Babies and Toddlers on a Plane

Personally, I would rather have Snakes on a Plane - but then, as I have a pet snake, I would say that.

Long haul plane travel with small children is dreadful.  Let's not beat around the bush.  There is nothing good about the actual travel part.  It is means to an end - the end being travel, wonderful new experiences, visiting friends and family.  It's worth it, I think, but it's still dreadful!

The best case scenario is a baby or toddler who will happily sleep on the plane (in which case, a night flight is the way to go), or who is content to sit relatively still, with stickers, colouring, movies and the like as entertainment.  Many children are like this - I have heard from friends with incredibly easygoing toddlers who literally watched Peppa Pig for 8 hours straight, with the odd pause to snack.

My children aren't like this - Tabitha is a wriggly worm Class A.  She's never sat still through a movie at home - she likes to potter around, dancing and fetching dolls as she watches.  Zachary has been crawling from 4 months and has never stopped going since!  So clearly, I need to plan ahead.

I have always maintained that ages 12 months to 2.5 years are a International Travel No-Go Zone.  That is, if it can possibly be avoided, long haul travel for that 18 months is a bad idea.  Of course, this is a gross generalisation, and I'm sure there are kids out there who will travel just fine in that age range.  I just haven't met any!

With this in mind, we were keen to get a big overseas trip in before Zach turned one.  Zach is 7.5 months, Tabitha is 3.  Babies under 1 are relatively easy to distract, tend to sleep easily in new or strange places (wrapped up in a carrier or with a mouth full of breast).  Toddlers over 2.5 / 3 have far greater language and comprehension, and can (sometimes) be reasoned with.  They are also hopefully toilet trained, and capable of walking reasonable distances on their own.

I mentioned night flights - truly, this is the path of least resistance.  If you can spend the majority of the trip asleep (or at least, your child can), you have far fewer hours in which to provide entertainment.

Most babies will sleep fairly easily on a plane.  In the past, I (and other parents I've travelled with and alongside) have put the baby to sleep in carriers, wraps and slings, or on the breast or bottle, or by walking-and-patting.  The baby then either sleeps on the parent, or is carefully (and perhaps riskily!) transferred to a plane bassinet (if one is available, and if the baby fits in it, and if the baby will have a bar of it whatsoever - mine don't).

While the baby is awake, he or she can be entertained by scrunchy paper, new shiny toys, a rusk or snack, babbling to her parents or the passenger in the seat behind.  It can be tedious, but it is perfectly manageable.   If you have easy-going flight attendants (luck of the drawer) your baby can possibly crawl up the aisle with you every now and then, or sit and play on the floor at your feet if you have a bassinet seat (which has a little more foot room than regular seats).

If you happen to be flying business or first class, and therefore have a flat (or nearly flat) bed, you can hopefully just pop the baby on the breast or snuggle him to sleep, and both get a reasonable night of sleep.

Moving onto toddler sleep.  If you are travelling in the 12m - 2.5 year age gap I mentioned (The Mummy's Avoid-at-all-Costs-Flight-Zone), my thoughts are with you.  It might be tricky, as your munchkin is thrilled and stimulated by the new environment, break to normal bedtimes, new faces trying to chat and engage etc.  All you can do is your best.  Try to follow the bedtime routine - PJ on, night nappy or toilet, brush teeth, milk, a few bedtime stories and then perhaps some quiet guided meditation with either parent ("focus on your feet.  Think about how much they have walked today.  Feel the toes getting very sleepy.  Feel your feet getting tired and still" etc, for possibly an hour, until sleep appears - yours or theirs!)

Do prepare your child for the trip - talk them through what will happen on the plane.  Discuss what their meal might contain.  Practice laying still.  Let them bring a favourite stuffed toy.  Perhaps introduce some 'portable' elements to their bedtime routine in the weeks or months leading up to the trip (for example, a hand and foot massage with a lavender oil or balm).  Try some calming music or an audio book with headphones.

It may be possible to bring your car seat with you on the plane.  Many sources recommend this, as your child may be used to (and happy with) sitting for prolonged periods of time in their car seat, and it can be more supportive for sleeping than a regular seat for small children.  You will need to contact your airline, and it will depend on the type of car seat you have.  Also, bear in mind that once the seat is installed on the plane, you are stuck with it for the entire trip - you can't decide to stash it in the overhead lockers if it's not working out.

Certainly bring an extra squishy pillow, comfy clothes, a snuggly toy, warm socks, perhaps a favourite lightweight blanket, and likewise pack light clothes in case your child feels hot.

Speaking of clothes - pack plenty of spare, for the baby or child and for yourself.  Long-time readers of the blog may recall our flight to America when Tabitha was 10 months old.  She developed a stomach flu a few hours into the flight, and spent the rest of the flight to LA (and the 5 hour stopover in LA, and the 5 hour flight to Boston) with a 40 degree fever, vomiting non-stop.  From this I have learned two things:  firstly, pack lots of clothes, wipes, plastic bags.  Now add some more.  Certainly a full box of wipes.  You might not need them all, but if you do, you had better hope you have them!  Secondly, it takes a lot to deter The Daddy and myself from international travel.  Many (either made of weaker stuff than us, or else eminently more sensible, depending on how you view things) would have sworn off travel with children forever after that trip.

