Holiday Travel with Kids
If there were every two words that went together, they are
"holiday" and "travel". They can be a pain in the neck during
the holidays if you travel with kids.
Holiday Travel
I happen to be a big fan of the Christmas televisions shows. I
happily admit that I am still a fan of the Grinch, the island of
toys and, of course, Rudolf. Alas, one can't help buy notice
none of these shows make any mention of holiday travel. While we
occasionally see Santa in his sleigh, he certainly isn't sitting
in a depressing airport lounge waiting for a four hour flight
delay to pass.
Holidays are a great time because they give you a chance to
loaf. If you're traveling out of town to a family home, you can
anticipate spending a few days of eating too much, sleeping a
lot, watching football and pretending to explain gifts to a
child while you are really playing with them. Everyone looks
forward to these family gatherings.
Nobody looks forward to actually going through the process of
traveling to family gatherings. Travel by airplane, and you have
to sit in crowded airports, suffer through connecting flights,
pray the weather doesn't act up and, of course, wedge yourself
into a seat made for a super model. There is also that moment of
apprehension when the plane is loading and you hope not to get
stuck to "drunk guy", "gonna get sick guy", "cute, hyperactive
child" or an insurance salesman. All of these downfalls are
multiplied when you travel with your kids.
Being a child is about having fun and exploring your
surroundings. Sitting in an airport for 5 hours is not conducive
to such things. The old Stapelton Airport in Denver used to have
a giant waiting room that was painted in dark red. When the
weather acted up, it was like getting a 10 hour preview of hell.
As miserable as you might be with delays, your child will be ten
times worse off. So, what do you do?
In this age of the gadget, there is always the video game. There
problem, however, is there something disturbing about watching a
child's eyes glaze over as he digitally kills monsters, other
humans or whatever happens to be on the screen. One has to
wonder what society will be like in another 20 years or so when
these video game experts come to the forefront.
A better solution to your child's boredom would be to get them
engrossed in something that actually helps their minds grow.
Books are great, particularly the latest installment of Harry
Potter which is sure to keep them engrossed for a few hours.
Another option is to give the writing journals, and tell them to
write down things such as their impressions of the trip, all the
important things they experienced during 2005 and so on. Both of
these options will keep them from being miserable as well as
develop a skill other than pressing a button as fast as humanely
possible.