Adventures in South Florida

Silas and I went on a mini-vacation down to south Florida to visit some friends. The five hour car trip is now officially the longest distance I have driven with Silas by myself. It wasn't even that bad. On the way down, he was on the cusp of a nap for about two hours, and kept crying out "nurse please!" but when I did stop, he was too excited by the trip to actually nurse. Oh well.

He doesn't sleep very well when we're traveling, so our days became sort of weird. Normally we're up by seven-thirty on a good day. He decided to bring that back about an hour and a half. And once he was awake, he woke up our friend's kid too. So we would have breakfast, let the kids play for a bit, head to the park, let them run around for awhile, get back home and it would still only be ten in the morning!

The first day down, we headed into Ft. Myers proper to see the Edison Festival of Lights. The parade was billed as an amazing nighttime parade and there were people lining the streets so thickly that the kids wouldn't have been able to see anything. Apparently people go down and tape off sections of the sidewalk up to a week in advance to get a spot.

But here's the thing. The parade kind of sucked.

I don't know how they do paraded by you, but where I'm from, a parade starts within five minutes or so of the start time and proceeds in an orderly fashion - you have your fire trucks and police cars and high school bands and cute floats, interspersed with Shriners on tiny motorcycles and the occasional baton twirling brigade.

This parade was supposed to start at seven. At seven, one single police car raced through the street. Silence. Ten minutes later, there were a few marching color guards. Ten minutes later, there were more fire trucks and police cars than I've ever seen in a parade before. Maybe I'm a buzzkill, but to me, three or four of each is sufficient to wow the children and start a parade. They had a small fleet of ten to fifteen of each.

Then another ten minute wait. Then another color guard and some cheesy floats and some politicians in cars. Since it was dark out, it was hard to see who was who and why they were there.

The highlight of the parade was seeing the Clydesdale horses. They were amazingly huge and followed by some ponies that looked like Sophie and Sherlock in comparison.

After that, we ended up leaving. The fireworks were nice though and walking around downtown had been pleasant.

The next day was a jet-setting kind of day. After hitting the parks in the morning, we made cookies and headed to the neighborhood luau (where we later learned up to 100 people had attended). Between me and my friend and our two kids, we probably brought the mean age down to, oh, fifty. But don't get me wrong - everyone was nice to us. We sat by an inflatable palm tree and Silas refused to wear his lei and we cheered on some people playing cornhole.

From there, we realized it was already four in the afternoon and it was a mad dash to the Greek festival to see the dancing and get some baklava. The kids were less impressed by this, so we didn't stay long, but it was still fun.

The best day was Monday. We went to the aquarium and the beach. There was a slight hitch to our plans - none of us realized it was President's day, so the aquarium and the beach were significantly more crowded.

At the aquarium, Silas enjoyed looking at all of the different sea creatures. His favorites were the manatees and the clown fish. For some reason, when he saw the clown fish, he had to point to each one and say "fish!" even though we had passed by many other fish already. There was also an area with giant plastic models of some coral and fish (they were ten times bigger than life-sized) and Silas stared up in awe at the towering coral.

We packed up and headed towards the beach near noon. Oh, the beach. Our first indication that we were screwed came about the time we pulled into the parking lot and realized that every spot was full and every row was full of lines of cars waiting for a spot to open up. We were optimistic at first, but by the third time a parking spot opened up JUST behind us while we waited behind someone waiting for a person to back out, we gave up. We went to Publix for lunch. This Publix didn't have any seating or benches, so we had an impromptu picnic on the sidewalk. The kids seemed to enjoy it and it beat trying to feed two young kids in their carseats.

Being gluttons for punishment, we headed back to the beach after lunch. I like to call it eternal optimism. And guess what? There were parking spots! Whew. Plus, we had only missed out on the extra strong middle of the day UV rays, so our skin was safer anyhow. (Always a bright side). Even better? Running on the beach for a couple hours wore out the kids so much that they slept on the way home, and after dinner, Silas slept from 8:30 to 5. That was the first time he's ever slept so well away from home. I would have rejoiced, but I stayed up until 11 to watch ice dancing (mostly worth it!) and waking up at 5 was still a bit rough on me.

The drive home was much better than the drive down. Silas napped for most of the trip to be honest. I think he was still worn out from the beach. Traffic was light most of the way and the weather was good, though I admit I prefer a bit of an overcast sky during a long drive.

