Infants and budget flightsApril 25, 2016
Next weekend we fly again.
It’s only been a few weeks since our last trip and so the memory is fresh. Every parent hopes their child will sleep, we’ve learnt to know better. Luckily our flight is usually under the 3 hour mark, but sleep is not on his radar. Our flights with an infant are now in double digits, and our hours stuffed into the cramped seat with a child on our knees begin to tally.
We fly budget, that means no seat for the under 2’s and no hand luggage for them either, just a pushchair you leave at the door, then a spare life-vest and seatbelt placed into your overfull hands as you board. It’s worth noting that the premium seats are not always available to you either as wing seats can not be occupied by the accompanying adults, however you do get priority boarding freely if you wish to use it.
I’ve learnt a few bits that make things a touch smoother. Any time you are crammed into a small seat with a child on your knee, be it on a plane or a bus, you’ll be blessing any preparation you do.
1. Check in the car-seat early but keep the pushchair
If your child is old enough to sit in the pushchair proper then walk in with the car-seat attached and ask to check it in early. You then have a pushchair to carry your bags and sometimes your child but without the weight or restrictiveness of the car-seat.
2. If you have assigned seats board late
Originally priority boarding for families with young children ensured they could get well placed seats together, now more and more budget airlines are giving assigned seats. If your seats are set you have no benefit from getting in early, it’s actually just more time you need to limit the movement of your child.
3. Use lightly packed small hand luggage
Pop the coats overhead and keep everything else at your feet, it’s much easier to access and if you move your child will want to follow. Overstuffed bags are really hard to get items in and out of, aim to have your bag three quarters full at most. Take half a packet of wet wipes and limit the number of bulky items like nappies and spare clothes.
5. Prepare your snacks
Snack pots already prepared with familiar things are best. Pre-chopped soft fruit and other wet items are usually our favourite. The plane is dry, keep the water cup topped up and offer it regularly. Buy a bottle of water on-board if necessary. We also always buy our ‘Adult’ food in duty free because it’s both cheaper and usually comes in resealable containers.
6. Carefully select your toys
Toys are probably the hardest thing to decide upon. We are blessed with a bookworm, but fine motor skills like threading work really well too. Using phones/tablets to play games or video’s are ok but beware the sound volume will need to be high. Generally speaking noisy toys, anything bulky and things with wheels don’t work so well. 6-7 items is our usual for any journey.
7. Let them walk
Even if your child doesn’t walk unaided, or at all, walking up and down the plane is a lovely way to let them wriggle a bit and stretch your own legs that have had their weight on them. Usually fellow passages are friendly and will engage little ones well. Free entertainment score!
8. Use free seats
This one is cheeky but worth doing. If you notice a row of free seats near you move there with your child. Other passengers often try to do this to lay down for sleep. If you are bold you can ask the staff if there are free rows of seats or if you are sharing a row you can hint to the other occupants and they may move instead!
9. Use the window
Isle side for movement or window side can be a close call if it’s just 2 or you travelling. Window side is better for the toddler as the view will usually fascinate them during take-off and landing when they are strapped in place. It’s also better for breastfeeding and more protective for a tiny one. That said, night flights and new walkers will probably be better isle side so they can easily stretch their legs.
10. Play the infant card
Lots of places have provisions and wavers for small children. Some airports have family friendly waiting areas with carpet and toys, some cultures wave parents with young children to the front of lines in both retail and customs. If asked politely most travellers will be happy to add 30 seconds to their journey to let you through. While it can feel awkward you need to swallow your hesitations and just gush appreciation.
Removing gracefully – the Commune retreat.April 15, 2016
Retreat is such an odd word in my head, I hear it shouted as a cry of defeat which is truly ridiculous because often backing away can be the most strategic way to win. I imagine the rest of the world must see them as our ‘Godly holidays’ but these times of pause are so valuable. Removing yourself from daily life gives a perspective that we just can’t find when in the hustle of our routines.
When ‘Velvet Ashes’ announced their on-line retreat this year and I jumped at the chance. With no flights or travel I splurged on a nice hotel with a pool and restaurant, both greatly appreciated as the heavens opened and lightening cracked. Knowing hubby and baby were safely at home I turned off the mummy button and breathed in the quietness about me. On a comfy bed I sat to work my way through a guide book, stream video’s and listen to the music that accompany it. Logistically you’ve given the tools and allowed to make your own schedule: mine read a bit like this (roughly an hour per part):
Check in
Scripture, meditation and prayer session 1
4 testimony videos
Holy yoga testimony video and workout + colouring page
Swim + sauna
Food
3 testimony videos + scripture, meditation and prayer session 2
Final video
Review
Swim + sauna
Prayer
Check out
What worked?
The session parts were good, especially the first. The testimony video’s felt a little long, I wish I’d broken them up a bit more, loved the latter ones and found some great truths in the stories. By booking for the first day of the retreat I couldn’t follow through the program with others around the world, the on-line discussion is set for Saturday, which was disappointing… however hotel rooms are cheaper on a Thursday night and 2 sessions in the sauna was simply heavenly. The colouring pages were lovely but I only half finished one, I think if there had been a group of us I’d not have had time for even that. The only part that really didn’t work was the yoga. 10 minutes in, as we were rolling around, the instructor said “Breath in his love, breath out your fear”… I just lost it, que puzzled look slowly turning into giggles. Everything lead up to the final session which sadly meandered a little and lost me at parts, but the overarching story of it spoke deeply.
