Some thoughts on overnight flights with toddlers...

Well, as you can tell by the previous post, we at least made it as far the plane from Heathrow to Glasgow. Actually, the rest of that trip was pretty uneventful, too. We arrived, our luggage, which was not lost, also arrived, we hopped a bus that took us within 2 blocks of our hotel and we checked on in. We resisted the urge to nap and instead found a little playground (and skate/bmx park) a few blocks from out hotel. Zara played for a bit, we went for an early dinner (almost 6, so not that early) at Taste of Punjab, which had some of the best saag paneer and aloo muttar that we've ever had.... and pints of draft beer and cider to boot! Zara had chips and cheese (which, when dipped in the curry, was oh so much better than poutine!) She actually ended up mostly eating paratha, but hey, she ate, it's all good. We came back to the room and Wes and I alternately fell asleep while trying to put Zara to bed - me while telling a story, Wes while watching iPhone movies with her... but finally (probably not after very long, though it felt like it) she did. We followed suit shortly thereafter when we couldn't keep our eyes open in the darkened room, having gotten less than 8 hours of sleep between the two of us since we left C'ville, and not having slept well for about 2 days before the trip!

And now, for my advice... :)

1. If you are into that sort of thing (and we are), try out an anti-histamine or some such at home before you travel, make sure your kid doesn't get more hyper, and use about an hour before you want them sleeping. Worked wonders (though she was very tired, so tired she seemed like she couldn't sleep!) and i wish we had done it for the first flight because....

2. You have until the first round of service on a flight to get a kid to sleep, after that there's drinks, then food, then tea and coffee.... and you won't (unless you have an amazing sleeper) get another chance until 2+ hours into the flight. So sleep early or just forget it for awhile.

3. Bring snacks. Food replaces sleep.

4. That's really about it. She was bit challenging in all of the security/immigration/biometric ID-ing/etc, but that's understandable. Her inability to follow directions got us both patted down and wanded, but at least they were nice about it. The immigration agent loved her. We were constantly fearing she might say something 'cute' that would cause the men with machine guns (tm) to come chat with us, but luckily no such clever toddler remarks.

Oh, one more thing. Many changes of clothes (for kid) and at least one for parents. We had a lot of spills. Airplane seats are small and there's a lot of elbows... luckily it was me who spilled and it was only water... but still. Love those extra clothes.