Welcome to the Sees the Ya Podcast. Busy and happy, but tired and worn, just some of the feelings when baby is born. There's magic, elation, there's chaos and tears, but everyone goes through the same hopes and fears. So this is a segment we hope helps you feel supported and valid. The mum Juggles reel the good, bad, the ugly, the best and worst day. It's part of the journey
to seize the Babe. I'm Sarah Davidson, a lawyer turned entrepreneur who hung up the suits and heels to co found Macha Maiden, a Macha Milk Bar, become a TV and radio presenter, and of course host The Sees the Ya Podcast. This year, I added motherhood to that list, which is the best job I've ever had with our beautiful baby Teddy, and this segment was designed to house
all the conversations we've been having about parenthood. We'll still do our regular episodes, and just like real life, it's a constant balance between our parent identity and everything else. I hope you guys enjoy this segment as much as I have enjoyed creating it. Hello, Lovely neighborhood, Welcome to our second episode of Seiza Babe. Thank you all so so much for the lovely feedback on our debut episode
last week with Jen covering the Juggle. I'm just so glad it ended up being as reassuring for some of you as it was for me, And I think it was such a good one to start with because it was like a real time dear diary moment. I had been really struggling with the juggle and finding the right balance between work and parenthood and life, and Jen had been such a role model and great support at that time, drawing on the things that had come up in her book on the juggle, so it all just seemed to
work out really well. I'm already enjoying this segment so much, being able to answer all the mum questions that you guys have in so much more detail than I can on socials. And it probably also is easier to listen to and be more real or vulnerable when you actually get to hear someone say it rather than read what they've typed, so hopefully it's more enjoyable for that reason. And we're going back to back just for this week.
Firstly because I've oji answers on this topic traveling with a baby as our second topic pretty much since Italy, which is now months ago. I keep saying, I promise I'll do it, and I haven't until now. But that's why this segment is so great, because now it has somewhere to live. And secondly because we are freshly back from more travel with Teddy to Sydney a couple of days ago for south By Southwest, and then are going overseas.
Again tomorrow with him.
Well it will be tomorrow by the time this is published, so it just seems really timely because I think, you know, there'll probably be questions again about packing and flying with him, and yeah, this will just be a really easy way to direct you, guys to all the brain dump and the most detail I can possibly give on how we prepare for those of you who aren't as interested in the parenthood content, which is absolutely fine. We will be back next week with a regular interview episode and then
those will keep dropping fortnightly. For today, though, I thought the easiest way to s set this one out was to give you the top twenty tips I've found useful traveling with Teddy so far, because you guys know, I love a tangent, and if I don't kind of have a list, this could we could be here forever. Sometimes I think it's going to be shorter when I do a monologue, but it often ends up being longer because
there's no one to rain me in. I must add a disclaimer quickly for this segment overall that my inner A type is so tempted to try and make this segment a neutral and totally comprehensive layout of the entire landscape on each topic, so that every single option that you have is covered in depth. But the Juggle episode will tell you I simply don't have the time or energy to do the research that that requires, even though I want to become like a one stop shop for every single.
Aspect of each topic.
These episodes instead are simply me answering your particular questions that have come up over and over again from my personal anecdotal experiences, based on, yes, a lot of research, but also based on and my personal choices and values. The fact that I often was recommended something by a friend and didn't bother trying anything else. So often I can't actually speak to other options, like if something works the first time, I just didn't really look at anywhere else.
It also is based on Teddy's age at the time that we traveled. For example, this is more about babies and not toddlers, so of course there'll be things that a bit different. But I'm sure, of course you guys know that I just felt the need to remind everyone. That means I'm sure I'll miss many other great options
or tips on these subjects. I'm sure I'll also forget things that were relevant, but just keep in mind that you know, of all the things I've learned so far in parenthood, it is that every baby, and every parent and then every family is completely different, and even my own answers will probably differ in future chapters of our life.
So for context, our biggest trip was with Teddy at four months old, and Italy was before he had started solids and before he was crawl, so of course that will be relevant too, and I'm sure that once it is I will probably have different or more comprehensive advice. So tip number one, it is so normal and completely valid to be nervous about traveling with a baby, whether it's the first time or the second time, or whatever
time you're up to. It is truly really different to any other travel that you've done before, and you guys know we've traveled extensively, so it was, you know, a really quite abrupt change from what we were used to.
But my top tip, really before we get into any of the details, is that, like parenting overall, how good a time you have on your trip is so impacted by your expectations and the mindset or perspective that you start with, which kind of sounds really wishy washy, but it really is the best tip that I possibly have on this topic. And I think people so often say, why would you even travel with a baby? It's like just parenting but doing it somewhere else, which is absolutely true.
You are still doing you know, the herds at home are the same hards that you end up doing overseas or interstate.
That doesn't kind of.
Necessarily align with what you think a holiday should look like. So it's not necessarily like a lie down, have sleep ins holiday, because yeah, you're doing parenting, except without the comforts that you usually have. But at the same time, I flipped that and was like, if you're parenting at home, you might as well do the parenting somewhere else, So exactly. Traveling with a baby is parenting, but just somewhere else. And that's why it's beautiful, Because it is somewhere else.