Apart from clothes, you will need an ample supply of nappies, wipes, smell-proof bags for nappies, a lightly padded change mat (those airplane change tables are rock hard), bibs, a small tub of nappy balm (pick one which can double as a lip balm or salve for dry skin, such as CJs

On the opposite end of stomach flu, we have eating and drinking.  Many children (and adults) become dehydrated on long flights.  Remember to drink plenty of water yourself, of course, but you might also need to remind and encourage your toddler or small child to drink as well.  I recommend bringing along their own familiar drink bottle - bring it empty (darn liquid and travel laws), then fill it up on board or once through security clearance, buying bottled water and decanting it into your child's water bottle.  Remind them often to drink.

Snacks and meals tend to be plentiful and regular on long haul flights.  If you have a child who eats properly, and happily eats the same food as you day-to-day, it might be tempting to turn your nose up at the children's meals offered on flights, and request a regular meal.  After all, you don't order from the nuggets-and-chips kiddie meals at restaurants.  I urge you to reconsider, and request the kiddie meal on the plane.  It comes out first (meaning that you can help them with their food if necessary, and they don't get hungry and ratty waiting), and it is includes a couple of fun treats that (if you are like us) aren't things they regularly eat, so the novelty adds to the entertainment.  If you are travelling with a baby, it might be worth ordering a 'special' meal for either yourself or your adult companion (such as a vegetarian meal, low fat etc).  This is because the special meals come out earlier, giving one of you a chance to eat your meal first, while the other adult holds the baby, then vice versa.

How about baby meals?  Infants under the age of two, who have not purchased a seat, can order a baby meal.  This differs between airlines, however generally includes some pureed and / or steamed veggies, meat and fruit.  You can try requesting a children's meal for your baby - we have always done so in the past when Tabitha was under 2, and the airlines always accommodated this request, providing her with her own children's meal instead of the standard infant meal.  If you are doing Baby Led Weaning, the children's meal is possibly a better choice for your baby.

Speaking of BLW - we all know it can be messy, these clever self-feeding babies!  Obviously, you don't want to have to sit in a seat covered in tomato puree and chewed up meat-and-veggies, dropped from eager baby hands, for the rest of your journey.  You could certainly try only offering your baby milk for the flight - nothing wrong with that at all - but most babies will protest once they see food, and demand their own.  I suggest packing your own food for a BLW baby - some sandwiches, perhaps some salad veggies, some cheese, things like that.  You can also use a bunny rug to cover yourself and the seat while your little one eats on your lap.  Cleaning up messy hands and faces can be done with baby wipes, of course, but I think that a proper wet facecloth does the job better, so consider bringing a couple of them in a snaplock bag, to wet and use as required (you could even get a cheap pack of them from the supermarket and dispose of them along the way).

Of course, if your baby is puree-fed, it’s probably a good idea to bring jars or pouches of food for him.  The infant meals on airlines vary wildly and are incredibly unpredictable.  They might include pouches of organic puree, with a rusk, some water and perhaps some applesauce.  Then again, they might not have anything pureed.  Then again, they might completely forget to provide your infant meal (it happens) so you really want to be prepared if your baby doesn’t eat regular food yet.  You can bring a stash of those pouch-foods, just show them at security, as long as they are properly sealed they do not count towards your liquids limit!

How about snacks for toddlers and small children?  Honestly, the airlines tend to bring out a reasonable amount of food.  Main meals, a few snacks, sometimes a pre-bed treat such as a Magnum ice cream or a hot chocolate.  Often pieces of fruit are available too, either offered or on request.  You can generally ask for other snacks, such as nuts, confectionary, museli bars etc.  Something about flying also seems to decrease the appetite for most people - perhaps the lack of movement and exertion, combined with increased pressure?  So you might find you're just fine without extra snacks.  But it certainly wouldn't hurt to throw in some of your own fruit, museli bars or a sandwich, particularly if you happen to have a fussy eater.  As I mentioned earlier, it is a good idea to bring your child's water bottle from home, and fill it up once you have passed security or boarded the flight.

If you think you will really struggle to get your child to drink enough water on the flight, consider some fun straws (those bendy straws are awesome for toddlers), or even a little juice mixed in.  I know, I know - but hydration is really important on flights and changing timezones.  Dehydration leads to all sorts of unpleasantness including irritability and constipation.  On that note - our lovely GP suggested administering lactulose in a low dose each day on the trip, to Tabitha.  We anticipate there will be a lot more refined carbs than usual (croissants, baguettes, cake...) and possible dehydration from the flights, so we want to prevent any possible constipation for her.  She's suffered from it before (not enough water was the cause) and it's so distressing and stressful for everyone.  If you think this could be a problem for your child, chat to your GP before you go.

Moving on to activities and entertainment.  The Big Topic for flying with kids.  Maximum entertainment with minimum carry-on luggage (bearing in mind that your carry-ons will already contain ample changes of clothes, baby wipes etc, right?  Right?).

