Just don't do it.
Ok, here's the story:
We were making a trip from Cleveland to New York City, staying a couple days there, driving to New Hamshire, staying there for a few days, drive back to NYC, stay a few more days, then fly home to Cleveland out of La Guardia. Just packing everything for a six month old for a 10 day trip was stressful. We planned on buying diapers, food and formula once we got there, so that part was easy, but we needed to pack bottles, spoons, binkeys, blankets, car seat, and everything else.
Flying out of Cleveland didn't seem too bad, we went right through security, no trouble at all. It was only a two hour flight so we didn't think we needed to pack very much on the carry-on. I had a bottle, a sippy cup of juice, a small container of banana puffies and a biter biscut. Our flight was scheduled to take off at 5, so I figured no problem, we have plenty of time to get to where we need to go by her 8pm bedtime. Right? Right?
Wrong. Our flight was delayed by over 2 hours. I was all exctited because I checked flight times before we left the house and our flight was on time. We walked right through security, sort of. At least the TSA officers were really nice about everything, lol. The baby was an angel, but mommy forgot that her belt was studded (oops), and then while we were gathering the carry-on baggage and car seat the baby decided to puke all the way down my back and all over the little table that all the x-ray stuff dumps onto (oops again). I have to say that the TSA folks were amazing, they helped stop the other bags and pull my bags off the belt so that I could clean up the spit up and they did it all while laughing. I felt terrible, but they thought it was amusing.
So here we are at Cleveland, we breezed on through the check-point and I figured we would settle down for a nice little hour wait, climb on board and then tada! we would be in NYC! After an hour they delayed our flight by half an hour, ok, I can deal with that. After half an hour (bottle was gone, so were half the puffies) they announced that the plane we were supposed to be taking was still on the ground in New York! We had at least 2 more hours to wait! They don't sell baby food or anything at the airport so I was getting a little worried. We ended up getting regular yogurt and apple juice when all her snacks were gone so that she would stay satisfied. I felt bad because I know she's not supposed to have cows milk yet, but I didn't really have a choice. So now we are getting on the plane at her bedtime instead of landing just before her bedtime. Great. The plane is a tiny commuter jet, no room at all and everyone is packed in like sardines.
My first though was "this is going to be bad", I have a tired and cranky baby (she was horribly bored) and I am in a tiny plane with tons of other people. She was good for the take off and then by about 45 minutes into the flight she was tired of banging on the tray table and wanted something else to do. She started getting upset and was jumping on my lap. Then she started laughing and smiling. I couldn't figure out what she was doing until I looked behind us and saw two huge steelworkers (sitting in the exit row, natch.). She was playing peek-a-boo over the seat and they were laughing and making faces at her! I couldn't believe how great they were, not only being tolerant of my naturally loud child, but playing along with her to keep her from crying! We landed at last and then sat on the tarmac for half an hour. By now it's almost 9 and Jordynn (my wee one) is starting to get inconsolable. It's way past her bedtime and she can't even play anymore. She isn't one of those babies that can sleep while being held, she has to have her routine and then lay in bed and sleep, she won't sleep any other way and will cry until it happens. By the time we get our checked baggage she is screaming. We found our ride (he was waiting, thank god) and got to the apartment. She was then too wound up to sleep and ended up watching Backyardigans for an hour before she fell alseep.
The days in New York were good, but we were excited to get to North Conway where my family had rented a cabin. It was about a 6 1/2 hour drive, I figured we would make it in 7, and we did. She was wonderful in the car and slept most of the way. I couldn't have asked for more.
The drive back to New York wasn't so pleasant. She spent much of the drive screaming and didn't sleep at all. I spent most of the drive in the back seat with her trying to keep her a little satisfied (thank goodness there were two of us driving, we wouldn't have made it otherwise). It took us a little over 9 hours to get there.
After a few more days of vacation, including a day of just sleeping. Sometimes you just need days of sleeping on a vacation :-)
Then came time to fly out of La Guardia. We were flying out earlier in the day (4pm) so I needed to be prepared for dinner. Now, I happen to know that the TSA is not permitted to limit food or drink that is needed for a toddler on carry-ons. Keeping this in mind I brought her typical dinner (a 4 oz jar of baby food, 6 oz bottle) and some snack foods (veggie puffies, 2-4 oz jars of juice, several teething 'cookies' and another 6 oz bottle). So, just our luck, we get a TSA x-ray machine person on a power trip. She tags all of our bags for hand searches because they "seem suspicious". She right away calls her supervisor over because we have "a possible weapon". Say what? Did we pick up a gun or something that I wasn't aware of? Nope, she is refering to my belt, the one that I stowed into my carry-on so avoid the whole taking it off at the check-point thing. Then she's freaking out because we have empty bottles in the carry-on. That's right, empty, but they are "over the limit". Huh? I have never heard of such a thing. Then she said that the juice and baby food we were carrying were "excessive" and that we didn't need nearly as much as we were bringing. I tried to explain that we were delayed last time without any food and we were just trying to avoid that this time. She was very rude and insisted that she call her supervisor or whoever and by now I am wanting to see this person. He comes over, rolling his eyes. He "searches" the bags (totally missing the 6 oz bottle of lotion I found later when I unpacked, oops again) and moves us through. This time it took almost 45 minutes just to get through security. At least our flight was on time.
Once we get on the plane and start taking off and Jordynn decides that she is hungry NOW! We can't get to the carry-on baggage and that's where the bottle is. I try to nurse her (I can get about 1/2 ounce of milk each session, so we don't really get to do it very often) and she isn't interested, she knows that she won't get much and she's really hungry. So I manage to reach into the overhead bin while sitting in my seat and and mix her bottle. After eating she was feeling better, but she was bored. The only thing that could entertain her was banging on the tray table, which she did for about half an hour before the people in the seats around us started to get irritated. I stowed the tray table and tried to entertain her with a toy, but she wouldn't have it, she wanted the table. Then when she got it back she didn't want it anymore. She started to cry, and then didn't stop crying until we landed (about an hour later). She fell asleep right before we landed and slept until Grandpa picked us up from the airport.
I guess that overall it wasn't all that bad, but it was rough for a while. I just feel bad for the other people in the plane and the ones behind us at security.
This picture is of her favorite new toy while in the car:
