Mamma Musings - Traveling with toddlers - my top tips

Traveling with toddlers – my top tips

As a Dub married to a country man we spend a lot of time traveling up and down the country visiting family, the journey time without children is about 4 hours with them well…….that’s a whole other story!

My 3 month old is still relatively easy to transport, I just need to make sure I have the essentials with me – feeding, nappies and change of clothes.  My 3 years old is a whole other ball game.  However I have learned a few things over the last 3 years and have made the journey as painless as possible for us all.

1 – Preparation

Since becoming a mother I have developed a serious obsession with ziplock bags (ok I know!!!!).  I get the Ikeas ones, my personal favourite!! I have them organised into snacks, changes of clothes in case of toilet accidents or travel sickness and little toys – my son absolutely adores little toys which he role plays with. They are handy for traveling as they are very portable.

Plan in advance the stops, I like to give the 3 month old a good stretch out after 1.5 hours so I time this to coincide with lunch with the bigger man.  We go to the same place all the time as we know there are changing facilities, plenty space for kids and a decent lunch.

2- Distraction

A toddlers attention span is short, well mine is anyway! So I take plenty of suitable toys which I give to him over the journey, not all at once.  What I try to do is give him toys he hasn’t played with for a week or so before hand, I get at least an hour out of the novelty factor!  I store his toys in a roll up toiletries bag ( I got this in Dunnes but they are readily available) which I used while in the Coombe having the boys for my own toiletries! It’s so handy, it rolls up neatly and its clear pockets mean I can pick out toys handy for him. Another personal favourite of my big man is sticker books so sometimes on longer journeys I will let him pick one in the petrol station which he just loves.  I on the other do not love scrapping Peppa Pig or Fireman Sam stickers off the car seats! However, it does really help pass some time.  The key is to take the toys, within reason which will get you some quiet time.

More recently we have been playing games like I spy – but with colours or what has become known in Mamma Fairys house “Storytime” where we each have to make up a story based some details given by somebody else – my toddler loves this game, he loves to hear his name mentioned in stories.

3- Prevention

Travel sickness is really common and unfortunately my toddler seems to have developed this in recent times. What has worked for us lately has been:

·       Very light breakfast before we go – no bread!

·       Water only to drink – no milk and no juice

·       No chocolate under any circumstances!

·       Caldekids lolly – these have been great, I let my toddler chill with one while I am getting ready. Never in the car and always supervised.

Hopefully you find these tips useful and if you have any other tips please do tweet or facebook them to me.

Currently writing this from a very wet and windy Donegal…..post coming up about the beautiful South West Donegal for families.

Take care

~ Mamma F

Skincare - Mamma Treats - Dry skin woes

A couple of weeks ago after my second was born my skin became so dry. I have never had dry skin, in fact I moaned about my oily skin (I take it back now!). I reached out on social media for some help and tried and tested a couple of different products.  Thankfully I found three that made such a difference.

1 - Bioderma Micellar Water

Ok! Before the make up buffs give out to me, since having my first, my taking off makeup routine consisted of walking bleary eyed up the stairs wiping my make up off with a baby wipe! Yes, I know its not great so when I was kindly sent some Bioderma products to try I decided to give it a go.  I had heard lots and seen lots of different brands of micellar water in shops and wasn't really sure what to expect.  I must say I was pleasantly surprised it really does remove all traces of make up off including stubborn mascara.  Its also super quick, I use on a bit of cotton wool (what new mum doesn't have plenty cotton wool!!!) and make up is off in a flash.

Its not drying or oily which I expected it to be.  I can safely say I have ditched the baby wipes to wash off my makeup for good. On the rare moments I get some time to myself, I do like to give my skin a good deep cleanse but for the tired-no-time-mummy days, its all about the micellar water for me.

It is only new to the Irish market but available from most chemists.

2 - Bia Beauty Skin Superfood

I purchased this product on-line from a company in Cork called Bia Beauty (actually love that name!).  They produce a range of natural skin care products at great prices.   I ordered the 50 ml of this product and it was out of stock and was sent the 100ml for the same price, that is good customer service.

I used this product after taking my makeup off every evening.  I actually applied it quite liberally and let soak in overnight.  The texture is lovely and there is little of no scent from it. The listed ingredients include the traditional soothing herbs of comfrey, calendula and mallow.  It took about 4 or 5 nights of using it to really start to see the difference.  I was delighted to see it left my skin very smooth and really moisturised the dry patches particularly around my jaw line where they were worst.

Once my skin was re hydrated I went back to using a normal moisturiser but I do go back to this product when my skin gets dry, which seems to be around the time of the month for me since having babies.  Its great to find a product that works and at such a good price and Irish which is also a bonus for me.

 3 - Vaseline Spray and Go Moisturiser
Stretch marks!!! Need I say anymore about them.  I didn't get any on my first but suffered badly on my second.  After having the section my tummy area was so tender and I couldn't bear to rub cream on it so it was great to get a product which was moisturising but in a spray.

I used (and still do)  this after ever shower (but not on the scar itself) and it really does moisturise the skin on my tummy area.  I am certainly not under the illusion that this was going to cure them or even get rid of the crinkled skin ( im sure there is a better technical term for this!). It did however much improve the effect of the crinkled part around my belly button.

I'm all about speed! After all with having kids every second counts, so this is so quick to use, it sprays evening literally in a matter of second and dries almost instantly, smells divine too.

I threw this in on impluse during my weekly shopping and im glad I did, ill keep using it for sure. It is available in most supermarkets and chemists.

~ Mamma F