All Inclusive with a toddler - tips please

[HamptonsBasket]

Hi all, I am taking my nearly 2 yo DS on his first holiday abroad this summer (Greek Islands). The resort looks very nice and has a lot to offer which is age appropriate for him and I'm sure he'll enjoy himself. I am not a resort holiday person, but it seemed easy enough to book it for our first trip abroad together.

Any tips please as to what to take for him? Do you normally bring lots of toys and books with you? Beach toys? Anything necessary or helpful that you've learnt to pack through your own experiences? Beach towels (there's a private beach, as well as a couple of pools, pool towels are included)?

Also, how do people deal with e.g.: morning/evening milk for young children? Is tap water ok to drink for him there? Shall I bring some small tupperware boxes to pack up fruit at breakfast for him to snack on? He loves fruit and apparently snacks will be available all day, but I don't really know how child friendly they will be.

So many little questions! I don't intend to overpressure, I'd just really like to relax a bit when we're there, so any tips will be appreciated!

Thank you in advance.

Baby antihistamine and a portable first aid kit. My toddle cut her foot on our first holiday abroad the beach first aid were useless but I had everything and she was able to play again safely (no stitches required)

Swim nappies, a pop up sun tent for beach, calpol and ibuprofen, UVA & UVB swimsuits and hats, a fan that can clip on to a stroller and a decent sun shade for stroller.

Colouring books and some cheap toy cars or similar for plane from Poundland.

Have a fab time OP x

Mine snacked on dried crackers/breadsticks we had taken with us whilst one of us when to get food from the buffet. We saved the stickers and toys for during the meal if we were still eating but he'd had enough to eat.

We love our travel booster seat, it has a storage compartment too so we pack it in the hold luggage (it’s really light weight) and put bottles of sun cream etc or things we don’t want to get squished in there. Then when we’ve arrived we store the plates cups etc inside. Use it all the time: Munchkin Baby Seat, Travel Booster Seat, Portable High Chair, Toddler Booster Seat & Baby Feeding Chair, Transforms into a Portable Carry Bag or Baby Changing Bag, for Baby Boys or Baby Girls https://amzn.eu/d/ca12zpI

i pack a tote bag of soft storage basket in hold luggage and a range of toys and then have the storage to keep them tidy.

pram fan with spider legs was very useful for us.

I take a large Muslin for draping over for sleep rather than a sleeping bag

taje your usual amount of nappies plus about 5 in hand luggage. Either take them out the packet and scatter through your luggage, vacuum pack them or put them on the bottom of the pram and then they travel for free when you put your pram in it’s bag on the hold.

snack wise I take: breadsticks, biscuits, raisins, yoghurt covered fruit, brioche or croissants (you can buy a pack of day 10 in Tesco and they all come in individual bags) take a selection on flight and rest for resort. Then as pp says liberate some fruit and bread from breakfast.

when we first took our 15m old away, I took about 4 different cups in the hopes she would drink from at least one of them to keep fluids up: had a camel back straw cup for flight, tommee tippee sippee cup, munchkin 360 and an open cup. Might seem excessive but the variety meant she drank.

look for bottled water that says suitable for babies or has babies on the picture as a lot of bottled water is high in salt content.

get the swim suits that at full bodied and have sun protection on them: next/John Lewis/Tesco do them

toy wise I reccomend resuable sticker scene books Reusable Sticker Books https://amzn.eu/d/gqgRQWG
puffy stickers for windows/doors/airplane windows) https://amzn.eu/d/cRPdkVF
sma jigsaws/cars/farm animal figures, take a tub or 2 of playdoh and some cutters in a small tuppaware

The Five Minute Mum book On The Go is fantastic for ideas to keep children entertained when travelling, like 20 games you can play with just things in your wallet or games to play while waiting in a queue. Your DS may be a little young for a lot of the suggestions but I can highly recommend it for slightly older ones, and beyond.

I don’t bother packing loads of clothes for all eventualities, I just wash out anything in sink with bar of dove soap. It’s fine and enough it’s not stained or sticky and can be worn again on trip.

I will be travelling soon with just 3 year old and he could go through 1 or 3+ pairs of pants a day, but I can’t take 30 odd pairs for 2 weeks so il just take enough (maybe 8) and rinse every few days.

I'm travelling to Egypt with DS as a single mum, cannot wait. I've bought the following things to hopefully make holiday as smooth as I can:

I've bought him the following colouring pack, the crayons only work on certain paper so I don't need to worry about him colouring all over on things.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/B09HR3J86R?psc=1&ref=ppx_pop_mob_b_asin_image

A lightweight pushcair that can recline so DS can nap when we're out.

Small pillow for napping on plane.

Going to try taking Uht milk cartons as DS likes milk in morning and before bed.

First aid Kit

I need to buy some small toys for the plane and beach.

We've just been away with my 15 month old. We took loads and loads of snacks and snack pots. It was half board but we took food from breakfast like fruit etc and we topped her snack boxes up with various snacks
toys- watering cans, those stackable cups, loads of sticker books.
Non slip water shoes for sure
We were staying in a very nice hotel and they brought us milk every evening.
They provided plenty of bottled water so she drank that

I haven't been to any ai resort in Europe that doesn't have either a shop on site or a shop just outside where you can buy milk and we've always had a small fridge in the room.

Nappies and sunscreen bring with you, they are ££££ especially swim nappies. I paid €29 last summer for a small bottle of factor 50.

We always used to take one small pack of nappies and buy the rest out there. We would put her in the fabric swim nappies for going in the pool as we found they were less prone to leakage. I bought some hand washing liquid out there for washing them out in the bathroom. Luckily she only pooed in hers once so it wasn't such a messy job.

Oh yeah and the non slip shoes are an absolute must!