The obvious first choice is an iPad or similar portable media player.  Load it to the hilt with movies, television shows, interactive games and apps, and picture books (this is an underrated part of the iPad - you can load up all your favourite picture books!).  Purchase some kid-friendly headphones (which prevent the volume reaching damaging levels for delicate little ears).  Let them go for it - it's hard to silence the Sensible Parent voice in your brain, "too much television!" but don't listen to it.  It's just one day, and if movies and games work, brilliant.

You will need other entertainment, however.  There are a good 20 minutes on either end of the flight where all electronic devices must be switched off, and, of course, you want to try to give those little eyes a rest from the screen.  Also, if your child is like ours, they simply might not be happy to sit and watch the screen for any prolonged stretches of time!

Here are my entertainment tips and ideas:

• Pipe cleaners.  They weigh nothing, take up no space, and can be thrown in the bin once everyone is bored of them.  You can bend and twist them into all sorts of fun things - little dolls, flowers, animals, jewellery.
• Drawing paper and crayons (obvious choice, but worth mentioning).  You can draw pictures of all the things you are going to see on the holiday, too, which is really helpful for small children, who struggle with the concept sometimes - that is, where they are going to sleep, where they will sit and eat their breakfast in the morning etc. can all be explained with crayons and a story.
• Stickers.  Then some more stickers.  I don't know what magical powers stickers possess, but give Tabitha a sheet of good-quality, raised and thick stickers (such as a sheet of dozens of little shiny cakes and lollies or animals) and she will stare at them for aaaaages.  Comparing them, peeling one off, finding a matching one, choosing her favourite.  I have packed about 10 large sheets, to be pulled out one at a time, every couple of hours.
• Sticker activity books.  These are often found at the bookstores at airports, actually.  They are large thin books, containing several pages of themed stickers, and 'scenes' on which to place them.  They are generally themed along a specific character, such as Peppa Pig.  Small children will need help with these, generally.
• Colouring in books.  You could even make your own by printing sheets off the internet - perhaps related to your trip?  Ditto for mazes, find-a-word etc. for older children.
• Magnetic dressup dolls.  These are great fun, though the sets can be a little heavy.
• Lego or Nanoblocks
• Small cars
• Small dolls - a family of dolls house dolls might be a good thing to tuck into the carryon.  Tabitha loves 'talking' these dolls to each other for ages.
• Some eye spy / scavenger hunt cards (possibly with pictures for small children).  Choose a bunch of things you would expect to find on a plane, such as a hat, someone in a red top, a bottle of water, a newspaper etc.  You could also play the game with the online magazine (an animal, a woman with brown hair, the letter P etc).
• Do you know Daiso?  It is a chain of Japanese stores where everything costs $2.80 (cheaper in Japan and the US, by the way, not that I'm bitter...).  If you have one near you, pay a visit without your child/ren, and fill your little basket up!  If you don't have a Daiso, you can try a newsagent or $2 store, but seriously, Daiso is brilliant and superior.  I bought stickers, erasers shaped like (startlingly realistic) cakes, biscuits and fruit, erasers shaped like animals and characters, notebooks of shiny, picture-covered drawing paper, pens with fruit-scented ink, pencils with a stack of rainbow leads (which you swap by pulling out the bottom one and inserting it back into the top), a little pinwheel, some miniature containers, sheets of origami paper, nail-art crystals (yikes, but if I get desperate...), some little dolls, a couple of toy cars.  Produce them one at a time, spaced throughout the flight.  If you can be bothered, wrap each one in paper and let your child 'lucky dip' every hour or half hour.  If each of these toys takes up 5 - 30 minutes of your child's interest, you will be a good way towards providing entertainment for the whole trip, if combined with some movie watching.
• If your child gets bored with the Daiso toys by the end of the flight, don't just throw them in the bin.  Put them in a cute bag and gift them to a random family you see at the airport, checking in or boarding a flight.  You might just have given them an additional hour or so of sanity!

How about getting around the airport?  From checkin, through security and customs, to the gate.  From the gate to the car.  With a mountain of luggage.  Your best choice is a carrier.  A good woven wrap is almost always my carrier of choice - it is the most comfortable and supportive of all carriers.  You can wear your baby or toddler on your front or your back.  Most babies and toddlers will nap in a wrap.  A wrap can also double as a pillow or blanket on the plane.  A wrap can be scrunched up and stuffed into the front pocket of a carryon.

The only disadvantage of a wrap is that it is not super easy to put on.  Yes, if you are used to it, you can wrap your baby onto yourself in less time than it takes to open a basic pram.  However, if you don't have someone else to hold your baby while you wrap (your travel companion, for example, might be wrangling other children or carrying luggage), you will need to lay your baby on the ground or a chair. Not ideal, particularly in a situation where there are loads of people and cases rushing past.

