Skiing holidays with a 3.5 year old and 4 month old

[Travellingislife]

Is it a bad idea and we should just wait or have any of you done it and it’s been enjoyable?! It would only be my husband and myself, so won’t have any help with babysitting.
Ideally we would stay in own accommodation as I don’t want to have one hotel room and having to go to bed when the kids do, and just use local crèches for the baby and ski school for the toddler. Not sure if this is possible or if you have to stay in a hotel which offers this? It should be close to an airport too.
I’m probably being silly and I’ll have to wait a few more years or bring grandparents to help with babysitting..

Are you thinking for this season?

4mths is young for a crèche but it might be worth giving Snowbizz a call take their advice - they are experts in young families skiing and Puy has tons of snow at the moment.

I have no personal experience and when I read this post I thought you were crazy but then I found this site which had some interesting info (other ski holiday sites are available):

https://skimagic.co.uk/taking-a-baby-skiing/

Are you comfortable with leaving your 4 month old at creche? I wouldn't have been able to relax and enjoy at all but I get that we're all different.

We usually go to a club med and their kids club start at 2 years old, included ski lessons for 4 years old. They can provide childcare for younger babies and private ski lessons for below 4 years old but will charge you for them.

Op it is certainly do-able for next season 24/25. And it's something to do before your oldest starts school prices can be wild in school holidays.

Snowbizz (I got a recommendation for them from MN 11 years ago) they aew a small family business, Wendy is English Michele is French, we've been with them about 7 times, missed a couple of years with pregnancy/DC2, (13mths on first trip) and 2021 because of covid.

Babies are in the crèche, Totons (tots on skis 3 & 4) are in crèche but have an hour with ski instructors in the snow garden area) the nannies & instructors are all English speaking.

The Sun Valley apartments are OK, clean do what you need them to do. And about a minute walk from crèche shops and slopes. The lift takes longer than the walk!

We skied with kids of a similar age (staying in our house). We always had one adult with the baby, so we didn’t ski together for a good while. I drank a lot of hot chocolate and played a lot in the snow…. It was fun but not sure it’s for everyone. When youngest was about 1 we did put him in guarderie des enfants for a couple of hours which was ok. After about 3 the Piou piou club was ok.

We used Kinderhotels when ours were that age. We went to one near Unken and another near St Johann am Pongo. Both were fabulous!!

Take a look at MMV in France. They do a baby club. We had a great holiday with them in Jan with our then 18 month old.

I took mine skiing when they were babies. We’ve done Au Pair when really little (slightly younger than your youngest) and local Creche at 18 months. I wouldn’t do local Creche much later than that when the words rather than tone matter more.

If it’s for this season, check with Espirit. Their childcare for all ages is excellent. I’m devastated that this is their last season.

I'd second MMV, their kids clubs are lovely and in the Residences you can get a 1 bedroom flat with a sofa bed, or a 2 bedroom flat, so you can put children to bed and still stay up. The Tignes one is ski in ski out, and you can sledge on the piste by the hotel, which is also the ESF meeting point, so that was awesome.

We have also used the local garderie when we were in Les Gets, but our kids are bilingual so that was fine.

ESF club piou piou would be fine for the 3.5 year old and is all fenced in and contained.

I’ve done it. You could look at Club Med, some of their resorts do childcare for 4 months +. You could also do a resort nanny for baby and ski school for the 4YO perhaps with the nanny to collect and look after for the rest of the day if you want longer to ski. We’re going to France for our next trip and the plan is that our youngest will do 3-4YO lessons from 9-10.30am with Oxygene ski school, then to be picked up by the nanny for some playing and snack, before being delivered to the restaurant we’ve booked for lunch! The nanny agency we use is Jelly & Ice Cream and they’re in most of the big French resorts. VIP chalets also do good childcare including for babies and they have some smaller apartments that you could book as a family of 4, we’ve never been with them since kids but family do every year and are very happy.

