How to Keep Your Children Happy When You're Traveling On an Airplane

Keep your children occupied when you're traveling on an airplane.

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Small backpack or bag (one for each child that is traveling)
• Snacks (small ones that are prepackaged)
• Paper or coloring books
• Crayons or colored pencils
• Small games (such as peg games or magnetic tic tac toe)
• Small electronic games (if you have them)
• A good children's book (one that you can read to them)
• A word search book (one with large print)

1. The first thing you'll need is a back pack or a small bag. You should have one for each child that is traveling with you. That way they have their own things to do, if the other child is playing with something that they don't want to play with. The key is to have something to keep the child entertained during the plane ride. Children will only stare out the window for so long, or look at the boring (adult) magazines in the seat pocket in front of them.

2. Remember to put baby wipes in your bag just for emergency spills, or just to wipe off faces and hands. That way you don't have to keep getting up to go to the bathroom on the plane for clean ups.

3. Put the prepackaged snacks in plastic Ziploc bags. Again make sure that each child has their own plastic bag of snacks. It is always best to give each child the SAME thing, so that their is no fighting over who has what.

4. You can keep the children's book in your bag if it doesn't fit in your child's carry-on bag. Make sure it's an interesting child's book, so that it keeps their attention when you're reading it to them.

5. Pack each child with a game (if you can) when packing up the their bags. If they have to share the games, then it's best that you put it in your carry-on bag so there is no fighting over that.

6. You can also put a surprise in each child's bag. Pack something that only she/he would like a lot. That way when they're going through their bag(s) they find it. Maybe a special snack they like, or a small word find book, or a comic book they like to read.

7. If you can arrange for all the children to sit near you on the plane, that is the best way to keep control of the situation. If you aren't able to do that, it never hurts to ask if someone will trade seats with you. Just explain that you want to sit closer to your children. More than likely they'll trade with you.

8. Make sure to tell your child (children) that you packed their bags just for this plane ride to...., that way they'll feel special about their very own back pack or bag they are carrying.

9. More than likely if you have more than one child, they will not be doing the same things at the same time. You can encourage them to play together, that will help to keep them occupied. Get them to play tic tac toe together, or teach them how to play hangman if they don't know how to play that already.

10. When signs of boredom are starting to show, that is when you get out the children's book and read out loud to all of them. Ask the other children to put away whatever they're doing. Make it a family thing. You can even ask the children that can read, to read parts of the book as you go along.

11. Try to do snacks when the flight attendants are handing out the drinks. That is a good time to do that, then you can clean up when they come back through to pick up the trash.

12. Try to keep them occupied, that is the key. If you run out of things to do, you can always look out the window and try to find animals (or whatever) in the shape of the clouds. Or you can look at the (adult) magazine in the seat pocket in front of you, and try to find something in the magazine. Like say to the child (children), see if you can find a dog in your magazine, how many can you find, something like that. Make a game out of it. Once again the key is keeping the child (children) occupied so that they do not get bored during the flight.