Travel With Baby: Surviving The Car Seat Blues

Travel with Baby

Since Alina was born, we have done a fair amount of travel. Nowhere magnificent, but we traveled nonetheless. Either by plane, car, or both within the same day, we definitely pushed our little girl to her limits. At 3 months of age, Alina took her first 4+ hour drive from Las Vegas to our hometowns in Southern California. We continued to take numerous additional LV to LA trips in that year.

At six months of age, Alina took her first flight to see my best friend in Washington DC {which was five hours}. We landed, slept a few hours, then got on the road to Virginia Beach {which was a five hour drive}.

And then, at 13 months old, Alina’s adventures took her to Atlanta so that we could reunite with friends Jessica and Ilah. {Many of my readers know Jessica of From Marriage to Motherhood, as they are a huge reason why I started blogging to begin with.} On this trip too, just hours after landing in our destination, we loaded our babies up in the car to travel from the ATL to the beautiful port town of Savannah.

As you can imagine, traveling by air, just to immediately get into a car for hours, can wear on anyone. Especially a baby.

Travel with Baby is not always easy, but definetly always worth it.

I don’t have any amazing tips on how to have a 100% stress-free experience, as I’m not sure “leave at least one strand of hair in your head” is good advice, but I will fill you in on some of the most ridiculous stunts I’ve pulled {other than my hair} to keep Alina happy in her car seat.

How To Stop Baby From Crying In Car Seat

In general, both of my kids are super easy to get into their car seats. They love an adventure! They also love their super comfy Britax car seats. It’s the part where you have to keep them in their car seat that gets tricky. Especially after long legs of travel that I described above. It can’t be only my kids that act like lunatics once they’ve got the car seat blues, right? Here are some of the biggest hair brained antics I’ve succumbed to in order to restore the peace while we travel with baby:

Back-bend triple twist with gold medal landing… just to get into the back seat of the car and tend to my maniacs.

Sing the same song over and over and over and…. ugh.

Oh-aren’t-you-the-happiest-baby-in-the-whole-entire-world-you-sweet-little-thing-you… in the most annoying voice ever.

While rattling 500 toys at once.

Snacks are always good… keep LOTS of snacks around.

Hey, we all like a fourth meal… they might still be hungry.

And a fifth… at least if they’re eating, they’re not crying. 

Wipe the vomit with my shirt… I always wear a tank top underneath anyway. Just in case.

And the ultimate most embarrassing thing I’ve done to keep my kid in HER car seat {thank God I haven’t had to do this with Sebastian}….

Breastfeed.

Yup. I breastfed my kid in a moving car {while still belted, if you can imagine, but please don’t} because we were stuck in wretched Los Angeles traffic and had already been on the road for 6 hours. D tried to pull over, to save me the agony, but I probably would have ripped his head off.

I guess my babies aren’t the only traveling maniacs

What is the most insane thing you’ve done to keep your baby in their car seat while traveling? Or was getting them into their car seat the biggest challenge?

*Disclosure: I am a proud Latina Britax Blogger and this post qualifies me for a chance to win a full sponsorship to Niche Mommy 2012 in New Orleans! Conferences are a source of education, they help bloggers network with each other and expose your brand to interested companies/organizations. Attending the inaugural Niche Mommy be amazing for the growth of De Su Mama and my professional goals. #NicheMommy12 would be my first conference ever!  I am beyond grateful to Joscelyn Campbell of Mami Innovative Media for this opportunity. Mucho amor, Amiga Wish me luck!