"Why would you have to unwrap your precious little sleeping angel?" I hear you ask.  Good question.  Bad answer.  Most security screening officers will make you remove them to pass through the metal detectors.  Yes, even if they are sleeping.  Yes, even if your wrap is simply a single piece of woven fabric without any metal.  Yes, you may want to attack them in anger.  It's no use - they are allowed to use their discretion, and if they ask you to unwrap your baby, you will have to.  Maddeningly, there are no laws around this - I've been informed by one supervisor that you do not have to remove your baby from a carrier, however most will ask you to do so.  It's incredibly frustrating.  I'm going to stop now, lest I enter a rant that reaches a thousand words.  You will also have to remove your (possibly sleeping) baby from a carrier or wrap once on the plane, for takeoff and landing - any time the seatbelt sign is on.  Again, so frustrating, because unwrapping a sleeping baby may cause them to cry and scream, which is not what anyone wants on a plane.  It is also annoying because the baby seems much safer and more secure in a carrier, rather than a flimsy, loose lap-belt attached to your lap.  The reason relates to being able to quickly release the child in the event of an accident, but I would hazard a guess that injuries are much more likely from poorly restrained babies and children, in the event of extreme turbulence, than by being 'stuck' to an adult in a crash.

So, I love a wrap, but appreciate the convenience of a quick buckle-on soft structured carrier (such as an Ergo or Manduca).  What to do?  I take both.  Neither are particularly bulky, both can be stuffed into the front pocket of a carryon suitcase.  If the baby is going to be in the carrier for any length of time, I use the wrap, or if we are needing to get the baby in and out quickly (security clearance) we use the Manduca.  This is the way we always travel, and it works well.  Also, The Daddy prefers a buckle carrier to the wrap, so it's handy to have both.

What about a stroller?  If your child is heavier, or prefers to nap in a stroller, you might find this a good choice (or a stroller in combination with a wrap).  Generally for international travel (and sometimes domestic) you can gate-check your stroller.  That is, you can take it right up to the gate, then hand it over when you are boarding, and they put it in a separate part of the plane.  There are even some strollers which fold up compactly enough to take on as carryon luggage, because they fit in the overhead lockers (Quinny Zapp Xtra with Folding Seat or Quicksmart or a few others).  We are taking an umbrella stroller (a Maclaren Quest), which we will gate-check, for Tabitha.  We also bought a brilliant universal scooter board, a Bumprider, for use while overseas, which will allow us to have Zachary in the stroller, and Tabitha riding along on the scooter board.  I would absolutely love to take our regular pram (a convertible single-to-double Bugaboo Donkey), however it is just too bulky to warrant taking with us, particularly as we are taking a few flights and trains within Europe during the trip.  It would also mean that our luggage would not fit into a hire car or chauffeured car for transfers.  So an umbrella stroller, scooter board, wrap and Manduca are our chosen methods of child transport for this trip!

There you go.  Travelling and carryon with little people.  If I have time, I'll write something about the rest of our packing.  Departure is around 48 hours away!

Chicken Sweetcorn Soup

Soup for breakfast.  Yes please.  Light on the stomach, many also contain a reasonable amount of protein.  Most can be prepared ahead of time, and simply reheated in the morning, making them a quick and simple breakfast.

Miso soup is an obvious choice - with cubes of silken tofu, plenty of wakame and your preferred rich red miso or soothing white miso.

Clear chicken broth, on its own or with fluffy matzo balls, cooked white rice or thin noodles.  The perfect breakfast for when you are feeling poorly.

Vegetable soup, with soft pieces of zucchini, pumpkin and kidney beans.

Tomato soup with a side of thickly buttered slices of toast.

Chicken sweetcorn soup, with silky strands of egg and plenty of fresh herbs is also a delightful breakfast.  Here is the one I love, recipe from Godmother Sophie.  It is beautifully aromatic ("so fragrant!" says Tabitha), with fresh ginger, sesame oil, coconut oil, star anise and fresh herbs.  It also contains plenty of chicken, and is quite filling without being heavy.

Chicken Sweetcorn Soup

1.5 litres chicken stock

3 chicken breasts

Sesame oil

Coconut oil

2 star anise

1 inch piece of ginger, finely sliced or grated

2 cans of creamed corn

3 - 4 tablespoons of soy sauce

2 eggs, lightly beaten

Fresh Vietnamese mint or coriander

In a medium saucepan, gently fry the ginger in some coconut oil and a little sesame oil until fragrant.

Add 1 litre of boiling chicken stock and the star anise, heat to a low simmer, add the chicken breasts and poach on very low heat (the liquid surface should be barely moving) for around 15 minutes, or until the chicken breasts are cooked through (74 degrees at the thickest part).  

Remove the chicken, let cool a little, then shred or slice.

Add the creamed corn to the soup, and the soy sauce (you can add more if you prefer it to be saltier - taste it first).  Add the chicken meat.  Add more hot chicken stock to reach the preferred consistency - probably between 1-2 cups.

Bring the soup to nearly boiling, then add the beaten eggs, stirring constantly for a minute.  Remove from heat.

To serve, ladle into bowls then drizzle with a little extra sesame oil, and top with plenty of chopped fresh Vietnamese mint or coriander.

Serves around 6.

