Success! Summer travel w/ 3-year old twins.

After a miserable 2010 travel summer, we were reluctant to try again (see:  http://twinlittlemonkeys.blogspot.com/2011/06/terrible-twos-times-two-flight-or-what.html) but try we did, with some adjustments as well as a year of maturing the monkeys.

I would say it was an unequivocal success.  Dada would likely disagree, but his success threshhold is unrealistic. 

What worked:

• Divide and conquer - we each picked a kid and on the plane, it was as if we were on separate trips.  We each had our own carryons filled with what we needed for that kid.  We were on Southwest, and did Early Bird checkin for the parents, so we boarded A and sat Window/Middle in consecutive rows.
• Practice - prior to the trip, we did some practice time watching our favorite movies on the ipad and laptop with headphones on.  Baby B doesn't love things on his head, so the practice was helpful so that the headphones weren't new and scary.  We also talked a lot about seatbelts on airplanes and seeing Nonnie and Papa.  And practiced wearing our backpacks.
• Preparation - on both the laptop (for Dada and Baby B) and the ipad (for Baby A), I loaded up about 13 hours of movies and Elmo videos.  I mostly stuck with tried and true favorites that I know keep their attention, but I did add a couple Shiny New Movies just in case that would be fun.  Didn't take up any physical space in the carryons, so why not.
• 10,000 foot distractions - before we were free to turn on the electronics, I brought some Shiny New sticker books.  Best part was rather than stickers that end up on everything (I still can't get the dinosaurs off my cell phone) they were clingy static stickers.  We left a lot behind, but not on my phone.  I had a few other favorite books stuck in their backpacks too.
• Pullups - Baby A had recently decided he was done with diapers, but still is uncertain about new potties, so he and I discussed pullups and he was ok wearing one.  Fortunate, because the only time he had to 'go' was when the plane was in heavy turbulence or in the final descent.
• Snacks - we were flying out of a gate area with limited concessions, so I did bring a full contingent of snacks.  The best trick was freezing some yogurt tubes.  They stayed cold, but by the time we were eating them, were thawed.  (Not sure about TSA's current position on yogurt as a solid, liquid or gas, I stuffed all 8 tubes into a quart sized bag and declared them at security.  My experience with cream cheese almost getting me thrown in jail is a topic for another blog).  And although the boys normally drink from cups with straws, we went to a sippy cup for the flight.  I know our limits.

What didn't work:

• Layover - we had a 2 hour layover in Vegas.  This is too long.  Also, the boys were hungry, but only wanted smoothies.  Of course we couldn't find any.  Strawberry milkshakes came close, but Baby B wasn't fooled.
• Fraternal Twins - no matter what, one boy is always going to be better than the other.  And the parent sitting with the Angel looks bad to the other parent. But frankly, there's nothing you can do about this. And I'm not afraid to admit that much of this could be the parent rathe than the child.  (I'm not afraid to admit this because my boy was the angel).  But honestly, Baby B was much better than I think we expected.  He just was antsy and didn't do well on the descent on our final flight.
• Bedtime - as an 'experiment' we flew later in the evening.  Our flight out of Vegas left around bedtime for the boys and we landed at about 1:00am.  We thought they'd sleep.  Ha.  As soon as we landed and got them in their stroller, they zonked out.  Not a moment before.
• Parent entertainment - in a million years, we didn't expect that we'd have any 'me time', but we did!  Since I was the planner, I optimistically stuck in my Kindle, but about an hour into the long flight, there was a little tap on my shoulder asking "what did you bring for me".  The best I could offer was the headphone splicer and the second half of Cars Movie.  Sorry, Dada.

Would we do it again?  Absolutely.  Did I think I could make it on a solo flight with them 2 weeks later?  Tune in to my next post to find out :)