Why not do it in a beautiful place and have a wonderful experience. Just because your life has changed and you can't do the trouble you used to do, doesn't mean you shouldn't still try and see amazing places. And if you're going for an occasion, it doesn't mean you shouldn't still try and make that work. You shouldn't have to miss out on everything just because you can't do
it the same way that you wanted to before. And at least for us, travel has enriched who I am as a person so much in my life, and you can see that directly in your child too. Teddy grew so much from seeing different faces, experiencing different smells and sounds, and even like airports exposed him to environments that he'd never been in before. He changed so much while we were away, and like, one of the weirdest things is also that he was born in almost winter was a
cold weather. He'd never been in hot weather. Like even that, it just kind of challenges them and extends them in a way that really helps you a little one developed, So I think, don't let the sort of fear of it being hard be a deterrent. And yeah, that quote that it's just trap parenting overseas, that's true, but that's kind of also the best part of it.
If you want to do it, it's so worth it.
And I have Victoria Divine from She's on the Money to thank for really pushing me to see that that, yes, it's hard, but why wouldn't you do it? It's so much less hard than you think, but also the better it's are so much greater than you think. So that brings me to number two, which is similar. And that
is another thing that someone said to me. I think it was when maybe when we were during actually on the trip, and I had said that, you know, Teddy was quite jet lagged when we first got there, and you know, there were really hard parts, of course, but the quote that they used was, of course, it is really hard. Realistically, it is hard to travel with a baby. It's not like the easiest, most relaxing thing ever. So that's having realistic expectations. But funnily enough, you only remember
the good bits. So even though when you're in it there's lots of hard parts, like logistically hard, there might be some meltdowns. It's funny that, like you, I've already forgotten those. I've already forgotten those, and in the forefront of my mind are the happy memories. And that's not just traveling with children. I feel like that's the same with any hard experience. It's so hard at the time, but even pain, it's like when you're not feeling pain,
you forget what it feels like. You know logically that you had that experience, but like you can't remember it. So when people run marathons, of course it's hard and it hurts, but all they remember afterwards is the endorphins from the experience or what they learned or how accomplished they felt. And so keeping that in mind also really helped me as well. It's hard, but you'll only remember
the good bits. You'll have the happy memories forever and you won't remember the hard or you might remember it, but it won't be like the overwhelming thing that you take away. And like, for example, the flight, if it goes really well, it's a bonus, but in the worst case scenario, if it's awful, it's still like maximum it's still only twenty four hours of your life. Like that's the furthest a way you could be flying. And even if it's awful, like once it's over, it's over, and
then it's done. It's like such in the scheme of life, it's such a small blip on the radar. So those two things was like really about how you go into the experience. It controls what kind of a good time you have or if you don't have a good time. If you go into it thinking it's going to be hard, it's going to be awful. We're not going to be able to lie down and have you know, by the pool and endless reading books and sleep in, then sure it will probably be disappointing. But if you go into
it knowing that, then it sets you up really well. Okay, Number three is I'm just a brief touch on the admin and is this information is kind of broadly available, so I won't really need to go through it that much. But one of the things I forgot until quite late is that babies need a passport and that can take some time. Luckily, there is an expedited option if you leave it as late as I did. I think it took us.
Maybe three days.
But you also have to go and get them a passport photo, which is a lot when they're little and they can't sit up by themselves, and it's you know, their first passport, so there's a bit more paperwork and you have to get everything right. So just don't forget that if you are going away, you do need to get them a passport, and depending on where you're going,
also look up the immunizations that they need. So that's just one thing that it sounds obvious, but when you're in the depths of early parenthood, nothing's obvious, and most things don't retain you know, aren't retained in your head that easily, so fe fully in the list of the top twenty things. This helps you to remember that number four.
Packing.
This is an area where I got so many questions, and I actually published a packing list that I won't just read out, but I've posted and I'll share the link in the show notes.
To that, like actually what we took.
But the tip here is that I think you have the best experience that you can when you have the least variables from your normal routine, because little ones thrive on routine and they're going through so many changes in time zone depending on where you are, obviously, but even if you're going domestically within the same time zone, getting on a plane is a lot. They're going to a new obviously, your accommodation is going to be different to your normal house. They'll be sleeping in a different bed.
So pack for the least variables, so that for us that meant bring your own sheets, bring things like that that smell like home that they're used to sleeping on. Don't forget your sleepsack. We were in a kind of unique situation where Teddy had been in the snow before we left, and you can hire us new in a lot of places, but in Sorrento and Italy you couldn't,
so that wasn't an option. Instead, we had to kind of mimic his bed as much as we could, and for us that was using the rocket z, which is a device that vibrates the base of the bed, and also having your white noise machine, which we use at home. So yet, keeping the things that change to a minimum if you can, that really I think helps their transition. Everything else is changing, so the things that don't have
to change, try not to make them change. And in that regard again, because you counteract, i mean preempt the fact that you are a new parent and you are exhausted and the mental load of packing for you. I mean most people find packing stressful anyway, thinking about things hypothetically, but doing that for you and a tiny person is hard. So write a list well in advance that you can tweak so that you'll like new things you remember you
add to it. But at least then when you're packing, I print it out and tick things off so that I've kind of spread the load of thinking about what I need to take and then making sure I've actually packed it. It's like delegated already onto a piece of paper because it's a lot. So write a packing list
well in advance. You can use mine as a base, but obviously when it's quite specific to the age we're at and whatever, and then you know, you can sort of also highlight the things that you don't have yet, so the admin of going to the chemist and you know, needing to borrow things, all that kind of stuff. Again, thank you so much to Victoria Devine, who I borrowed so much off because she had just done this exact troup, which was so fortunate for me. That made the packing
list a lot easier. But then at least you also know what you've already got and what you don't. That was a really good tip for me. And another thing for how little they are the kids, stuff takes up so much space, so it depends on you know whether you want to pay access package or not. But we ended up just having one whole suitcase basically was for Teddy and I'll go into this more when I talk about what stuff we actually packed for him. But then Nick and I shared a suitcase, so you have to
really get economical with your own packing. And like we had a wedding to go to it with multiple events and Nick has suits, so that.
