I know for sure I’m not the first Mum blogger to write about holidaying with kids and I won’t be the last, I feel the general consensus between parents is that ‘Holiday’ is perhaps not the most accurate word. Change of location perhaps? Trip away maybe? Call it what you will but ‘Holiday’ it is not. I prefer the title ‘Time Out’ for us that’s what it was, not a rest, not a break but time out. We always seem to have somewhere to be, some sort of appointment, meeting or activity and although my kids don’t really do relaxing some Time Out to be busy just having fun is what we needed.
Travelling with three kids five and under one of whom is physically disabled wasn't the easiest task we'd ever set ourselves but we muddled through and survived, just and it meant that we could have some much needed family time and see some well missed sunshine. It did of course come with the few ‘Holiday’ pet hates that you have to overcome in order to actually ever go on holiday. I am going to share mine with you and please feel free to let me know what yours are.
1 ‘Holiday’ shopping - I'm so unorganised its always done in a panic normally the day before we leave and it’s just really stressful. I don’t know why because actually it doesn’t matter if I forget anything as we aren’t traveling to the middle of the jungle so I could probably just get when we’re there. Before kids holiday shopping was a little pre holiday treat but now it’s just a pain in the arse. Luckily the time of year we went away this year meant that I could still squeeze the biggest one and middle one into their summer clothes from last year and being a third child the littlest one has plenty of hand me downs so that was them sorted. Yay. I of course just chucked in the same summer clothes I’ve had for the past 100 years including a few trusty old bikinis from before I had kids that haven’t been worn enough to start going see through. On past ‘Holidays’ these have done just fine however after fairly recently growing a third child my body decided it was not going to be quite as forgiving as is was with the first two and it was quite evident that my swimwear was purchased when my arse was a little smaller and my boobs a little bigger so I spent the week with a bit of arse overflow and looking like I had a pair of udders in a couple of hanging baskets. MOOOOOO.
Never mind it could have been worse, they could have actually finally gone see through. Moving on.....
2 Packing - Uuurrrggghhhhh!!!!! Enough said.
3 Flying with Kids - Sorry there is no way to be polite about this........it’s fucking shite! I can literally only think of one good thing about flying with children and that is that once they are on the plane they can’t get lost. Quite frankly that is one thing I would have quite liked. It was hell, pure hell, 6 long hours of hell. We unfortunately had the dreaded get delayed once you’re on the plane scenario so the toddler lost her shit and wanted to get off before we had even left the ground and the baby who never sleeps in the day didn’t want to let the side the down so put up a good fight to stay awake for as long as humanly possible and made sure the whole plane were well aware of her efforts. Luckily we had a night flight on the way back and with a teeny bit of bribery involved they managed to redeem themselves. When I say a teeny bit of bribery what I actually mean is my husband promised the kids a playhouse if the were good! A playhouse!!!??? Who bribes their kids with a fucking playhouse.!?!? A couple of chocolate biscuits would have probably done the trick! Anyway they behaved so all was good in the world and I got to be the smug Mum with three sleeping children on the plane.
4 The transfer - Whenever we go away, where ever we go away, however close it says online (or in the brochure) that our resort is from the airport we are always the last bloody people on the bus! Always! We always get a budget tour of the whole flipping island with a screechy shouty holiday rep inaudibly waffling into the mic at the front while we make a note to hire a car next time. We are yet to remember to do this. Next time we WILL hire a car.
So apart from these teeny weeny little things that we HAD to do in order to go on ‘Holiday’ it was great. And it came just at the right time. In the last six months the biggest one has started school, received another new diagnosis and become a big brother all over again. My baby has had to adjust to no longer being the baby but becoming the middle child and a big sister, and our gorgeous little rainbow baby's first six months have flown by and I feel we've been so busy I haven't had time to really get to know who she is. Some Time Out together getting to know each other again now we all have a new place in the family is exactly what we needed. Everyday life still carried on, I still had to pound the streets with the pram trying to get missy to sleep but it was lovely to do so wandering between palm trees in the sunshine. The kids still wanted attention and entertaining and it was lovely to have the time to give them all the attention they craved and let them take as much time as they wanted to do things. When Wild Child wanted to sniff 800 flowers, pick up every single rock, pretend to be an airoplane or crawl along the floor being an ant she could. We didn't have anywhere to be or anyone to please except those that really mattered to us. It makes me sad that sometimes life sort of gets in the way of life. Time is so precious and it’s something you can never get back. I’m not going to start believing I should cherish every moment as we are so often told because there are times I would rather push to the back of my mind, the plane journey out is fairly high upon that list, but I am going to start taking more Time Out to just BE. Time to know my children more, I don't doubt that I know them pretty well already but I mean know them in that exact moment what is going through their little head right there, right then. And Time Out to watch them getting to know one and other more. The relationship between the older two has absolutely blossomed from having more time together (My Little Holland did have a bonus four weeks off school following his epilepsy mishap.... yeah 4 weeks, three kids all day! Well done to mums/dads who do this all the time) , don't get me wrong they wind each other up something chronic but to take the Time Out to watch it is funny and heartwarming. Watching how they handle each other not behaving how they want or expected the other one to, problem solving together, how the middle one helps the big one without smothering him, how he helps her understand when she doesn't quite get it and how they both want to involve the baby and how much her face lights up when they give her attention. Each day I watch them grow and especially the middle one at the moment I can see changing from a toddler into a little girl right before my eyes (god help us for the threenager phase) One day they'll be grown up and I will be able to go on Holiday and treat myself to some new swimwear in a pre holiday shopping spree and I'm pretty sure I'm going to enjoy it but for now I am happy to take a deep breath and mutter 'for fuck sake' quietly under my breath as another drink gets spilt, the Wild Child makes a run for it again, the baby gets woken up by the shouty rep and enjoy some time out with my family, and I'm looking forward to doing it again and again....except next time we will hire a car...and maybe not go quite so far...and maybe put the kids on a separate flight...
