Small Irrational People

I hope everyone had a wicked awesome weekend.

As predicted, ours was fun and exhausting.

Mostly exhausting.

Totally exhausting.

Rather than give you the play by play of what we did because you don't care, I figured I would share what I have learned from said trip because, boy, was it a lot.

On traveling with a toddler:

1. Bring a lot of toys. Like, fill the entire back seat with toy options.
2. You'll need a bunch of pacifiers and no pacifier rules about having no pacifier in the car. Also, be prepared to have said pacifiers thrown at your head.
3. Be sure to pack more snacks than any adult could ever consume and make sure they are relatively healthy. Sugar is pleasing to a monster toddler, but it only makes a difficult situation worse. Just imagine a bored child hopped up on sugar crack and strapped to their seat.
4. You may want lollipops. Ignore number three.
5. Bring books. Obviously they can't read but it's something else they can throw around and maybe look at for 10 minutes or so. These small intervals of calm count.
6. Be prepared to stop, several times. This means you'll need to build at least an extra hour into your travel time.
7. Don't bother bringing your iPad. The damn thing makes the situation 8,000 times worse because children, like The King, smack it and close the app and yell at it and yell at you to fix it. It can also be thrown (notice a pattern?).
8. Buy a DVD player for the backseat and pray that your child will watch it for at least 20 minutes.
9. Travel at night to avoid as many awake hours as possible.
10. Avoid traveling with a toddler. 

What I learned about The King.

1. He sucks at traveling.
2. He needs all of the above and then some to be happy in the car. I'm not sure what "then some" is but I can tell you, I am not interested in trying to figure it out any time soon.
3. He absolutely cannot function without space and time to run around like a wild animal. Literally. He needs to run and jump and "build" things and get dirty. I'm terrified for what this winter will bring.
4. He has way too much energy. Way. Too. Much. This may have something to do with all of the munchkins and lollipops he consumed en route. Sacrifices had to be made.
5. Don't expect him to act like a reasonable human being when he hasn't had a decent nap or slept alone in a few nights. Even though you think he has, he really hasn't.
6. We can't sleep together. Actually, he can sleep. I cannot. Think: spinning around, sitting straight up and body slamming down, kicking, punching, rolling, snuggling, flailing and sweating. All of which happen while he is totally asleep.
7. He is really, really funny.
8. He can be an unreasonable little beast when he is out of his element.
9. He is manipulative. Already. He plays the "I'm hungry" or "More books" card to stay up just a little bit later. Lord help us all.
10. He is awesome and big and smart and silly and it all makes me sad because time is moving way too fast.

All in all. It was a great trip and I'm glad we went. I'm also really, really glad we don't have anymore trips planned until December.

Happy Monday-ing Friends!

xxoo
ma