Was really hard.
But you do kind of get really discerning with your own packing so that you can make sure that you have everything for your little one number five practice in the lead up. This is not like this again, this is like up to you. You obviously don't have to depending on what your load is before you go away.
But we knowing that Teddy would be out of a snow for the very first time, we practiced in the lead up with the travelcot, so we spent I think it was the week before we left, just putting him in the non snow travel basinet that the exact one that we were going to use with the rocket zed and the white noise machine for one nap a day
and then two naps a day and then overnight. And that just meant that it wasn't the first time he ever went into this new environment, wasn't when we were overseas whenever thing else was new at the same time.
And it's hard to know.
We didn't beat a test that obviously, it's hard to know how much difference that made, but I think it did at least ensure it wasn't a thousand new things at once. Having said that, one thing we didn't do, there's an amazing app I actually it was Olivia Molly Rodgers who first posted about this, and I used it extensively when I was traveling alone. There's an app called time Shifter which helps you with jet lag to kind of phase yourself from one time zone to the other.
I think when you're with a little one.
And again I'm not an expert on this, but we didn't do that time difference fading beforehand when it was us traveling with Teddy because I think it's already so much for them that you just stay on your existing time. So I'll cover this in the next point. But you know, we didn't when we did practice with the new COT. We didn't do practice with the time difference, but we did with the COT and the sheets and the rocket z and everything else. Number six is we're up to
the flight now. And my tip here is actually, back at the time of booking, try to book your flight.
Times very carefully.
And Nick and I didn't do this, and we actually ended up having to pay an exorbitant amount of change fees once we got closer. And I think this is quite common because at the time of booking, you're not actually thinking about the logistics of getting your baby on the plane and to the other end. You're just thinking about making sure you've ticked off the booking and that means that you use the same habits that you've used the entire time, your entire life that you've been traveling
without your baby. So we kind of looked at what was the cheapest flight to get us to the other end by the time we needed to arrive at That happened to be the five am flight, and that seemed fine.
And then we kind of sense checked it and we're like, yeah, cool, Like Teddy gets up really early five am, we'll be fine totally forgetting that for a five am flight, to be at the airport three hours early, you have to check in at two am, which is totally disastrous for you know, your baby's meant to be sleeping overnight, so you have to wake them up to be at the airport by two am. It's just so suboptimal, and we
just didn't even think about it. So one of the really hard things about travel is trying to keep their routine as close as you can. And our first mistake was obviously totally buggering that up with the flight time. So have a look at the times of when you're leaving. Obviously, especially for a long haul, at some point everything is going to fall apart, and that's just part of flying, but at least the original departure time. Like, keep things as easy as you can for as long as you can,
So be careful about your flight times. And someone asked a question about whether you would do a long layover like for a while or for overnight, or whether you just do it all in one go. I think that's a really personal preference. It also depends on your little one.
At this point.
I would also say, if you've never done a short domestic flight, I'd maybe do that first so you get familiar with what it feels like. We did a Sydney trip first, so that at least we could check if he was one of those babies whose ears was really sensitive, if he hated flying, if he was okay. And so, because Teddy was quite good on the plane, we thought it's already hard enough that at some point along the
chain their routine goes out the window. The quicker you can get to the other end and start the new routine felt better for us. So we thought, let's just rip the band aid, and it might be a really hard twenty four hours, especially once the nap cycle starts to get all messed up. But a longer layover for us just delayed us getting to where we wanted to go. We wanted to get on Italy time as quick as we could, so we didn't do a long layover and
just rip the band aid. But that's really personal. If you feel like you need time to gather your thoughts before I left, I thought I did want that once I got there, I thought, I'm really glad I did it all in one go. And then the other thing at the point of booking is it's not guaranteed that you'll get a bassinette just because you make a booking
with a baby, which I didn't know. And we ended up booking through a travel agent because we have one that my family uses all the time, and I sort of was nervous about booking with the baby for the first time, and she was the one who told me, you actually have to book that. So if you're booking yourself, you might not know. And there's a limited number on each flight, so make sure you ask about that, because not having one means there in your arms, which makes
the likelihood of them sleeping well really difficult. And I'll also say that certain airlines have different basinets, and some are a lot easier than others. On our first flight, we had one that was built into the bulkhead, so instead of being like this portable thing that Teddy could see through the sides that were mesh and see us, it was built into a solid structure, like a sort of deep cavern that was cut out so he couldn't
see us, We couldn't see him. It didn't really work, but the second flight on the way home.