I hope to go down and visit again in March and coming up shortly after that, we'll be heading down south again when Smiley runs in the Tough Mudder with some friends. I can only hope Silas will continue his positive trend of kind of sleeping better while we're away!

Airplane Travel With 16 Month Baby

On my recent trip from Florida to Chicago, I redeemed a travel voucher and was limited in my choice of flights. I actually had to fly south from Tallahassee to Orlando to pick up a connecting flight to Chicago. Fun times.

As always, my goal was to bring everything I needed for my six day trip in a backpack and a messenger bag. It was tough, due to the fact that warm clothing is so space-filling. Let's break it down and see how it went. If you are interested in traveling with a small child, you can see what I brought and didn't bring and make changes in your luggage as needed.

First, in my backpack I packed clothing. Silas got a pair of warm pajamas, several undershirts, a couple long sleeved onesies, three warm coveralls, a jacket, a sweatshirt, a hat, and socks. I got a pair of jeans and a pair of pajama pants, two long sleeved shirts, two camisoles, a skirt, leggings, leg warmers, socks and underwear, and two sweaters. Somehow, when I wasn't using my baby carrier, I managed to shove it into the backpack too.

In terms of amount of clothing - it was possibly a little bit too much. I can't help that; I always, always overpack clothing. For one thing, I had access to laundry at my parent's house, so I just ended up washing clothes every day. I never ran out of clean options for Silas or me and I never wished I had different options.

I probably could have gotten by with two pairs of coveralls for Silas, but in the end, baby clothing doesn't take up THAT much space. Plus babies look so cute in different outfits; I'd rather he have some variety than me.

In my messenger bag, I packed diapers and wipes, a few toys and books. I brought too many books. I was very worried about Silas being bored on the plane and acting out, so I brought about six different paper books (standard size) and six or seven little board books (like two inch by two inch). Silas ended up picking three favorites that he wanted to hear over and over, and I ended up with a backache from carrying around all the extras.

I packed enough diapers for two days of the trip and bought some extras at my parent's house. That works out nicely. I brought two toys that he liked to chew on - also worked out very nicely. Once he was at my parent's house, he didn't want his own toys anyhow; he wanted to explore! I brought a baby blanket in case it was cold on the plane - that blanket never got used.

The messenger bag also carried my wallet and phone.

Because babies only fly free in an adult's lap until two, it's very likely this was my last flight with Silas for awhile. If I could change anything, I would have brought a few less clothes and a few less books. I think that it is easy to overprepare, worrying about a delayed flight or something, but keep in mind the airport and airplane itself also provide some entertainment; Silas loved looking at the safety cards because they were full of pictures.

Finally, economy plus seating is probably worth the extra money, kind of. I lucked out and ended up in there on my flight up, but on my flight back I was near the back of the plane in between two guys. Thankfully, the one on my left fell asleep and the one on my right told me he had four kids and to not worry if Silas accidentally kicked him. (Trust me, I still did my absolute best to make sure Silas kept the squirming down to a minimum. It was just nice to know I didn't have to apologize profusely each and every time a squirm happened.)

Oh, and there is probably no better workout than letting a baby walk down the terminal (try to find a section with mostly empty gates) - I would let Silas walk up and down, but the true workout came from trudging after him with all our stuff on my back and squatting down to pick him up and "reset" him when he started heading towards the crowded parts of the terminal.

Safe travels, all!

Tired Mom, Happy Baby

You remember Christmas as a kid? I mean Christmas Eve, the night before. Going to sleep seemed impossible because tomorrow was going to be so awesome.

Or maybe you didn't celebrate Christmas, but you might still know the feeling - perhaps the day before your family went on a really fun vacation. You might have been up every other hour at night in excitement.

Ok, so maybe you didn't celebrate Christmas and your family never went anywhere. I'm sorry. That sucks. But you still might know the feeling. That feeling of anxious excitement keeping you awake the day before you start a new job or go to a new school.

I'm pretty sure that for Silas, every night must be Christmas Eve. There is no other explanation for how he can almost settle down to sleep, quietly babbling baby bedtime talk before turning over and sitting up and starting to shout about "football" or "doggies."

And once he reminds himself that there could be doggies outside, he can't understand why in the world I would want him to stay in his bed and not go look outside for doggies. After all, if he's thinking about doggies, clearly doggies are around here somewhere.

Imagine that for five nights in a row and you've imagined how my trip up north went with him. Silas could not and would not shut down at night. Somehow, he got by on less sleep than ever and I could only hang on for the ride.

