Traveling with a baby, a toddler, and a preschooler in 2021 might sound crazy to some parents. We definitely got a few raised eyebrows when we told friends about our plan to fly to California with all 3 kids for a long weekend! When the wedding of close friends was bumped because of the pandemic, we decided to re-route ourselves to San Diego and bring the kids along for the trip. It ended up being a great decision that provided tons of amazing memories!

Travel Preparations for Kids

The main question I got from other parents was “how do you travel with 3 kids under the age of 5??” with trepidation in their eyes…

The answer: very deliberately. Hah! Trust me, it took weeks of planning to pull off our trip with only a couple snafus. A few tips really made the trip work for us:

• Packing with a color scheme for the whole family
• Planning for tons of snacks and special entertainment
• Prepping the kids ahead of time for what to expect on the flight

Packing with a color scheme is my favorite tip and I will never pack differently ever again! 😀 It really worked SO well and eliminated the stress of trying to decide what each child (and myself) would wear. For this trip I settled on olive green, blue, neutrals, and denim. I picked jean shorts for myself and the boys, neutral t-shirts and sweaters, and a few pops of olive green: a jumpsuit for me that I LOVED wearing, and the boys favorite joggers that are so comfy for traveling.

Planning for tons of snacks is also essential. If you think you have enough, pack 2x more. Seriously. You can’t over-pack the snacks! I packed an extra diaper bag with granola bars, fruit snacks, empty water bottles to fill after security checks, veggie straws, and yogurt melts for the baby. During our stay in San Diego, I made a Target stop to re-fill the snack bag for the trip home.

Prepping the kids ahead of time for what to expect on the flight really worked in our favor. We got them excited about it a few days in advance and talked about how much fun our adventure would be! We gave them new masks, talked about how we needed to stay together and hold hands in the airport, and even discussed being patient while we waited in security, rental car lines, and hotel check-in. I’m so proud of how they handled the entire trip! I truly believe our conversations beforehand played a huge part in their behavior.

Hotel and Transportation

Since this is 2021 and many people haven’t decided to brave air-travel yet, our hotel was nearly empty. We had the entire floor to ourselves! With 3 kiddos, staying in 1 room is almost impossible if we want to get any sleep. I have friends who can accomplish this with 4 kids (!!) but for our family, it’s either 2 rooms or a suite. This time we had a suite with a queen bed plus crib in the bedroom and a sleeper couch in the outer area. Fun fact in case you didn’t know: you can call your hotel ahead of time and ask for a crib so you don’t have to travel with a pack n’ play. One less item to drag through the airport.

It worked out really well for the older boys to share the sleeper couch since they are already used to sleeping together at home. I brought their white noise machines and one of our baby monitor cameras so I could keep an eye on them from the bedroom.

When we were new parents, we thought our only option when traveling was to bring our own car seats. It only took 2 exhausting trips for us to figure out that we could rent them. 😉 Enterprise gave us a Ford Expedition for this trip, complete with 2 toddler seats and an infant seat. We were so impressed by how quickly they got us on the road! No long line, and the car seats were already installed. My husband was thrilled to drive a brand new SUV around San Diego for the weekend, and it’s a great way to test out a family vehicle.

Food and Fun

The best part of traveling (for us) is getting to explore different food scenes! My oldest son and I have Celiac disease, and that definitely makes our choices a little trickier. It didn’t take long for us to find some amazing options though. I compiled a guide to gluten-free San Diego restaurants that we loved! If you have food restrictions, I suggest using google maps and searching for specific foods, ie: “gluten free burger” or “vegan mac and cheese”. You’ll be surprised how many places pop up!

Finding things to do in a beach town is never too hard. We explored Coronado Island, visited the San Diego zoo (which had just re-opened the weekend before our trip), walked around downtown, watched boats in the marina, played at parks, and of course, dipped our toes in the very cold Pacific Ocean! Keeping our boys entertained was much easier than I anticipated. They were fascinated by the change of scenery, different people, and all the planes, trains, boats, trucks, and bulldozers we encountered while walking around town.

Safety Precautions

Wont it be amazing to travel without health worries? Someday soon. But for now, here’s our experience with pandemic-style travel.

• Masks on the plane – Contrary to popular horror stories floating around, United Airlines employees were understanding about our 2-year-old struggling to keep a mask on. Another good reason to pack a ton of snacks and distracting toys!
• Sanitizing at the hotel – as I mentioned earlier, no one else was on our floor. The staff were very hands-off during our stay. We dropped trash outside the door for no-contact pick up, and they didn’t come into the room unless we requested cleaning. Since it was a short weekend, we never needed it.

Home and Happy!

Going into the trip, I honestly didn’t have the highest expectations for our sanity. 😉 But with lots of prep work, and planning for worst-case scenarios (ie: bored kids trapped on a plane), we made it home with lots of amazing family memories.

Even if your kids are small and won’t remember all the things you do, say, or experience, plan trips anyway. The memories will stay with YOU forever!

xx Barbi