Was a dream.
He had a portable one. It was mesh We could see him. Yeah, so do your research on that as well. There's a lot of information on which airlines have what bassinets number seven. I had a lot of questions about the process of getting the baby on the plane. Again, this probably depends on the age that your child's at, but I would definitely in the early months take a carrier and a travel pram. The carrier was amazing for us.
It's funny now thinking about it because Teddy doesn't love the carrier right now, he's much more riggily, but at the time having him just strapped to you so that you know.
He's sort of part of your body.
Because you're moving so many different things you need both arms free as well to when you're sort of checking in your bags and stuff like that. That was really helpful. So I had him in the carrier for a while. It also meant that when you are desperately trying to rock them to sleep in a situation where it isn't there normal, like they don't have the normal copy. You're trying to get them to nap the carryer is really helpful for that, so yes, we did the carry out,
then had the travel pram with us. I would highly recommend a travel pram. I think most of them do, but that kind of you can take, you know, in the airport like as you carry on. Most of them sort of flip down into a carry on size. We use the reds Baby Skip, which has an amazingly easy fold down and fold back out mechanism. It's really compact
the amount of times when you're checking in. It's sort of slightly different for each airline, but you do have to take the baby out of the carrier or take them out of the pram and fold it down at security, so you're kind of getting out in out a lot.
So getting one that's really easily foldable is so useful.
And we just alternated him being in the carrier or the pram depending on sort of how he was feeling, what else we were carrying, but having both was really really useful and I can highly recommend the Red Bread's Baby Skips. Another question was whether I considered other options. We didn't at the time because both I think the Jewels and the Bugaboo both had either a newborn bassinet, but that didn't fold, or they had the toddler setting which did fold, but Teddy wasn't big enough because he
was four months old. The reds Baby had like a middle option which didn't require you to take the newborn bascinet, but it did allow him to lean like sit up in the toddler configuration, but lean back a tiny bit so he could still have his neck supported. And so that seemed like the only real option that we had that we had looked at, and we love it. I recommend it so highly. I still use it all the time,
and that was really helpful. Yes, So the process of getting him on the plane was he was in the carrier, then on the layover he was in the travel pram because it was easier. One of the things about the carrier I will say is once you get to really hot weather, it's you get really sweaty and they get really hot and airports can be quite hot sometimes. So that's when we swapped him to the travel pram and pushed him around right up into the gate until we had to fold it down, which was just before we
got on the plane. And again, a lot of airlines get let families on the plane earlier, so you have room to put your travel pram overhead, and yeah, everyone's really helpful. Number eight on the plane. This is the bit that people are often the nervous about it, and
I definitely was. And my top tip here is chances are, even if they're a dream, at some point they will cry a little bit for some reason, maybe not necessarily on a domestic flight and a twenty four hour flight, they're gonna cry because they cry at home.
So at some point they'll cry.
And at some point you'll get that sweaty, cold filly on your neck that everyone's looking at you and it's so awkward and oh my god. But firstly, my tip is other parents traveling in my experience at least have been so compassionate. They'll give you a warm nod or say, look, we've all been there, or they'll just you know, say what can I carry for you? Or they'll often help you.
Or if there's someone who's giving you death stairs and they don't understand the situation you're in, you'll probably never see them again. Like, you've all paid the same to be there. You have the right to be there, and I know it's really hard to remember in the moment when they cry. Every second feels like five hours, but you just have to let go of the fact that it's probably going to happen. It's not the worst thing. You know, you deserve to be there as much as
everyone else. But generally, in my experience, people have been kinder than you expect. So, and then in a long haul flight, at least when you do need to get up and go into the galley, you can bop them around. You don't have to be stuck in your seat. You can kind of walk them up and down. But yeah, it will happen. Don't stress. And like I said before, worst case scenario, it's twenty four hours of your life.
And yeah, people often, especially in those bigger planes, like Teddy cried quite a bit on the way over because he couldn't nap in his bassinet. He got so overtired. But everyone has their headphones on so most people didn't even hear him, so it's totally fine. The other question about on the plane was routine wise, Did we stick to it? As I mentioned before, Yes, as much as possible. We stayed on the old time zone, and this was
from a lot of the research I did. The biggest recommendation I got was stay on the old time zone until you arrive, because you know that as closely as you can. That's what their bodies used to. So you want to get the best out of your baby as long as you can, and that's by sticking to their routine. And then once you get there, that's when you swap to the next one. And I've got tips on that, you know in a couple of couple more dot points down, but that's what we did.
Anyway.
We didn't do a middle phase. We just stuck to I kept my phone. One tip that was helpful is I didn't let my phone automatically change the clock and I just stayed on Melbourne time until we arrived. Tip nine relates to that, and that is one of the main ways you can do that because the airport, the airlines are turning lights on and off and doing dinner and breakfast dinner kind of manipulated way to help adults get on the time zone is to be able to
control the light. So the overall tip at point nine is be prepared for the flight and pack your carry on really carefully as if you might have a delay, because I think we sometimes think about what we need if everything goes smoothly, and put every try and put every everything else in checking so that you're not carrying
a lot of stuff. But if you have a major delay you can't get to your check in, assume that you might need a few extra of everything so that you could kind of get by if you were delayed a little bit. So really be prepared in packing your carry on. And one of the things for us that was an absolute game changer was the one we used anyway. It was called the cozy Go, and that's like this cover that goes over the bacinet and blocks out all
the light. It's still breathable, but it blocks the light so that it feels like nighttime for them and that allows you to just control and you can put it over the pram as well, so it just allows you to increase the likelihood that the baby is going to have a nap when you need them to, even if the adults all have their lights on because they're trying to feel like it's daytime for them to adjust to the time zone, especially in airports when everything is bright
all the time. The cozy Go in our carara was like just such a game changer for slightly older kids if they're not in a b I think there's lots of other things like that that.