Socks, Truffles and Beetroot Lips

Godmother Sophie knitted both myself and Tabitha some beautiful socks for our birthdays - truly, these photos do not do them justice, they have a beautiful lacey pattern up the ankles on mine, and on Tabitha's as well as on her feet.  Sophie is so talented!  Tabby and I have been doing a special "crazy sock dance" together whenever we both have them on, jitterbugging all over the rug.

One of Tabitha's greatest joys in life is being allowed to scrape out the ice cream maker bowl after I've made a batch.  It's really incredible how clean she can get it.  Just cream, milk, egg yolks, vanilla bean and a bit of sugar, so I am happy to let her enjoy this treat.

Recently hosted an evening dessert night for local mummas from our ABA (Australian Breastfeeding Association) group.  There were about a dozen women, plus a few wee babes in arms.  It was really a lovely night!  I made a large flourless chocolate cake (recipe here, although I do it in a larger springform these days), a pain au chocolat bread and butter pudding (recipe below) and a steamed golden syrup sponge pudding (recipe here).  Oh, and vanilla ice cream (recipe here).

For the pain au chocolat pudding, simply slice up 4 stale large pain au chocolat croissants (about 1cm thick), place in a buttered 1.5 litre shallow dish. 

In a medium saucepan, heat together 500ml thickened cream with 500ml full cream milk until nearly boiling.  

Remove from heat, then pour into a bowl containing 1 egg, 4 egg yolks and 3 tablespoons of caster sugar, whisking the whole time.  

Add half a teaspoon of vanilla extract, then pour over the pain au chocolat slices, leaving to sit and soak for about ten minutes.

Bake at 160 degrees for about 45 minutes, or until the pudding is softly set.

In other food adventures, The Daddy recently brought home a truffle.  He was terribly excited, but I felt such pressure to cook something fancy with it!  I am not a fancy sort of cook, so I reached out to some of my clever friends (including Miss Kitty-Cat) and ended up using the truffle for the following:

- Two roasted chickens with butter and thinly sliced truffle under the skin;
- Toasted sandwiches with pane toscano bread, Gruyere cheese, truffle roast chicken and plenty of truffle slices (which the children both loved!);
- Simple risotto with chicken stock (infused with truffle slices) and shaved truffle over the top
- Scrambled eggs with truffle-infused eggs, and fresh truffle over the top;
- The final scraps of truffle were whizzed up with some nice organic unsalted butter in the food processor and frozen in a log, to be sliced and melted over asparagus, poached eggs etc. later on.  I might try making a hollandaise sauce with the truffle butter.

So there you go - if you find yourself in possession of a 70g truffle, keep calm and proceed as above!

My darling little Tabitha is becoming camera shy - so I am getting plenty of gorgeous shots of her silky hair from the back.

Zach, however, remains cheerful and keen for photos - even when he's covered in food.  Perhaps especially when he's covered in food.

Chubby hands covered in roasted beetroot:

Beetroot makes his lips so pretty and pink!

Zachary was off his solids over the last few days - with teeth numbers 7 and 8 making their way through, his mouth has been too sore for chewing, so he has been filling himself up with lots of nice milk.  The Baby Led Solids approach of 'food is for fun until they are one' is most reassuring at times like this.  I know that he is getting everything he needs from breastmilk (he's 95th percentile for weight, and 4cm taller than 98th percentile for height, so he's obviously thriving), so if he wants to stick to milk for a week, that's just fine.  This will also be helpful on our Europe trip (four days until we leave!) - if we are out and about, he will be happy with plenty of milk.

Europe Holiday Imminent

Goodness.  This has really snuck up on me.  Next week, we're off on a holiday for three weeks, to Netherlands, France and a two-day stop in Kuala Lumpur on the way.

The Daddy's best friend Chris is Dutch, and has just had his first baby with his lovely partner Cyrelle.  Their little girl Neala was born in February, and we planned our visit even before she was born.  Then, we thought, if we are going to take the children on a plane trip all the way to Europe, we want to go somewhere else as well, but somewhere fairly laid back, so we added a week in Aix-en-Provence to the trip.  Then, we realised we would need to leave from Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris for the trip home, so we may as well spend a few days in Paris as well.  Then, after chatting to some friends who travel to Europe with children quite often, we decided to add a couple of days in KL on the way over, to break up the long flight and to help the kids adjust with the jet lag - and to catch up with friends of ours, who are popping over to visit from Singapore.  Coming home at the end, we elected not to stop over, merely spending 5 hours in KL, as we prefer to just 'push on' and collapse in a heap in the comfort of our own house at the end!

So, the trip is as follows:

Two days in KL, a week in Netherlands (in a small-ish town where our friends live), then fly down to Aix-en-Provence for a week, then catch the fast train up to Paris for three nights, then home.  Total of exactly three weeks, including travel time.

The weather will be lovely - mid 20s to mid 30s between NL and Aix - and our schedule is incredibly relaxed.  In the Netherlands, our plan is just to mooch around and enjoy spending time with our friends and their new baby, and Chris's three siblings and their total of ten children under six (yes, you read that right!).  Plenty of time for Tabitha to play with all the children, a good week to adjust to Euro time, and lots of Dutch food.

