A Work In Progress: A 3 year old's trip to India

Preparations in Progress

Searching for unique tribal Rabari embroideries to study and photograph, we are traveling to remote Kutch in Gujarat, India with our toddler. Many might consider us insane, and I may begin to agree. But I'll be taking candy, lots of candy!

Halloween is the perfect holiday and it's my favorite. And we're going to miss it this year. I was so preoccupied planning our trip that I hadn't realized we would be traveling that day. Not until my 2 year old found her Halloween basket from last year and my heart sank as she excitedly gushed about this year. No Halloween in India.

Contemplating this revelation, an Idea struck - one of those wild ideas you get from being the mother of a toddler and your brain is already consumed with preparing for the next catastrophe in advance. A plan formulates, evolving to include candy in our luggage and hoping that no one minds a miniature Storm Trooper. Begging hotel staff and fellow travelers to hand our daughter Halloween candy is suddenly an option. It's a bold plan with one major drawback: will I have the courage to do it?

So this new plan is added to the "Crazy Potty Training Before The Trip" and the "Gaining Back 10 Pounds On Gujarati Thalis" plans on my ever-increasing list of things to organize for our departure. Packing lists are on hold while I scrutinize every piece of kids travel equipment that exists to find what we need, hoping to keep our luggage to the size of a small hill rather than a mountain. (We took an embarrassing amount of luggage to Thailand last year!) There are three weeks left to get ready, can we do it? (Down to two weeks and counting now...)

Currently Searching For:

1. Halloween Candy - Something that my daughter will like and that won't be as likely to melt either in the bags or in the hand. Purchased so far: Teddy Grahams Halloween treats,



2. A new car seat - We think we've located the one we want and I'll be ordering it next week. In the meantime we're starting to get our daughter used to the idea of a new car seat. I will probably let her look at the color choices tonight so that she can help choose and start being excited about the change. (This worked extremely well for her new travel bed when she outgrew her Pack'n'Play).



3. Airport Toddler Transport - a way to get through the huge airports quickly and efficiently without all the stuff that we lugged with us to Thailand. We want something easy to use and safe and that will get through airport security like a breeze.

Found!

1. Shae by Air by Little Lima Bean Productions - a DVD that teaches toddlers the wonder of airline travel. We had read the reviews of this product in several places and they were always excellent. Rightly so. Our daughter LOVES this video. She has asked to watch it every day since we got it, and is even more excited about the trip than before. She continually repeats Shae's motto: "I'm a good little traveler" whenever we talk about going on a plane. Addendum: We will have to have goldfish and raisins on the plane with us since that's what the little girl in the video eats as her snack on the plane. Our daughter has already informed us that she expects to have these items available, lol.



2. Peapod Plus Travel Bed by Kidco, Inc. - We wanted a compact and easy to carry travel bed that our daughter liked. When we found the Peapod we were ecstatic. Not only was it light and collapsed nice and small, it had built in mosquito netting. She was introduced to the idea by letting her look at the website and see the pictures of it, she agreed that it looked like fun and was excited that we were going to buy it. And indeed, she really loves this bed.



3. Squeaky Shoes from the China Direct Store - These days we consider the squeaky shoes to be our security blanket. Most people seem to think that they are cute but that we are crazy to want to listen to the squeaks with every step. On the contrary, we are relieved to hear them! It is when she's in 'sneaky' shoes that we get jumpy! Of course, we only let her wear the squeakies when in large crowded places where we need to keep track of her. Does she get to wear them in the house? No way! But they really do help us know exactly where she is and how fast she's going at all times. We can't lose her and we love the squeaks.



4. Radian 65 Car Seat by Sunshine Kids Products - The new car seat arrived yesterday. So far we all agree it's awesome! Sleek and streamlined, it has a steel frame and is approved for airlines. And - IT FOLDS!! Yes, the seat really does fold up to make it a non-bulky package to carry down the tiny aisles of the airplane. We haven't actually gotten a chance to try it out in the car yet, but I think we're in love with it already. The only drawback is that the all-steel frame makes it a little heavy. We'll see how much the weight affects us during the trip.



5. gDiapers - Environmentally friendly diapers for the part of our trip that takes us into the desert where we'd prefer not to leave too much of an impact with disposable diapers. (These are, essentially, still disposables but they are also biodegradeable unlike normal disposables.) They are very cute and my daughter assures me that they are very comfy to wear. We seem to use less of them than our normal diapers (Huggies Pull-ups) which is really nice. They are a tiny bit inconvenient since the liners don't have tabs to close them up with for disposal like most diapers do. We are planning to carry ziploc baggies to deal with that, though. It will be interesting to see how they do for the entire trip!