Taking 20 month old on a plane tomorrow HELP!

[sugarbea]

Ok my 20 mo old dd is lovely but she doesn't sit still. Shes very independent, she won't stop at home (unless I put on peppa pig) and hates sitting in the buggy, and in the car infact she hates sitting down in general she's far to busy. How am I going to keep her still (on my lap) for 3.5 hours. I have a ds (6.5) who has always been a brilliant traveller but has a march birthday so we always flew just after big milestone birthdays and dd is smack in in the middle. I've packed her favourite toys, colouring pencils, crayons etc and downloaded peppa pig on my phone. What else can I do?

Oh dear. Been there, done that - and it was a flight to Australia! Nightmare with 3 under 5 DS, never to be forgotten.

Your flight is only 3.5 hours, so at least 1/5 hour of it will be taken up with the novelty of being in a plane, folding and unfolding the tray, you pointing out various things on the plane that you can see from your seat, out the window if you can see out of it. At some point, there will be snacks/drinks or a meal served, so make the most of that - it will use up another 1/2 hour of flight time. Unless your plane is quite small, there will probably be a tv screen on the back of her seat - it will be fun for her to watch a cartoon with headphones on, as that will be a novelty, and hopefully she will fall asleep for at least some of the time. GOOD LUCK tomorrow!

1/2 hour not 1/5 hour taken up with novelty......! Kind of hit the wrong key.

Hiya,
I took ds on a 9 hour flight on my own at about 20 months. I was terrified because it was not only ds's first flight, but my first flight alone. I'd always travelled with family.
I decided to take his car seat on the plane and book him his own seat. I just couldn't imagine him sitting in the chair for take off/landing. It worked really well. He understood that car seat = sitting still. Every hour or so I would let him up and we'd walk up and down the plane, say hi to other passengers, change nappy etc.
I also decided to sit right at the back of the plane for a couple reasons:

1. So we were right by the toilets
2. So we wouldn't be anyone's way getting on/off the plane

I also brought his buggy on the plane, not for ds to go in but all the carry on luggage! Car seat, changing bag and entertainment bag all fitted in the buggy and made it so much easier getting on/off the plane. DS either walked or went in a sling on my back.

For entertainment I took loads of books, crayons, his comfort toys, but mostly he was fine just to babble. We avoided noisy toys so we didn't disturb other passengers. If you're going to bring Peppa pig, I would see if your dd would wear headphones.

The staff were really great on the plane too. They arranged for ds to eat first and kept my meal warm and served it when he'd finished. They were also more than happy to keep an eye on him while I popped to the loo and were great for entertainment, showing him the galley etc.

All in all it went really well and I had several compliments from other passengers about his behaviour

We've been abroard twice this summer when DD was 13 mths and 15mths (approx 3.5 hrs each way both times). We didn't try to keep her still except for take off and landing. She spent most of the rest of the time walking up and down the aisle. This was a bit stressful in terms of knowing it was annoying for cabin crew and other passengers wanting to walk anywhere, but in my view much better than having her complaining constantly about being kept still. She was too young to have much interest in colouring, stickers etc and the toys we had taken held her attention for a matter of minutes. I hope that next year it will be easier on this front!

I took DD on a 3hr flight in June at 13 months. She just entertained all the other passengers as I'm sure yours will.

If you can afford to get a one - a portable DVD player is A GODSEND!