I'll write more about my trip later, but I wanted to finish with the "happy ending" of this story. On our last day of the trip, we had two flights to get home. The first flight was roughly around the time of his afternoon nap. Silas fell asleep in the car about fifteen minutes before we got to the airport and no amount of clapping or singing could have stopped him. This led to him really not feeling like a nap on the two and a half hour flight.

At the very end of the flight, as we began our descent, Silas fell asleep for about another fifteen minutes.

After a two hour layover, we got onto our final plane. I was certain that Silas would fall asleep and remain asleep for the short one hour flight. We boarded the fairly empty and tiny plane and got a row of two seats to ourselves. As the plane taxied down the runway for take off, the cabin lights were dimmed and I thought to myself - perfect!

Then pretty much everyone else on the flight turned on their reading lights. On the tiny plane, this brought the light level up enough that Silas had to look around. He waved to the person sitting a row ahead of us across the aisle. He looked out the window and said "bye-bye doggies" about fifty million times. We read the Airplane Safety Card sixty times or so. Every time I would fold it back up, he would unfold it and point to a picture, looking at me to explain what it meant.

But I was not going to be discouraged. I scooted over to the empty window seat, hoping the space would be a little darker and tried to nurse him to sleep. It was almost working, until the cabin lights came up when the complimentary beverage service began.

I knew when I was beat. I read the Airplane Safety Card with Silas a few more times and we looked out the window together, wondering if, perhaps, there were some doggies outside.

Then we hit some turbulence. It wasn't bad, but my stomach dropped a few times and I'll admit I was somewhat more nervous than usual due to the small size of the aircraft. I did my best to breath slowly and calmly and to force my heart rate to stay normal so that Silas would not sense my nervousness.

He quieted down, looking out the window without trying to pull down the shade or asking about doggies. Was he scared too?

He had never sat so still in my lap, and I was certain he was deciding that this flying business was no fun after all. I couldn't quite see his face since he was looking away from me out the window and was hugging my arm gently. Each new bout of turbulent movement caused him to cling just a touch harder, and I gave him a kiss on the top of his head.

That's when I noticed he was asleep. The hugging must have been an involuntary movement, because he was sound asleep. So sound asleep that even landing did not wake him up, nor the movement of passengers retrieving their bags from the overhead compartment. But we couldn't stay on the plane forever, so I gently woke him and we went on our way.

That night, Silas didn't get to sleep in his crib until ten, and I was ready to cry when I heard him crying in his room at about five in the morning. I sent Smiley to go grab him, and Silas surprised us both by snuggling between us and going back to sleep until eight thirty. He must have been making up for some of that lost sleep. I was very thankful. And I even feel coherent. I hope this blog post reflects that. I'm too scared to check myself.

I wish I were making this up!

In the past two weeks, I've seen so many people run red lights that I'm starting to suspect I'm part of a mass hallucination whenever I "see" a red traffic light. Clearly, the light must be green and all the other people who are stopped with me are also hallucinating. It is obvious that these bold, innovative drivers have unlocked the secret of faster travel - through the strength of their own will, they are finding ways to shave precious minutes off of their drive time.

The first time it happened, I watched as a car turned left in front of oncoming traffic, treating the red light as more of a suggestion. I blinked several times, expecting to hear some sort of ugly crash noise. There was none. This driver had successfully played the traffic light and won, to a prize of moving through the intersection two minutes faster than me.

The second time it happened, I watched in lesser amounts of awe as three cars took lefts despite the left turn arrow turning to red a few seconds ago. I suppose I wasn't as shocked for this one because the left turn arrow had been green and sometimes I will play with the yellow arrow to make a left turn. The sheer number of cars going through an obvious red instead of dashing through the yellow is what still punctuated this event as "terrifying," especially since it wasn't like they had been stuck at the light for several cycles.

It happened a third time. The driver simply decided there was no reason to stop and continued straight through the intersection. As I said, it is this sort of bold driving that will continue to get the fine people of my city to their destinations faster, most of the time. Probably. Until they eventually, maybe get a ticket or get in an accident.

I have also seen more than a handful of right turns in the face of "no turn on red" signs. More common, yes, but still frustrating. Plus, I'm never sure whether I'm dealing with drivers who are just terribly unaware of their surroundings or drivers who assume the rules are for other people to deal with.