Once we are in Aix, we have similarly low-key plans.  We spent a little time in Aix on our honeymoon, and adored the town (it's a very pretty university town in the Provence region in the South of France).  Mostly, we will spend our week just wandering, eating and people-watching, though we are also hiring a car for a few days, to allow for day-trips to some of the local areas (considering St Tropez and / or Monaco via Nice).  My darling friend Shalini, who currently lives in London, is also coming down to Aix to stay with us for a few days, which will be fabulous!  Our apartment in Aix is right overlooking the old town square, where a divine farmers market is held a few times a week.  I cannot wait!

Up in Paris, we have an apartment in the 8th, walking distance from most of the things we want to do, so we will hopefully have a relatively calm few days in Paris.  A little shopping, some macarons, a trip up the Eiffel Tower at dusk.  Then home, with five hours in KL on the way back through (not too terrible, as we are flying Malaysia Airlines, and their gorgeous flagship Golden Lounge is in KL, so we can hopefully have some quiet time there, and it also has a wonderful kids corner with comfy chairs, art supplies, movies etc.)

What am I looking forward to?  Spending quality time with the family, especially The Daddy, seeing our friends' new baby, buying some gorgeous boys' clothes for Zach in Paris (no one does boys' clothing like the French!), strolling around the food markets in Aix, watching the children splash around in the waters of St Tropez.

What am I dreading?  The packing (I've been working on our packing list for months and I'm still tweaking it!), having the children on several long flights (mostly night flights, praying hard that they sleep), the possible jetlag leading the 4am wakeups for everyone for the first week.

If you follow the 'travel' tags on this blog, you'll find some of my musings after our month-long American trip when Tabitha was 10-11 months old, including packing lists.  I'll write some similar posts after this trip, including our experience of travel with two children this time.  

We are not taking my beloved Bugaboo Donkey pram, sadly - we decided it was too large to lug around, considering we are moving around a fair bit - opting instead for a lightweight Maclaren umbrella stroller with a scooter-board.  So, Zach can be in the stroller with Tabitha riding along on the scooter, or Zach can be in the wrap or Manduca carrier with Tabitha in the stroller.

On our US trip when Tabitha was small, most days our days went as follows:  Awake, go for an early walk (with breakfast, coffee, a quick play in a park), then come home for the morning nap.  We would then go out for the rest of the day, letting Tabitha have her afternoon naps in the carrier.  This meant we could go out for lunch, do an activity in the afternoon, have an early dinner, then be home in time for bed.  We found this worked really well - her morning nap was time for her to properly rest, and for The Daddy and I to rest, and plan our days.  We then had ample time to get out for the rest of the day.  Honestly, it was probably much more relaxing and sensible that cramming so much into every day, as we were inclined to do when we travelled before kids!  Spending time each day at local parks is also a lovely feature of travel with kids - you get to meet local families, as well as 'stopping to smell the roses', so to speak.  Also, it was on one of our early-morning park trips in New York with Tabitha that we got to play with Hugh Jackman's beautiful French Bulldog Peaches!

Any questions or requests?  Advice?  Warnings?!

Accidental Low-Allergy Cooking: Banana Pancakes and Two Eggless Biscuits

Pancakes that are outrageously simple and also nutritious, dairy- and gluten-free?  These are a breakfast staple in our household, for The Daddy and I as well as the children.

For these Banana Pancakes, per person (approximately three small pancakes), mash a large, ripe banana and beat in one egg.  Add a tablespoon of buckwheat flour, mix to combine.

We usually also add a scant teaspoon of LSA meal, and a good shake of cinnamon as well.

Heat a non-stick pan over medium heat, and cook for a few minutes on both sides until cooked through.  I recommend sticking with small pancakes (around 12cm diameter or smaller), as they are easier to flip that way.  You can also make them with just egg and banana, but the buckwheat adds flavour, body and makes for easier flipping.

I love Bob's Red Mill organic buckwheat flour.  I get it at my local independent supermarket - they carry a dizzying array of specialty flours - but Bob's Red Mill products are also available from lots of healthfood stores and online retailers.

Tabitha and Zachary have their banana pancakes with fresh strawberries or blueberries.  The Daddy and I love them with maple syrup, and bacon on weekends!

The other day, I made two batches of biscuits which were both, by pure coincidence, egg free.  So I thought I'd post the recipes here.  I am not normally a good 'something-free' cook, as most of my recipes contain lots of butter, milk, eggs, flour or all of the aforementioned, but it is handy to have a few such recipes up one's sleeve, as more and more children are allergic to various things these days.

The first recipe is for homemade arrowroot biscuits.  Similar in texture to a shortbread, but much lighter in flavour, these are an incredibly versatile biscuit, perfect for icing and decorating, or for an 'everyday treat' sort of biscuit for small people.  They are also delicious served alongside a cup of tea - three or four small biscuits is just about right.

