Photo Credit: K. Rose Photography
Well, you’ve welcomed twins into your family, settled into your new role as a twin mom, and can’t take much more of the countless hours you have spent on Facetime with your out-of-town family and friends.
So now it is time to bite the bullet and plan a trip across country with your twins so Grandma Ida will stop heckling you and get her chance to pinch some plump baby cheeks!
Traveling with twins can look a bit like a circus and preparing for your trip can feel like a daunting task.
With quite a bit of traveling experience under our belts, we promise that with our preparation tips, you won’t be replaying the scene from Home Alone over and over in your head.
We laid awake many nights tortured with the thought that we would be racing through the airport with a ton of gear only to find out that we had left one of our twins in the car.
While that likely WON’T happen, you don’t want to find yourself in a bind when traveling with twins. That is precisely why we are here to help you plan and prepare, ensuring your actual travel day is a SUCCESS!
Before we get started, you should know that we are making some assumptions about your situation.
- You are traveling with infants, and by this we mean generally immobile babbling tiny humans. Traveling with toddlers is whole different can of worms.
- You are traveling with your twins as lap babies, meaning they won’t have a paid seat of their own.
- You and your partner are traveling together….because who is crazy enough to travel with twins ALONE (Is that even possible?)!
7 Tips to Easily Prepare You for Traveling With Twins (Infants):
1. Be in the know before you go:
Knowing each airlines basic policies about traveling with lap babies will help in planning your trip and ensure that you are choosing the most cost effective options for your trip.
All major U.S. airlines allow lap infants free of charge to travel with a ticketed adult, who is the baby’s legal guardian.
Strollers and car seats can be included with your checked baggage (not counting as part of your baggage allowance). However, lap infants do not get a baggage allowance, so any luggage checked (aside from strollers and carseats) will be lumped into the accompanying adult’s allowance.
If your child (as young as 15 days old) will be occupying their own seat on the plane, you must purchase a separate ticket at the full adult fare.
2. Layovers only complicate things:
When searching for flights, aim to fly directly to your final destination.
As adults, layovers are taxing….we all know that long travel days take a lot out of us. Intuitively then, long travel days will be even more challenging for your babies.
When possible, opt for a direct flight to simplify your life when traveling with twins.
3. Know your limitations:
We have already suggested that you try to shorten your trip by flying directly to your final destination, but to go along with that, we suggest that you think about any additional travel (via car, bus, train, etc.) that your trip may require after you land.
If your trip requires a lot of additional traveling after you have disembarked the airplane, consider staying the night and continuing on the next day.
It may seem silly, but driving several hours with cranky babies after being on an airplane is only going to be torture for you.
We know you want to get to your destination, but wouldn’t it be more pleasant to arrive with a happy family rather than two angry babies and stressed out parents!?
4. Flight Times and Your Babies’ Schedule:
We know you LOVE your babies dearly, but you don’t have to pretend that you don’t LOVE when your babies are sleeping!
You can’t necessarily control airline schedules, but aim to buy flights that are scheduled to take of close to your twins’ nap or bedtimes.
Sleeping babies on a plane will make you a much happier mama!
5. Seating arrangements:
When flying with lap infants, there are several things to know when it comes time to choose seats for your flight. Depending on your airline, you may be assigned seats when you buy your ticket, when you check in, or you will choose where to sit when you get on the plane (when traveling on Southwest).
So mama, know these few things:
First, sit in the aisle seats across from your partner.
This is where traveling with twins as lap infants get’s a little trickier. Per FAA regulations, you cannot have more than one lap infant per row, which is related to the number of oxygen masks available in each row.
If you and your partner sit in the aisle you will be able to easily get up on demand and you can also pass the twins back and forth when you need to make a switch!
Second, choose a seat near the back of the plane. Not only will you have white noise to hopefully soothe your babies to sleep, but you will also have noise to drown out the sound of screaming (which hopefully won’t happen).
Being in the back of the plane also enables you to have easy access to the bathroom, the changing table and it gives you a little additional room to bounce your twins during the flight.
6. Packing 101:
Make a packing list and STICK TO IT!
You don’t want to bring a bunch of unnecessary stuff on your trip….you will have plenty to lug if you just pack the necessities!
Trust us, by the time you add up baby clothes, feeding items, diapers and toys, your luggage will quickly reach the 50 pound weight limit.
Really….
You don’t need to bring that extra cute board book you think you might read to your kiddos ONE TIME (ehem…weight limit, remember).
Whoa baby, long gone are the days of throwing a few things into a carry-on and jet-setting to a destination wedding with mid-flight cocktails! Traveling with two babies means that packing can take a wee bit more time.
With a packing list, you can relax a bit and have your cocktails WHILE you’re packing.
Join the Two Came True Community today to gain access to our FREE printable packing list AND our FREE RESOURCE LIBRARY. Our resources will help you to make sure you can pack efficiently and don’t forget anything!
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Shop online:
The fortunate thing about raising kids this day in age is all of the amazing online shopping sites that include FREE shipping!
To save yourself some space and the stress of making everything fit in a limited number of bags, use a site like diapers.com or amazon.com to order and ship a supply of diapers, wipes, formula, baby food and non-perishable snacks to get you through the entire trip.
It’s a nice feeling to arrive at your destination and have everything already waiting for you!
Prepare for the worst:
Air travel can be a bit unpredictable.
The last thing you want is to find yourself delayed without enough diapers or food for your twins. While shipping supplies to your destination saves space and stress, make sure that you are prepared with extra food and diapering supplies to get you by in case of a delay.
Traveling with twins, especially for the first time, can seem overwhelming. The key to reducing your anxiety and successfully preparing for your trip is knowing some of the logistics that with simplify your life as you plan. Regardless, the more you know and the more prepared you are, the smoother your trip will be.
Stay tuned for our next post…the logistics of navigating through the airport with your twin babies!
Have you traveled with your twins before? Do you have any great tips that we didn’t include? We’d love to hear how you prepare to travel with twins!
Let’s talk in the comments below.