In the meantime, you'll recognize me as the "person not leaving her house until all of this dumb driving sorts itself out." (And also as the "person who is really surprised I haven't seen an accident yet.") I thought about walking everywhere, but I'm sure avoiding turn signals and not taking the time to look for pedestrians are two more ways that these drivers are saving themselves precious time.

Driving Baby Blues

We're back from vacation. This vacation included a round trip drive from FL to IL clocking in at 17 hours each way, a round trip drive from IL to MI clocking in on an average of 8 hours each way, and plenty of daily drives out to various beaches.

What I'm getting at is that Silas no longer puts his arms up to be lifted out of his carseat when you unstrap him. Instead, he starts putting the shoulder straps back on, presumably because he has come to learn that his natural habitat is his carseat.

I wanted to make the drive from FL to IL by car instead of flying to see the difference in stress levels. The easiest conclusion is that there is no good way to get to and from IL with a small child. The more nuanced conclusion is that I think flying is probably better.

The downsides to driving included a 17 hour car trip that nearly destroyed my spirit to live. There's something about driving all day only to hit Indianapolis and realize that there's still three more hours to drive. At least. And on a good day, a three hour car trip is nothing to sneeze at!

Both times, we started the drive mid-morning and ended the drive in the wee hours of the new day. This stemmed from the fact that I wanted to be "well-rested" before starting the drive rather than sacrificing potential sleep to leave earlier. I am NOT able to stay up super late these days though, so the final early AM hours of driving were horrific.

Really, the only downside was that I had to drive all of the hours and therefore couldn't rest at all. Had Smiley been with me to take care of some of the driving, flying wouldn't even need to be an option, really.

The upsides included the fact that I had plenty of space to nurse Silas when he needed to nurse, and plenty of legroom in my seat. I could stretch my legs out and listen to any music I wanted without headphones. I didn't have to run across an airport with a baby and luggage. I had space in the trunk of the car to bring extra clothes, toys and books for Silas. I was also able to bring home stuff with me, IKEA stuff to be specific. Also, I traveled completely on my time, instead of being at the mercy of plane delays.

But 17 hours in a car is just really awful. It went beyond my driving limits and I should have stopped along the way and made it into a two day drive. Though things will change as Silas grows older and our situations change, right now I can say with 80% confidence that flying is mostly the better option as it packs all of the stress up into a nice, neat 6 hour package, but for at least 10 hours of the drive, driving was worth it.

Traveling With Baby - To Drive or To Fly?

I've done two round trips with Silas now, for a total of eight flights. When you consider that both times, my return trip consisted of at least two trips to the airport each due to cancelled/delayed flights, I feel like I've pretty much mastered airplane travel with a baby.

The only problem is, my baby is growing much faster than intended! Right now I've been taking advantage of the "infant free in arms" part of flying, which puts the cost of flying somewhat close to the cost of driving. The time saved by flying easily pushes the flight option into the "best choice" category. However, the last time I flew, I had a heck of a time trying to nurse Silas on the plane. He's just too danged long!

It's no secret that I'll be seeing my family this summer again. I've started staking out plane tickets. Except, summer plane tickets are apparently very premium, as the prices are already over $100 more than I'm used to seeing. Between that and the fact that Silas is still growing, I'm starting to think driving might be the answer after all. (There's no way that the answer can be "buy two plane tickets" due to the cost). Assuming an average of $4 a gallon, I'd be able to drive there and back over two days for cheaper than a single plane ticket.

There's other benefits as well - I'd be able to bring larger toys and more books. Packing more clothes would be nice, though certainly not a necessity. We could stop closer to the times Silas eats and plays instead of attempting to have playtime at an unused airport gate for ten minutes in between flights. I wouldn't have to deal with a diaper blowout in an airplane bathroom. (It took me ten minutes to decide whether writing the words "poosplosion on a plane" would put me on some sort of government list.)

The huge downside is the time factor. The drive is about 16 hours (that's with about three to four stops for fill ups and food) which is a huge amount of time for a baby to spend in a carseat, even over two days. And it's a lot of driving for me. I've been able to do up to 8 hours of driving by myself, but my back does start to complain at 3-4 hours.