Little Arrowroot Biscuits

150g plain flour

60g arrowroot flour or tapioca flour

70g icing sugar

1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

50g thickened cream

60g or a little more canola oil

Sift the dry ingredients together into a bowl.  Using a fork to mix, slowly add the cream, then the oil.  You will need to mix very firmly and for a reasonably long time.  The mixture should be very crumbly, and only come together when you pinch some together with your fingers.  You may need a little more cream or oil, but first try mixing for longer to make sure the liquids are thoroughly worked through.

Using your hands on a sheet of baking paper, press out about 1/3 of the mixture at a time, to a uniform thickness of around 3-4mm.  Use a small cookie cutter, and cut out shapes, re-pressing down the remaining mixture as required.  You will get around 50 small cookies - my cutters are around 3cm across.  Place the cookies on a baking tray lined with baking paper (you can put them close together, as they will not really spread) and bake at 180 degrees for around 8 minutes, or until they are just slightly changing colour.

Let them cool on a wire rack, then store in an airtight tin.  They will happily keep for a good week or so.  They are a good little biscuit to ice, as well.

The second biscuit recipe is one I have posted here before - here - but I am posting the recipe again, for the purposes of having both eggless biscuit recipes together in one place.  These are delicious little chocolate chip cookies made with condensed milk.  They are most delicious when fresh from the oven, but perfectly acceptable for a day or two afterwards as well.

Highlander Biscuits

Cream together 115g softened butter with 55g caster sugar, until light and fluffy.

Beat in 2 tablespoons of condensed milk (note - these are NZ metric tablespoons, so only 15ml each), and 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla extract.

Sift together 170g plain flour and 1 teaspoon of baking powder, and work into the creamed mixture, along with 60g of milk or dark chocolate chips (or chopped chocolate).  Once you have a crumbly mass of dough, tip it onto the bench and lightly knead it together into a rough ball.

Roll teaspoonsful of the dough into balls, and place them, spread apart, onto a baking tray lined with baking paper.  Press each ball down to flatten somewhat with a fork.

Bake for 12 - 15 minutes at 180 degrees.  They should be lightly golden on the bottoms, and barely coloured on the tops.

Cool in a rack, and store in an airtight tin.  This makes around 25 - 30 small cookies for me.

One final sweet dish, which contains egg and dairy and gluten, and is incredibly quick and delicious - my golden syrup Hasty Pudding.  Recipe here.  We've been eating it quite often lately, in the cold evenings of Melbourne winter, and it really hits the spot, with plenty of cream or ice cream.  Make it tonight - it's a one-bowl, melt-and-mix kind of affair, perfectly manageable to throw together after dinner on a chilly night.

A new pair of Baby Legs leggings for Zach - these are really handy for babywearing, as you can slip them on and off according the temperature (for example, if you are going in and out of air conditioned places on a hot day) without disturbing or unwrapping baby.  We're off overseas next week (more about that soon) and I think Baby Legs will be brilliant for all the on-off-on plane action.

Also a few mini pots of CJ's Butter - truly the best and most delicious smelling range of nappy cream / all purpose moisturising balm.  I am never without a little pot of it - current favourite scents include Narwhales and Unicorns, Warm Vanilla Cake and Blueberry Crumble.  The little sample pots are the perfect size to throw into a handbag or nappy bag.

A Visitor, and Snacky Dinner

We had a visit from "Great Aunt Penelope" this week.  She is not really anyone's Great Aunt, in fact she is a friend of my mother's, but we have bestowed the title on her as an honour.  Tabitha is incredibly fond of her - Penelope runs a ballet school, and teaches children Tabitha's age, so she is wonderfully fun with littlies.  She also brings beautiful presents and sends gorgeous postcards from France, so Tabby thinks she is marvellous.

Tabitha and Penelope singing nursery rhymes:

Lots of tea, and warm apple cake, and cheeses with olive bread.  Perfect for 11am, or any time.  Someone asked where my purple cup was from - they are Limoges with platinum edging, available from many places.  They come in the most beautiful jewel-box range of colours.  I love them because they make any everyday cup of tea feel like an occasion.

Beautiful knitted cat for Zachary, and a French ragdoll for Tabitha.  Called Sarah, she says.

Zachary got stuck into the goat's cheese and olive bread.

Also pears - clever boy, he knows that pears go well with cheese!

I always dissect bouquets when they are seemingly on their last legs - I pluck out any of the surviving blooms, and pop them into smaller jars, discarding the rest of the arrangement.  From my birthday arrangement, I have salvaged several full white roses, divided into two jars, and many beautifully wavy lengths of Snapdragon blooms, below.  Snapdragons are a lovely flower to have indoors - just pluck off the bottom blooms as they wilt, and the top parts continue to open and bloom for ages.

'Snacky' dinner time - when The Daddy isn't home for dinner, often I just put together some bits and pieces for myself and the children to nibble on.  Actually, I thoroughly enjoy these sorts of haphazard suppers!  Tonight, grilled sage-marinated lamb cutlets and tomato chutney, fried buttered mushrooms with thyme, and some mashed sweet potato with butter and loads of cinnamon, spread onto toast.