Are really helpful.
I think there's like one called cushy Kids, or something that turns the normal seat into like a small bed that they can lie on. There's also like kid friendly earphones that are in like a headband that are really helpful. Teddy wasn't up to that stage, but you can research those things. The biggest thing I would pack is extra outfits for both of you, more than you would ever expect.
One of the things I didn't know is their bowels often relaxed quite a bit, and we had two unbelievable punamis unbelievable one in the first four hours, and I was like, we can't carry this material for the next seventeen hours. So I threw out the entire outfit, and then he did another one on the next plane, and I was like, oh my goodness. I thought packing three changes of clothes was excessive, but now way down to one clean pair if anything else happened, so overpack outfits
for them. Kids have a lot of bodily fluids, and pack extra outfits for you as well. Another thing that really helped for us is oh another huge a few sorry, oh my god, I'm losing it. This point nine has lots of abcds, so as well as extra outfits, pack obviously.
Enough nappies.
Nappy bags for throwing them out or putting wet clothes in. One of the most useful tips for us was a change mat because all airports and planes have changed tables, but they're often not padded. They're just hard, and there's also sort of not necessarily like a clean protector on it, and I just didn't want to put Teddy down on anything especially hard, but also just that hadn't necessarily been like that was clean, but that I didn't know what had been on it. So we have a Bunny Caddy
travel change mat that's a little bit padded. That was amazing for changing on the go, and we took that everywhere that we went once we were there as well. Take enough medication on the plane panat all, whatever you might need for your little one forget to pack that in your carry on for their ears if anything happens
along the way. We also took baby fest which is like the nasal spray to help clear his nose and ears, and then the snotty boss, which is what we used to clear his snot Teddy wasn't quite at the stage of playing with toys a lot because it was quite little.
Now he would be. But another tip I got is bring some new toys that he's not seen before so that they're not bored of them, and open them throughout the flight, because twenty four hours is a really long time, so that they've got something novel each like to keep them distracted, particularly if you don't want to do much screen time, and no judgment if you do. I can totally imagine that it's just you know, anything for survival when it comes to traveling. But yeah, the new toys
tip was one. And then for us this is quite personal, but Teddy really really responds well to music, particularly when he's like crying or not feeling great. So we had a soundtrack and we still use it everywhere. That was preloaded, so we downloaded it so that it was available offline if there wasn't Wi Fi on the plane, or it wasn't working, or there wasn't WiFi we could connect to
in the airport. Pre download that like the Happy Song, Baby Shark, all those emergency songs that was a really good tip because we used them more than I thought we would. Tip ten for their ears. They're much more
sensitive than adults' ears are. The biggest tip that I read before we went for the actual flight itself is to feed them on the way up and on the way down, because swallowing helps clear their ears, because they can't often yawn themselves at that early age, so you kind of feeding them helps them do that by swallowing. That's all well and good, except that most of you will know that trying to feed a baby at exactly
a particular time, sometimes you can. Often you can't, Like Teddy would get hungry, or we'd be on the TIMEAC longer than I thought and he'd need to feed before we took off, or I'd start and then we wouldn't actually with taxi for a lot and he would have finished before we took off or whatever, or you know, we just didn't last the window. Like there's just so
many logistics already. So another alternative is if they have a dummy that sucking also works, or if they are drinking water, maybe their water bottle.
They all helped.
If they're really really sensitive, ask your doctor about panadol or some kind of pain relief and how you should do that if that's your choice, like consult a professional for that. But yet the tip was feeding on the way up or down and I managed it twice and the other takeoffs and landings we use the dummy number eleven. Once you arrive, you kind of forget about the fact that you won't have your own car seat in your car. We hired a car and we pre booked a car
with a baby seat in it. But even in Sydney for example, like there are different rules in New South Wales and Victoria on babies under the age of whatever it is whether they can go on your lap or whether they need a baby seat, so always look that up before you go to take the stress out of it. You might want to pre book a transport that has a baby seat in it, and particularly if you're at that age where it still needs to be rear facing.
A lot of cabs have front facing seats, like you can just book any maxicab and they often have them, but if you want a rear facing one for a smaller baby, you often have to book it. So I would look up the rules before you go and work out you know what you need. And then my big tip here is take like a light muslin rap or something that folds down really small and won't bother you
too much. But because you can't necessarily like sterilize the entire seat, and they've been used by lots of different children, we kind of put that rap over it before we put Teddy in it, so that the bits that his face were touching on the rap and not on the chair. That was really useful and we did that in Sydney the other day as well. Number twelve the time difference, so I've kind of covered the fact that we didn't.