It's not an issue of days off; thanks to my school schedule, I can take my time and drive up over two days without cutting into the time that I see my family (though it does sadly leave me away from my husband for a day longer, he might not complain at the chance to have an extra full night of sleep). It's an issue of whether or not a marathon car ride is worth not having to twist sideways to nurse and apologize to a seatmate as Silas wants to explore their side of plane and maybe fusses for two two-hour flights. Whether it's worth it to stress about Silas crying in his carseat after the first hour of driving or to stress about running across an airport and missing a flight while wearing my baby and carrying our luggage. If it's worth it to have more of our items from home than to get there faster.

I'm not sure. I may feel like I have a lot of travel experience with a baby under my belt but right now it seems like I need to pick the lesser of the two evils. I certainly wouldn't mind any thoughts or comments or experiences with driving vs. flying, that's for sure!

Baby Travel Tales Part Two

I couldn't sleep the night before my first flight with Silas. I laid there in the dark, imagining all of the hatred I would see in people's eyes when Silas started bawling the moment we sat on the plane and didn't stop until we got back on the ground. Hearing the snide comments people would say when they saw a baby at the gate for the flight they were going to be going on. I don't particularly enjoy people I don't know not liking me. I'm weird like that.

Luckily, my experience traveling with Silas was nothing like that. I can't say enough how nice people were towards us. To be self-sufficient, I had brought my carry on luggage in the form of a backpack and messenger bag and had a baby carrier to keep Silas close to me. But even still, people offered to help me stow my bag and retrieve it for me after the flight was over. I was very thankful to them.

And, I did get lucky that Silas does not seem to be affected by the change in pressure during take off or landing. I nursed him and/or he was asleep for most of my flights, but he was wide awake for the last flight and didn't even fuss during take off. That's not to say he didn't fuss and cry at points throughout the flights, but the reaction of people around me was not at all what I had feared.

On my first flight, I had a row of two seats to myself and Silas slept for nearly the whole thing. No problem. My next flight, I was kind of squished into my seat area by a gentleman who took up almost every square inch of his seating area. I had to twist sideways to nurse Silas so that his legs were pointing completely forward in order to avoid Silas kicking my seatmate. But when Silas started fussing some, my seatmate was quick to smile at him and Silas quieted down quickly.

My return flight started to get me nervous. At first, it was fine. I got onto the plane with Silas and stowed my backpack. The people next to me asked me how old he was and the flight attendant told me about his seven month old granddaughter. A man in the row behind and across the aisle from us smiled and waved as Silas stared at him.

Then the captain announced a flight delay due to a mechanical problem. The maintenance team was on another plane, so we had to sit tight for a little while, he said over the intercom. Silas was still being happy and content, but inside I worried a bit, because I knew that it would be soon time for him to nurse and nap and if he started that while we were still on the ground, there would be more time awake in the air.

Time passed, about fifteen minutes, and Silas started fussing to nurse, so I fed him while we all waited. More time passed and Silas fell asleep on my lap. Still more time passed and then the maintenance team arrived and started working on the problem. Silas woke up from his nap and I started to think of ways I could entertain him for the nearly two hour flight. Silas is a baby who enjoys being walked around and I was picturing a flight of frustrated cries.

Then came the announcement that we had to deplane for a pressurized test of our aircraft. It had been just over an hour since we all boarded the plane. I found myself somewhat happy to have a chance to take Silas out of the plane and have a bit of a change of scenery, but I had no clue what this meant in terms of my connecting flight. Honestly, I thought almost immediately that I would just ask to fly out tomorrow.


And that did work out. I ended up with a first class ticket for a flight out the next morning. I was happy to spend more time with my family but frustrated to have spent most of the day at the airport and on a plane.

My first class flight was amazing. There was so much leg room. I'm not insanely tall by any means, but a lot of my height comes from my legs and so airplane seats in coach are not very comfortable. In first class, I could almost stretch my legs out completely. And the seat was wider, so that I could comfortably nurse Silas without having to twist around. And the people were just as nice, even in first class. My seatmate smiled at Silas and the man across the aisle played peek-a-boo with his book when he noticed Silas looking his way.

At the near end of the flight, another man came up and congratulated me on having such a great traveler. A woman told Silas "you have a great mother." I couldn't stop smiling. I had been so nervous about how people would react and came to find out that it wasn't bad at all. Even when he did cry for a short while, no one glared at me as I calmly rocked him and patted his back.

My last flight was another short one, and Silas slept for most of that. Overall, I know it could have been worse, especially if the air pressure had made Silas uncomfortable. I know that is luck, as much as I wish I could claim that it was my "being awesome." I do plan to visit my parents again as soon as possible and I will be much less nervous about flying with an infant. I realized quickly that Silas is at a great age to fly and it will only be harder as he grows more and doesn't sleep as often. But I will worry about that later.

