Sunday, January 23, 2011

Traveling with a Toddler



This weekend we went away for a night. Steve had a work thing to go to so the hotel room was free. I volunteered to spend the evening with Miles. The pictures above was Miles and I relaxing early in the evening before everything unraveled into chaos. "What a deal for me" I thought. Miles and I took a train in to town, walked around for a while until we found a place to eat and then came back to the hotel room. It was close to 8:00 pm so that was a great time to put Miles to bed. I was so excited to put him down and then lay in bed and read. I wouldn't have a cat jumping on me and I could spend the time completely alone.


What I got was a screaming toddler. I knew he would not like being put to bed in unfamiliar surroundings, but I was sure he would settle down after about an hour. That did not happen. He cried for an hour. I then picked him up and turned on the TV (Miles never gets to watch TV so it is very exciting for him when he does). Unfortunately, I couldn't figure out how to get to the TV so all I had was the free videos. I first picked a review of a childrens' movie. That lasted 5 minutes. I needed something that lasted longer. Next I chose a workout video (I didn't have many choices). The workout video was targeting abs and since I plan to get into a swim suit this summer I thought it would be a great learning opportunity. Well it turned out to be a pretty interesting 20 minute work out video so I thought I would give it a try. I put Miles back in his crib and watched it again, this time while participating. While I was working out, Miles was in his crib throwing everything out saying, "Kitty out. Giraffe out. Blankie out. Other blankie out. Miles out?" followed by him banging on the wall and opening and closing closet doors very loudly.


After finishing my workout, which was pretty intense, I moved the crib so Miles could not touch any walls. I then turned out all the lights so it was pitch black in the room. At this point, it was around 10:00 pm. Miles started screaming as loud as he could. I was tired and grumpy and did not last very long. I picked Miles up and again turned on the TV. This time, I found a free video called "Sleep" that showed calming images while playing calming music. We watched it three times before Miles finally fell asleep in my arms. At that point, it was 11:00 pm. I was exhausted, and Steve was on his way back to the hotel. I didn't get any quiet time to myself, I was all wound up and my muscles were aching so I didn't sleep well, then Miles wakes up promptly at 7:30 am.


Lessons learned, don't expect relaxation when traveling with toddlers and keep your expectations low when it comes to "me" time.

3 comments:

Belkycita said...

Oh dear!
I'm so sorry. At least you got a nice work out.

I can tell you that it gets better, and that they get used to it.

liz j said...

So true!

Thomas and Jamie said...

Uh oh! Things for us to look forward to.

Sorry you weren't able to get any "me" time, it's definitely something that is hard to come by with a small child/baby.