If any VA people are reading I adored the song at the end, couldn’t find it on the audio files though 🙁
Was it worth it?
Retreats are great because they offer you space. Pennies wise it’s good value too, I could join people bi-yearly in the UK but it would cost a lot more. Yes, I could have read the psalm at home, but I know I wouldn’t have taken the time to underline and scribble notes. In the space my answers evolved, I ended up restarting as truth dawned. In the space the testimonies stood bare and exposed, their rawness cutting me, their stories nudging memories and maybes to the surface. I’m really aware how much I flit and float about, run on self imposed schedules and creative whim, I really needed the discipline and commitment of being away.
What did I walk away with?
The tag line of this retreat was Closer to Christ further from fear and fear is a theme that we all resonate with. I think the biggest thing I came to realise is that a lot of my fears are linked to my expectations, linked to the ideals I hold in my head. Though a process of grieving well and trusting in God’s plan over my own, many of these fears can dissipate like sugar in the rain.
I found myself returning to the idea that many of my deep worries were connected to my faith being anchored to community, not just of friends but of believers. I fear that I am unable to lift the weight of the tasks set before me without their collective strength. I think a lot of this comes from the fear stories of youth, if we do not surround ourselves with believers our faith will die, any kind of solo faith is insufficient in this view. However, God calls us to be with him, in him, commune with him as we are, he is enough and we are enough as we are. At the end of the time there was a questions: What has God had spoken to your heart? This was my answer:
My identity is in him,
My faith is in him,
My ability to share that faith is with him not a community of people.
Looking forward to next years retreat already. If your work moves you from community to community, overseas or not, I’d recommend the velvet ashes retreat. Linking up with Velvet Ashes – “It’s Time to Commune”
A new palletMarch 18, 2016
“How did Jesus actually die?” asked a small voice from the group of children who had been quizzing me on the old building that surrounded us. I was at the edge of the chancel in a church that betrayed a hotchpotch of generational changes, including the small stations of the cross that this class had come to examine. I looked at the child in question, this was no time for the simple answer, it was time for a story.
“He probably suffocated” I started, knowing that it was the unexpected answer, the accurate answer. “Crucifixion is like that. They would take a wooden beam and place it in the ground, the second wooden beam is the one across the shoulders” I slowly raised one arm then the next. “Arms would have been tied in place and then long thick nails would have been pushed against your wrists, there’s a bone there, they won’t rip like your hands might” Out of the corner of my eye I could see the other groups had stopped to watch, I dropped my arms to swing the hammer, breathed in a huge breath to show the effort of breathing – I was a storyteller and I was painting a masterpiece. By the end of the description the building was quiet, the children downcast, the air thick. How I delighted in then dusting the miracle of Easter… that this wasn’t the end of the story. In a hushed voice I told how we believe this suffering was a battle, and though Jesus died he won the war, he rose again.
The spell broken, the room shook off the trance and returned to it’s activity. I loved my job, I loved being paid to tell these stories, to make the dry words alive, to dream ways of bringing the intangible miracle of a personal relationship with the divine to the youngsters I met. When the position ended I couldn’t imagine not continuing to work in the same field. Countless interviews and some ugly experiences later, with a mission trip under my belt and a wedding ring on my finger it was still unbearable to think I’d never one day return to that place.Could God really leave me like a painter with no canvass?
I remember boldly declaring at the age of 10 that I’d one day write material for Sunday School. I thought I’d probably become a teacher back then, but this declaration was more prophetic than I would have imagined. As a children’s worker I had dipped in my toes composing and editing material, but now so far from that church I believed I was called to serve, so far from the middle England my heart broke for, I was finally fulfilling those words. This time I wouldn’t be the storyteller in the room, for my words were mangled by translation before they reached the ears of the children I encountered. But my artistic nature ended up bursting out in different ways. I learnt to draw in vectors, to sculpt lines into clothing and expressions, to lay down one pallet of intonation and emphasis for another of curve and contour. I continued to write, this time for the inspiration of others, and let my creative imagination pour into games and crafts. It wasn’t the same, it’s not the same.
We always long for the same.
We long for the favourite artists brush, the almost completed painting, the familiar, for the blank canvass is scary. Writing material isn’t being in the room with the faces that hang on your every word, there is no watching the spark ignite in the faceless inspiration. Where I am is serving a bigger picture than I could every have done back then, it’s a truth I grasp tightly. Another comforter I hug into is that only by having the experience of standing where I did then can I serve as I am now. Recreating our memories paintings is not what God has called us to. I firmly believe God equipped us with skills for a purpose, and it’s our aim to find those places we can use the skills to glorify him. God did not promise to fulfil every desire of our hearts, he promised to fill our lonely spaces with his presence, to push us further along the pathway and match our footsteps along the way.
In the hearts of all who are skillful I have put skill, that they may make all that I have commanded you (exodus 31:6)
Linking up with Velvet Ashes where the theme this week is “Art”