We did.. but it's crackers! We paid an arm and a leg for Chillli Powder and then Family Ski ... put one kid off lessons for life, the baby wouldn't take a bottle from anyone so I had to come back and feed her at lunch time. We have also used Piou Piou .. it is quite a traumatising experience... DS2 was known to fall asleep when they sat down for a snack and quite simply refuse to wake up.. there is a lot of crying and kids frequently wet themselves. Getting kids to lessons / childcare with skis, poles and loo stops in snow gear is no mean feat. We eventually went for resort nannies for a few days of the holidays.. a mix of half days and nanny pick up after lesson and home for lunch. They did all learn how to ski but lessons were not the highlight. They often seemed desperate to latch on to any kid so that someone would wait for them / pick them up if they fell. For years afterwards, my daughter used to stop and pick up kids who had fallen over and were crying while their instructors ignored them. Overall.. skiing is a huge amount of effort and totally amazing on the perfect day but I am not sure the icy, snowy, windy days, the falls, injuries, logistics, equipment and costs are all worth it. I'd take a solo hike any day!

Thanks everyone, lots of great tips!
My baby is exclusively breast-fed and to be fair I’m not sure if I could leave her in a crèche. Perhaps for a couple of hours and after that we have to take turns skiing, not sure if it’ll be worth it.

imo Taking turns skiing isn’t worth it, it’s just not the same on your own. I’ve hired an au pair 9-1pm (paid by the hour) and then pumped once a day while in a cafe / by the side of the slope. It was fine actually.

Keeping in mind we are in March, usually resorts close early April, prices double or treble during school holidays, so really you'd be trying to get away this weekend or next.
Is that doable if a crèche would take a young baby?

I certainly think it's doable for next season but look now, get a decent deal.
Taking turn about gets very boring very quickly - we tried and failed with it when or oldest was 2 - before MN found me Snowbizz.

You must think I work for them I don't honestly. They are just fab at making ski holidays with under 12s easy. Its something like 90% of their customers return.

This is great info @Outthedoor24 because I’m currently grieving Espirit stopping operating. I’ll definitely be taking a look. I always say skiing when you’re with a family tour operator is actually like a holiday rather than just being somewhere different with the kids.

@Mazuslongtoenail they are definitely worth a look.

Our oldest is 13 now, youngest 7 so we are trying somewhere different this year, a bigger resort. But we have had great times with Snowbizz, even when things go wrong, they make it as easy as possible.

I have to say that I read your OP and thought that your DH had got himself a ski-ing trip whilst you do childcare. My DC at 4 months wouldn't have stayed in creches.

Honestly I’d probably skip this season. It’s very short notice. Easter school hols are only a few weeks away and that not only means expensive and busy but finding spaces at ski school for the eldest and childcare for the baby could prove tricky.

Why not look to go in December? The weekend of the 14/15th is usually a lull before schools break up for Christmas, it’s the last week of early season so you can still get discounts but there should be plenty of snow, you’ll have a 1YO so much easier to leave than an EBF 4MO and it’s really not that long to wait!

I think it’s a crazy idea. We just came back from skiing and my youngest is 7. We all loved it but I’d not go unless the kids are capable of dressing themselves and looking after their own gloves and skis etc.
Your youngest would be stuck in a crèche all day unless you take turns skiing and the oldest might not even like being away from you for lessons, are they still napping? I don’t think you’d get much skiing done as a family of 3. I’d do other stuff for a couple of years and go skiing when the whole family will enjoy it and you can actually ski as a family after any lessons. Skiing all together in the afternoons after my kids had finished their lessons was amazing.

I've taken my kids skiing from as young as 14mths, never manged to loose gloves, or equipment.
There again Snowbizz make it easy, give you printed labels for the kids gear. 😀

Honestly they make it so easy!

Yeah same. Even without Snowbizz (who sound great BTW, I’m off to google…) the kids manage to keep track of their stuff. We usually book a resort nanny who handles ski school pick up and drop offs, and looks after the youngest, they even deliver them to the restaurant table!

If it was OP I’d be skipping this season just because I would want to avoid school hols and it’s really too late to organise anything before then, but I’d be booking ASAP for next season!!

Totally agree with PPs - I have two children and never missed a season apart from Covid. Been as babies and toddlers and now 3 years in ski school for the eldest. It’s been fabulous and such a great experience.

So we’ve gone to Norway and aunties, cousins and grandparents are here too, they live here so it’s easy. Since I’m from here and grew up in Sweden I like going to Europe for skiing and didn’t consider Norway or Sweden as options but it was probably silly of me. It’s not like a large ski resort in Europe but beautiful and we are doing cross country and randonee skiing as well. We all get to hang out and get help with the kids so I’m happy with this. The travel was mental with 3 flights but now we’re here and it’s all good.
If you’re looking for something different I recommend skiing here, there are no crèches or babysitters though.
Hemsedal or Stranda are two good places in Norway or Are in Sweden.