Baby Travel Tales Part One and a Half

I mentioned yesterday that I bought two new toys for Silas to have on the plane. What I forgot to mention was that I purposely tried to find somewhat "quiet" toys for him to play with. It seems these days that every toy has a chime, rattle, crinkle or crunch somewhere and I thought that would be a little frustrating to the other travelers on the plane. Except, I found out just now that the soft book I bought him has a particularly large squeaker, and that Silas absolutely loves it. I am quite thankful that he doesn't know how to work it on his own, because man would I have annoyed some travelers (and dogs).

Baby Travel Tales Part One

Having traveled with Silas on four, almost five planes now, I feel qualified to talk about traveling with a baby. This first part will be about packing and preparation. The later parts will touch on my actual trip and also the act of being on a plane with an infant.

So, I don't know about you, but if you're like me, you don't want to check a bag. If you don't want to check a bag, you need to know what you need for a trip and what you don't need.

I traveled for five planned days (six with a flight delay) from Florida to Illinois, so I needed to be prepared for coldish weather (around freezing most days). I packed one messenger bag to stow underneath the seat and one backpack to stow above me. I use a backpack instead of a standard size carry on because I don't want to have to gate check my luggage.

My messenger bag was the diaper bag for the trip. I brought about ten diapers and a package of 80 wipes. It goes without saying, but if you can buy diapers at your destination, do so. I packed enough diapers for Silas to need one every hour of travel plus a few extras. Honestly, I could have gotten by with five but diapers are small enough that it's easily a case of better safe than sorry.

In addition to that, I had an easily accessible burp rag tucked into the side pocket of the messenger bag. I made use of that rag often. I also packed two more receiving blankets, a bulb suctioner, two new toys and a warm sweatshirt in that bag. The receiving blankets made a good place for him to roll over on the floor during our layover. The sweatshirt was overkill as Silas is a baby furnace and next time I'll skip it, but if your baby gets cold easily, I'd keep it.

Finally, my wallet and cell phone, along with a baby book, a birth certificate and our plane tickets went into the messenger bag. On the return trip, I packed the baby motrin that I had bought during my visit into this bag as well, though I didn't end up needing it. However, as a "just in case" item, it barely took up any space.

For Silas, I packed two pairs of pajamas, three pairs of pants, two short sleeved onesies and four long sleeved onesies. I guess it was overkill because I didn't use all of that, but baby clothing is so tiny that over packing is not typically an issue. Plus if you don't have an easy option for laundry, you might have to over pack.

For me, I had originally packed several outfits but ultimately ended up going with two pairs of yoga pants, a nursing bra, nursing tank top, two short sleeved shirts that were easy to nurse in and one (you guessed it) nursing shirt that was long sleeved. I also brought a button front sweatshirt, and the basics of underwear and socks and a pair of long johns. My clothing took up more space that Silas's and honestly, I didn't do anything that left me unable to wear a shirt two days in a row, so I think next time I will try to bring less.

Anyhow, all of that clothing went into the backpack along with a hat for Silas and a hat for me, a couple more receiving blankets, my manual breastpump and a few other of Silas's favorite toys.

When you're traveling with an infant, you are allowed to gate check a stroller or car seat. I did not do either, and instead used my wrap and tie baby carrier to bring him around. I think that next time I will bring an umbrella stroller as well. I really like my wrap and tie because then I can take the stairs/escalator in the airport, but it was exhausting to have a baby on the front, my backpack on my back and my messenger bag. So we'll see.

Finally, as far as a traveling outfit - I chose to wear a pair of yoga pants (yes, I brought three pairs of yoga pants. They were all black. And comfy) and a nursing bra and tank top. I also wore a button front sweater and zip up hoodie, and boots. I was a bit warm in Florida but it served me well in Illinois. Silas was outfitted in a short sleeved onesie, a pair of pants that had feet so that he wouldn't lose a sock in the airport and a lightweight jacket. He was plenty warm in the baby carrier with his hat outside, but if your baby tends to be colder, you'll want to obviously dress them a little warmer. Next time, I will wear comfier shoes. My toes ended up cramping by the end of the day from wearing those boots and walking everywhere.

Overall, flying was worth the time it saved and I think I'll be doing this again in the near-ish future. We'll see how my advice holds up then!