our Cross-Country Flight"},"content":{"rendered":"

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This summer, I flew across the country (a direct flight from Los Angeles to Washington, D.C.) with my three-year-old for the first time without my husband. We’ve flown several times as a family in the past, but my husband couldn’t make this trip because he couldn’t take time off work.<\/p>\n

I was really anxious about the flight, especially since my daughter was going through a very clingy and whiny phase. I’m happy to say we survived – and she did a lot better than anticipated. My anxiety was worse on the flight there than it was coming back. Thankfully, my daughter was fine for both flights.<\/p>\n

In preparation for the flight, I did a few things which helped. Here are some tips and products that helped us on our flight.<\/p>\n

A Variety of Single-Serve Snacks<\/h2>\n

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We attended a few events (such as SoCal Moms Great Big Family Play Day<\/a> and the Parasol launch party<\/a>), weeks prior to our trip, that had snacks in the swag bag, so I saved those to take on the flight. Everything was individually wrapped. Some brands were new to us (Cabo Chips<\/a>), and others were favorites (Skinny Pop<\/a>). I’m glad I had the variety of snacks, because they tasted a lot better than the bag of pretzels the airline provided.<\/p>\n

Travel-sized coloring and activity sets<\/h2>\n

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A friend of ours gave my daughter this cute travel-sized pack of coloring pages and mini washable markers<\/a> <\/strong>for her birthday. It was perfect for the flight because it was in a compact box that fit easily in her backpack.
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