Overnight flight with kids

[tabbycat4321]

Hi everyone, can I please get some advice and tips on overnight flights with kids. Kids are aged 14, 12 & 6 and we are taking a 13 hour flight overnight in the summer. Less worried about the older ones but all and any tips would be appreciated. Thanks so much!

We fly back from the US once a year with kids a similar age and my tip would be not to force them to sleep if they don’t want to and don’t sweat it too much if they just want to sit and watch the same film on repeat. They will nod off when they are ready even if it’s a lot later than normal. Ours seem to recover much better from the jet lag than us too!

After the meal is served (within the first couple of hours of your flight), I try and stick to a fairly normal bedtime routine, or as normal as it can be in an aircraft. With very small children, I put pyjamas on them, brush their teeth and wash their face, get out their favourite cuddly toy, read a story and stop screen time just like at home. What I do differently is allow them to do quiet activities like sticker books, colouring, reading etc…. until they’re finally too sleepy. Last time we also allowed dc to fall asleep with headphones on listening to an audio book as it helped to block out the noise.