The Commandments for Flying With Kids.

I love to fly.
I love everything about flying.
L-O-V-E
Love it.

And thank the heavens, so do my kids! I like to think I've done my part to raise a tiny little clan of future pilots and flight attendants.

So, how do we do it?
How do we fly across the country and still want to do it again and again? How do we keep the kids happy and the parents sane?
(Or parent in this case as I was without my spouse)
Simple, we know the 5 Commandments for flying with kids. 

Join us on our 1800 mile, 4-airports-trip from
Knoxville, Tennessee to Salt Lake City, Utah and learn ye too the commandments to making what could have been a long stressful day into nothing but wonderful family memories.


Commandment 1:
Prepare thou offspring for what lies in store.
Don't wait until you're untying your
shoes to explain the TSA checkpoint to your kids and don't
wait until they're kicking the seat in front of them to explain why it's inappropriate. Set down the rules and the expectations for your children long before you pack your bags.

Now, our children have all flown before, but I still give them a rundown of what's expected of them while we're in transit.  For this trip, the little's needed to be prepared for just how long a day it was going to be (11+ hours)  and my 15 year old needed to know that she'd be helping with a lot of the duties her Dad would pick up if he'd been able to go. (Helping with bags in security, buddying up with her little sister, etc.)

Waiting in our rocking chairs at McGhee-Tyson Airport in Knoxville.



Commandment 2:
Pack ye carefully and ye shall not want to rip ye's hair out whilst ye sits in an airport for a very long layover(s).

Seriously. Think about the ways your children entertain themselves at home and then try as best you can to bring some* of that along.

For my 15year old that meant:
Her Nintendo DS and her Kindle Fire
with a few new books loaded on.

For my 9year old:
His iPod, some Matchbox cars and his favorite book.

And for my 6year old:
A favorite stuffed animal, a coloring book,
crayons and access to my camera.

And for the love of all that is holy:
DON'T FORGET THE CHARGERS**!
*Some means some. Don't pack their entire bedroom as
you'll most likely be the mule shlepping it around when they tire of carrying it!
**Delta is great about having outlets very accessible in almost all of their terminals.

The kids entertaining themselves at Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport.




Commandment 3:
Research ye your airports ahead
of time and know ye what they offer.

So, we'd left Knoxville and landed safe &sound in Atlanta right on time around 10ish a.m. Thanks to my insistence that they eat a hearty breakfast, no one in our group was even remotely hungry. It didn't matter that the Atlanta airport has food courts and small food vendors just about everywhere you look, you can't eat if you're not hungry, and that was that. We decided we'd grab our lunch when we arrived in Memphis.

HA!
Having forgotten to obey my own commandment, I did not research the Memphis Airport and therefore did not know that Memphis, being a much, much smaller airport, offers considerably less than Atlanta in the way of food stuffs.

And having gone from "Mom, I'm not hungry!" to "Mom, I'm starving to death!", the 3 kids and I wandered the nearly deserted terminals in search of an easy meal. They were a few nice looking sit down restaurants but most were catering BBQ (not a huge hit with my kids) and most were well beyond the price point I was willing to pay in an airport, so we passed. We finally ended up at a sub joint called "Lenny's" where we found a decent meal at a decent price. Not exactly what we'd wanted, but it was good in a pinch.

So how would I do it differently next time?
I'd have bought cold sandwiches in Atlanta and put
them in our carry on to enjoy in Memphis.

Lunch at Lenny's in Memphis International Airport.


Continued ....