We kept him on the Melbourne time zone as long as possible, and that just means, yeah, you're more likely to get a more predictable baby for as long as you can. Once you get there. They also get jet lag. Of course, it's really hard. In Europe, it was like the complete opposite time. Sometimes it's like the younger they are, the less they have a circadian rhythm, so maybe it's easier. But Teddy had just figured out night and day and
then we went and flipped it on him. So Victoria gave me the biggest tip before we went, and that was get them up and out in the morning. First thing in the morning, get them up and out so they get light in their eyes and that helps them kind of recalibrate, So this is morning time, and then you try and get them on the time zone as
soon as you can. But at the same time, and again this is probably quite personal, but my advice anyway is that get them up and out in the mornings, same for you, even if you want to sleep, and it will help you all to get sun light in your eyes. Then kind of try and get back to your normal routine as soon as you can, except.
That, of course, they will be really tired. And some of the.
Advice is don't let them sleep longer than their normal nap time. I would say let them sleep a little bit longer, because if they're overtired, they won't sleep and that's even worse, and then you're sort of chasing yourself.
So we sort of got Teddy.
Up really early in the morning and then gave him his normal naps. Is ish, but let him have longer naps for those ones. And yes, of course, like don't let them have an overnight length sleep during the day because then they'll just keep thinking it's nighttime.
But we would kind.
Of you know, he went two hour he's a thirty minute napper, and we'd let him have like two hour naps because he needed to still catch up on the fact that even in a really good scenario, we had a dream flight on the way home, but he's still overall in that twenty four hour period got less sleep than he normally would at home, so he had some catching up to do, which means that when we got back, we let him have slightly longer naps so he would catch up, but just not nighttime length naps, so then
by the time he got to bed, he wasn't so overtired that he could fall asleep. It's like that age old thing that sleep forgets sleep. And yes, I know there's lots of material out there saying you don't want them to have so much sleep that they're not tired enough, but I don't think in the case of a long haul flight you need to worry about that because they probably won't have had the same amount of sleep as they normally do, and you do need to let them catch up.
A little bit.
Again, this is a personal choice, but that's what worked for us. And yeah, the day the first day, I did kind of wake him up from a few naps, thinking that I needed to stop him sleeping, and he just got so overtired that yeah, I abandoned that pretty quickly, but yet getting them up and out in the mornings
was a big tip there. Tip thirteen. Jet lag does take them a little bit of time to get over, so again coming back to those realistic expectations, it does take a little while, and I was really overwhelmed when I read a few blogs that said it can take up to seven days and we were only going for like twelve or thirteen. I would say that it did take seven days for him to be completely normal, but it took maybe three for him to be more manageable.
And in light of that, I would say my tip here is if you're going for an important event, like a wedding, for example, don't have it in the first three days. And this comes back to us making the bookings. When we thought that we could fly at five am. We also fly thought that we could fly the day before land, then get a car, not have a night to just recoup, get a higher car, drive three more hours. Again, he'd also never driven for three hours and then have
one night's sleep and then have the wedding. We were there for the next night, absolutely impossible. We realized two days before that was not going to work, so we had to pay, like I said, an exorbitant amount to change it, because I was like, we're going to miss the wedding if we don't change it.
So we're very privileged. Of course, it's a privilege.
To be able to pay the change fees, but I just thought, you know, there's worth going otherway. So my advice to you so you don't have to do that, is if you do have a really important event that you need the little one to be a bit more routine for maybe plan that sort of.
Not in the first few days.
Having said that, we did make it, and it was amazing, and I took my mum so that she could help with babysitting, and again that's a great privilege and it was beautiful to have a family experience, but it was a lot harder to make sure that by the time we needed to leave, he was ready to sleep and he was going to take a bottle, and part of Teddy's when he's really tired, he sort of doesn't love his bottle, and that was really difficult, So I didn't get to stay at the wedding for the whole time,
and I think probably the week after I would have been able to. So I would yeah, plan any important events after they've had a bit of time to adjust. Tip fourteen where did he sleep? So in Sydney, we knew the hotel chain that we were staying at, and we knew that they had We knew that the cots would be of a particular quality. We knew that families travel often. He's also used to, you know, sleeping in a cot. Now he's been out of the snow. We never went back to the snow after the trip because
we'd kind of already weaned him. So in Sydney, you know, we were happy to trust that the hotel we were going to how to cot. If you are going overseas, it depends, of course on your location and on your baby, but you can call an advance. Definitely call an advance and work out what their options are. But in the Amalfi
Coast we were staying at an amazing hotel. But Italy overall, sometimes like the communication isn't as great or you know, they have different standards on certain things and there's a language barrier. So I just wanted to, particularly for such a big adventure, make sure that we had consistent Also, because we were swapping hotels, I wanted Teddy to have sort of, like I said, changing as little as possible. I wanted him to have the same basn't the whole time.
