Tips for Travelling With Kids

I am finally decompressing from our trip and decided to share some of the stuff that helped us during our trip. Travelling with kids can be really stressful but some things really made our trip easy.

Tips for Travelling With Kids

1. Pack the Kids an Activity Kit – I went to the Dollar store and grabbed a bunch of new items for the kids to use while on the plane and waiting around in airports. Items like colouring books, new crayons, books, and new headphones so that they could watch shows on their devices made travelling with four kids a breeze. Give each child their own backpack so everything is organized and your kids are well behaved during the flights. Also, get a travel pillow and blanket to entice your kids to nap 🙂
2. Take Naps – Try and do all of your hardcore activities in the morning and get some midday zzz’s if you can. We spent about 7 hours in the water each day and it wasn’t until midway through our trip that I started to take naps with the younger kids midday. It meant we were able to stay up later at night and take in the entertainment the resort put on.
3. Bring Your Stroller – My youngest kids are 4 and 5 and although they do not use a stroller at home bringing it on vacation was nonnegotiable. It helped us get priority boarding and gave us access to very short lineups at all the airports. It also provided somewhere for our kids to rest (and sleep) once they became exhausted that didn’t require one of the parents to be in the room with them.
4. Download Shows On Your Devices – Whether you are for or against devices they can be a real help while away. There were moments when the kids were getting restless or when we ushered them to the room to hide from the sun that having shows downloaded via Netflix app and the Rogers app really saved us.
5. Pack a Full First Aid Kit – With four kids I never travel without a fairly abundant first aid kit but I don’t really expect to use it. This trip one of our kids seemed to be crazy allergic to everything including one brand of sunscreen we brought with us. Packing items for fever, allergies, pain relief, Gravol as well as sunburn relief will save you a TON of money if you don’t need to buy it on the resort.
6. Get Sun Blocking Swimsuits – We spent an insane amount of time slathering on sunscreen every hour on ourselves and still got sunburnt. Two of our kids had sun blocking swimsuits and it let their skin be protected and saved us some time on applying sunscreen on only exposed skin. We ended up using 6 full-sized sunscreen bottles in only 7 days while on vacation as well as having to spend $30USD on a bottle of sunscreen for our kids who was allergic to the sunscreen I had.
7. Bring More Than Enough Money – Next time we travel we will be taking $1000 USD with us as a family of 6 because even at an all-inclusive there were costs. Between tips, taxis, medicine, trinkets, memorabilia, and food at the airport, we had to exchange money a few times while at the resort and the exchange rate is 50%. So $100 Canadian dollars became $50 USD when it should have been $75. We were lucky though and knew that the casino on the resort would give us the fair market exchange so we went daily to swap there.
8. Always Haggle – If you were looking to master the art of getting a bargain, practice while away. The first price they give you is never the actual price and when it came time for us to get trinkets for the kids we always ended up paying about 1/5 of the first price they gave us.
9. Snacks – Make sure you pack a ton of snacks for the plane ride or you will be paying for it every time the food and beverage cart goes by. Also, try not to pack snacks that are full of sugar because kids + sugar makes for horrible travel. I packed some snack bags on our trip so I could bring some pastries from the resort on our trip home.

Do you have anything to add? We’ve already got two more trips planned in the next year and I would love to make them as stress-free as possible.

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Aneta Alaei

Aneta is a Toronto-based mom of four that loves a good meal, great company, and learning something new. In her free time, you can find her trying to keep yet another plant alive.

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