Zach loved his lamb cutlet!

Tabitha ate her dinner in a tutu.  Why not?

Perhaps it sounds off, but I love mashed vegetables as a toast or sandwich spread.  Often, I use avocado in place of butter, but lately (in the Winter, I suppose) I have been thickly spreading sweet potato, pumpkin or cauliflower mashed with plenty of butter and cinnamon onto toast or sandwiches.  Quite delicious!

I am in a bit of a vegetable rut.  We so often have roast veggies, or steamed beans, broccoli or asparagus, or honey mustard carrots, or cauliflower cheese, or mushrooms, or stir-fried bok choi, or salad veggies.  What else is good?  

My Birthday and Zach the Eater

Last week was my birthday - just two days after Tabitha's.  I turned 29.  I had a great day - started with presents and a cup of tea in bed, then spent the morning with the kids, then my mother and The Daddy came home for lunch and birthday cake.

Tradition dictates that I have some sort of chocolate birthday cake from Laurent.  Preferably with crunchy bits and cakey bits.  This one was gorgeous - crunchy praline bits, chewy nougat bits, brownie fudgy layer, a light mousse layer, and incredibly rich ganache.  With crunchy biscuits around the edge. 

Zach was entranced by the candle.  I wish I had have thought to dry my hair before photos!

Birthday presents from The Daddy and the kiddie winkies.  What is more exciting than a blue box?  A blue box and an orange box!

The Daddy picked out the scarf while in Hong Kong for work earlier this month.  He said he thought I needed a pale one, as I have lots of bright and dark scarves.  Clever man.  It's cream, lemon, apricot and lilac in a geometric design.  The necklace is a Paloma Picasso design, 15mm beads in all sorts of semiprecious stones - it has Amethyst, bloodstone, blue lace agate, chrysocolla, dumorierite, green aventurine, hawk's eye quartz, garnet, jasper, lapis lazuli, green jade, red jasper, rhodochrosite, rhodonite, rose quartz, sodalite, tiger's eye and yellow chrysoprase.  Whew!  Anyway, it's incredibly pretty, appeals to my inner hippy, and looks lovely with a plain black dress.

Very large bouquet of flowers from mum, from my favourite florist, Camberwell Market Flowers.  They are just a little stand at the market but they do weddings and events and the most spectacular pomanders and gift arrangements.

After Zach and Tabitha were in bed, The Daddy and I went out for dinner, to Ocha, one of my favourite Japanese restaurants in Melbourne.  As soon the food started to arrive, we received word from home that Zach had woken up, but he was quite content to get up and play with our babysitter until we got home!  He's such an easygoing baby.  We finished off the rest of the cake when we got home.  I would say I ate at least half of the cake over the course of the day!

Cheeky Tabitha.  She has taught Zach to climb the stairs - she stood there for ages, "come on Zachy!  I know you can do it!"  He can climb a few, which was enough for me to organise a stair gate, quick smart.

Made some brownies.  It's a rare week in which I do not make brownies!  They are just so easy, delicious and they even freeze beautifully.  They also go down a treat with the neighbours, and we have lots of lovely neighbours.

Brownies and apple cake.  The apple cake has apples, you see, and wholemeal flour.  Which makes it practically a health food...

Tabitha cannot be trusted alone with an apple cake:

Godmother Sophie read The Jolly Postman to Tabitha - she was enthralled, thoroughly excited by all of the letters.  If you loved it as a child, I'm sure you have already shared the love with a small person, but if you haven't read it, grab a copy for your own family or a little friend.

Zach had a few days off solid foods last week (he had a bit of a cold, so I wanted to get as much breastmilk into him as possible, to help him get better).  Now that he is back to full health, he has plunged back into the world of Solid Foods with gusto.

What does Zach eat on a typical day?  And yes, these photos are all from today - I find it easier to just change his top than bother too much with bibs!

Bananas are popular for breakfast:

For lunch, some steak and mushroom pie with roasted sweet potato and roast potatoes:

For dinner, fish with green beans and cauliflower cheese.  Cheeky grin below - and covered with bits of fish and cauliflower!

Tabitha off for a ride on her balance bike.  With her new Ballerina Barbie, naturally.  Ballerina Barbie was a 3rd birthday present (belated, from moi).  I saw her in her pink box on the shelf and couldn't resist - I received my own first Barbie when I was 3, and it too was a Ballerina Barbie.  I still have her.  I don't believe that classic Barbies are damaging to little girls.  This one has a pink tulle tutu with glittery bodice, sheer pink stockings with seam backs (!), ballet shoes with tiny real ribbons, and a silver tiara.  I think I love her as much as T.

Yes, Tabitha owns lots of clothes that are not pink.  More than 50 per cent of her wardrobe.  Do I have a hope in hell of getting her into any of these non-pink clothes?  Rarely.  It makes me laugh, really, her pink obsession - we deliberately started her out limiting gendered toys, clothes and activities for the most part.  She took soccer lessons, wore blue jeans, loved her toy cars.  Fast forward to around two and a half, suddenly a switch seemed to trip, and she is All About the Pink.