And so for us personally, it was worth taking our own and then at least we knew it met certain standards. He would have been able to try it before we went. And again I benefited enormously from Victoria Devine who had done all the research on the one that would fold down to be the most lightweight and fit within the large July cases, so it didn't take up much of that case, which was amazing. It was called the Chico
Lullago travel Coot, and it was amazing. That's the one we gave him a couple of days before in and it just took the stress out of it. It meant that if they didn't have a cot setup, or they didn't have one, or it was taken, we knew that there was somewhere to sleep that we knew he could
fall asleep in. So my tip there is, if you can and you want to take your own travelcot if you can't call ahead and make sure that they have one and that they know you've requested it, because yeah, but then what happened with us is we arrived and
they knew we were booking in with a baby. They did have one ready, but the bed they had for Teddy was a fold out sofa, which now maybe he'd be able to fall asleep in, but at the time it was four months, there was no way and things get lost in translation, so we just thought it was better to have our own. So my tip is, depending on your level of anxiety about uncertainty, Yeah, we use the Chico La Lago and highly recommend it. And the other question in that area was did we get two
rooms with Teddy napping in one or one room? And again this comes down to budget, how long you're going for where you're going. I would say that we ended up having a room for Mum because she was traveling with us. So we did end up having two rooms for our trip because we had Mum with us, But in terms of Nick, Teddy and I us three were in the same room. We didn't get two rooms for just our unit. And that was quite difficult because you
do sound wise or like just general activity wise. Being all in one did mean that when Teddy.
Goes to sleep, we all go to sleep.
I think there's an Airbnb ad about that that right going around right now, that you got to sleep when your kids go to sleep. So if there is a way to book a room. Again, this is coming from a place of great privilege that we had saved a lot for this trip and we were able to kind of have flexibility. The reason we didn't get that extra room is because it wasn't available in the hotel. But when we went to Sydney a couple of days ago, we did make sure that it was a two bedroom family set up room.
If you can make.
Sure there's a separate room with a door where the baby can be napping so you guys can still do stuff when they're asleep, that helps a lot because when they are napping, they nap three times a day or two times a day or whatever, and then they go to sleep really early, so it kind of limits you if you can't do that. But again, we had the cozy go which allows you to control at least control the light, so if we were moving around at least if we were doing it quiet, even if it was
the middle of the day. Another, yeah, I would highly highly recommend getting some kind of blackout mechanism so you can control their light. We took that to Sydney as well, enormously helpful. And then we use the white noise machine, which would at least kind of minimize the impact of our sound moving around. So yeah, we had one room for the three of us, one for mum and the cozygo and the cot number fifteen. This is specific to small babies and hot weather, especially babies who have never
been in hot weather ever or the reverse. It is also not just the time zone, but they're dealing with a different climate. Everything's going to feel weird for them, their skin, it's all new. One thing that really helped us was to have and actually this is probably helpful anyway.
At home, we always have small white face washes everywhere in the house, in every bag, in every like pram and everything, because you just need to wipe them at all times, but particularly when it's hot and you need to cool them down quickly, not air con always everywhere you can just get a bottle of water or go into a bathroom and get like literally wet the face washer and put it on them to keep them cool.
That was so useful.
And we also always had a light muslin wrap like a pashmina type thin piece of material, not just for the car seat like I mentioned before, but to cover the pram to keep the heat and like the sun out, and also when he was napping, to keep the light out. That was really helpful for us if you're going to a sunny climate. Number sixteen is the things that help you during the day, like just in general the time between the naps. They're wake windows, pack really well for that.
Don't forget that you will have time where you're not distracted, you're not going out and seeing stuff. Particularly if it's really hot or it's really cold, you might or a raining you might get stuck in your room. And I've kind of only thought about it at the last minute, so we actually ended up taking and this is a
very time specific thing. We don't need it anymore, but we ended up taking the fitball with us and a pump because it's so essential to our wake windows and calming Teddy back home, or it was at the time that I thought we need this. There also we need someway for him to roll around, like he wasn't sitting up, he couldn't walk around at the time, so we needed
a play mat. So getting one that's portable for just like when you're in the room doing nothing was really important and you kind of forget about bringing toys for just kicking about. So yeah, a playmat that you can fold up, a bouncing ball if you need that. You obviously can't necessarily take their rockers or they walk it, they're all those things, but taking the things that are
portable was really helpful. Number seventeen bottles and sterilizing such a big question, and that was a big part of like, again when it comes back to their stuff taking up so much room in the case, the feeding was a big logistical thing. So this list, part of my list was like extensive. Yes, we did bottles over there, particularly because we were going out without him, but also because I was pumping and we wanted to maintain his familiarity with bottles so that when I came back I could
still go to work. And it is really hard, because sterilizing is really hard. I had a lot of questions about that. The fridge control I didn't think about, but a lot of hotel fridges aren't at the same coldness, and milk storage is a really big thing. So what we did is we took our normal bottles. I took my pumps. We also took sterilizer tablets. The brand was Milton. That was a tip from Victoria. Again, like I owe this whole entire episode to Victoria, I should have actually
done it with her. She was just amazing with tips like that. You can also sterilize using boiling water, so we use the kettles a lot. One of the things that was really helpful was and I didn't think you'd need, but a portable bottle washing kit that like folded up and it had a washing brush, a detergent bottle, and a drying rack so that you could put the bottles on something after you wash them and then you would
sterilize them later. So yeah, we kind of took everything that we would normally use, the bottles, sterilized tablets.
I preferred to use the kettle because I thought it was easier.
And the one problem was one of our fridges wasn't that cold, and I wasn't super comfortable with that.
So and also because.
Again stupidly, we arrived not that long before the wedding, where well we would need bottles. I didn't have enough time to pump enough milk for that. So the best thing that we did there was you've heard me probably talk about it before, is we freeze dried some of my breast milk beforehand. And again this is quite specific to breastfeeding mothers or parents. If you use formula, this is not a problem because you've already got powdered milk
that is shelf stable. But if you are using breast milk and you don't know about the fridges, that's where Narashi was amazing because they freeze dried bags of my frozen breast milk so that I could travel, and even having spare milk on the plane because you don't know that airplane travel and JETLA doesn't affect.
Your supply either.
I felt a lot more comfortable because Teddy wasn't on solids, knowing that I had powdered breast milk with the same convenience of formula, but that it was my milk on the plane in transit in case, so Teddy wouldn't starve if my boobs just kind of dried up suddenly because
you just don't know. So I can include more links to that, but that was really amazing for peace of mind to just have yeah, the shelf stable, non refrigerator needing milk, and then if you were if he was on solids, which he was for Sydney, that's when again it depends on what you can access at the other end. If you do have cooking facilities and you can cook eggs or beef or ground beef or whatever your sterup, whatever you're doing, if you can take a nutrible whatever
your setup is, that's helpful. I also just took a lot of pouches. We hadn't really used pouches before. I've just preaked everything. But there are a lot of great pouch options now that have nothing, no additives or anything. So I feel like that's a really good option if you're comfortable with that, or if you're just not going to have cooking facilities at the other end, there's some really great brands.
So we did that for Sydney.
And I also took his wheat bigs in like a little ziploc bag, and then I took my pump so that I had the milk to put with it.
And Yeah, but I.
Think if I traveled overseas for solids, I'd probably have a bit of a different approach. Eighteen was about heating up milk on the go. So the old school ways just use a kettle, and like all the maternal and child health nurses and night nannies and all the people that we know, or even my mom was.
Like, just use the kettle, but we used.
We bought one from the memo called the Jiffy. We tried a few and the Jiffy ended up being the one that we like the most. It's really portable, easy like it packs down really small. We took that so that we could heat up milk as we went. Another tip though, is if you're in really hot weather, it doesn't need to be as hot as it normally is. Teddy tolerated it a lot cooler because he was hot, so we might not have needed like a full on warmer.
But yeap, that's what we use the Jiffy.
And that's also so all of the products that I've mentioned pretty much are in my packing list, but I've also got baby essentials like page that has the links to all of them, so I'll put that in the show notes as well. Number nineteen. This is one from my sister in law who always said with kids, if they have an absolute meltdown, and they probably will at some point, because they also sometimes might at home. Like that's the other thing you've got to remember is if
they cry, they also cry at home. If they have meltdown, sometimes they have those at home too. But also you have to have so much compassion for them, their tiny little humans, and they're seeing a whole new world. They're new to the world anyway, but you're showing them a whole nother new world. Of course, it's going to be overwhelming, and the poor little things, it's a lot to drag on to the other end of the world. So there
will be a couple of meltdown moments. But my sister in law always says, either put them in nature or just add water, and so if you can get outside, that also, like always really helps. But one of the things that helped me when Teddy was having quite a meltdown when we first got there, he was like, what is this hot place with the opposite time zone without my staff, I'm tired, I don't know what's going on.
He just yeah, absolutely, and like he was really good on the planes, but he actually he's like kind of meltdown was after we arrived, when he was just done. I jumped in the shower with him and just add water in a bath or in a shower is so calming. I'd never jumped in a shower with him before, but that just like was a circuit breaker he needed. And I found that a really valuable tip when you just went all else fails, You're bouncing, you're you know, padding,
you're shushing, and none of it's working. Is just jump in the shower. That's not like expert advice by any means, but that helped me. And then number twenty, I can't believe I've monologued for like a bloody hour. I thought this was going to be a half an hour thing. But I'm just trying to give as much information as you guys might find it helpful or useful, and I hope it has been. But number twenty and I've probably
missed stuff. But someone asked anything I do differently, And I think the biggest thing is just be kind to yourself. It is there's nothing I would do differently because I couldn't know what I couldn't know. You've just got to try it. It's hard traveling with the child. You're doing the best you can. You're doing an amazing thing, and
it's not the same as travel before. And just like we said in Jen's episode, you're not the same person you were but were before, and you do say goodbye to your old identity, So you also say goodbye to the old way that you traveled for a little while, not forever. You will be able to when they're bigger, kind of go back to that same kind of independent travel. But you also gain a whole new identity and you
gain a whole new set of experiences. And seeing your favorite tiny human that you made see the world is special in a way that I can't even describe. It is so worth it. It's one of the best things we've done. It's not as hard as you think. You will be amazing again. Even if it is, you will only remember the good bits. And I hope that this is at least help you feel a little bit more prepared and excited. But if I have missed anything, please let me know.
If you have any further questions, please let me know. This is meant to be bite sized, so I'm going to cut myself off now. But I hope that that's been as much detail as you had hoped for, and please, yeah, you guys know I love keeping the communication channels open. I want to make sure that you get as much value as you can. Remember this is my specific anecdotal information. I feel like I'm that like TNZ disclaimer at the end of an at But yeah, I hope this was useful.
Let me know what you thought. Good luck on whatever travel you have, and we'll be back in a fortnight with the next one, which I think will be on the sleep progression. I have so much to say on that it'll probably be longer, but chat to you guys then.