I AM BACK! (from my holiday, in case you missed my incessant pre-holiday Tweeting!)
Yesterday we landed at Bristol airport having been in Spain for ten days and what can I say?
Well a lot actually….
Firstly, I ABSOLUTELY HATE FLYING. I have no idea why I have suddenly become so phobic as up until this year I never minded it, in fact last year I flew to Spain on my own with Iyla who was three months old and although I didn’t love the experience, I was a totally different person to the one who almost cried and locked herself in the toilet whilst up in the air yesterday. I hate being so out of control, I hate the way it makes me feel, I hate the way the air conditioning burns my nose and throat, I hate the fact that you don’t know if there is going to be an engine failure causing you to plummet 38,000 feet to the ground and I hate the noise. We experienced some turbulence yesterday too which led to me telling Dad2BabyInsomniac that I am never flying again, I don’t think he took me very seriously though because A. the seat belt lights never even came on and B. I said a similar thing about never giving birth again when I was in labour with Iyla!
Secondly, my relaxing in the sun days are no more. One of the things I used to love doing pre-children was lying in the sun with my eyes shut but this just isn’t possible now. Shutting your eyes when you have a toddler is not an option and keeping them open, even with sunglasses on, results in a big fat headache.
Thirdly, beaches just aren’t that fun – unless you are a child. Iyla absolutely loved the beach which isn’t surprising given that it is basically a giant sandpit. She made sand soup, sand cakes, and thought they looked so tasty that she actually tried to eat some.
She could have been entertained for days at the beach but all Dad2BabyInsomniac and I wanted to do was lie back and close our eyes (see above). Then you have the risks of the sea, in this case jellyfish. Dad2BabyInsomniac and Iyla were paddling, about a few inches in, when a jellyfish came over and stung him, very unfortunate but thank god it wasn’t Iyla as that would have been awful.
On returning to show me his wound he sat on his beach chair only for the material to rip and him to fall through onto the sand, I was in absolute hysterics but as you can imagine our beach trip ended pretty shortly after this, but not before we had to try and de-sand a toddler, under a cold tap as the sea was too risky!
Fourthly, there are only so many tortilla baguettes you can eat. I don’t like Spanish food. Or more like I don’t like the element of surprise that comes with ordering something of a menu. If I order a vegetable stew then I just don’t expect it to arrive with a hard-boiled egg floating in it. I am happy to admit that I am a fussy eater, I am very unadventurous and stick to what I like which made me feel like I was about seven years old when looking at a Spanish menu!
Fifthly, and much to my surprise, I didn’t miss the internet at all. I am permanently attached to my iPhone when in England, I check Twitter, Facebook and my emails a ridiculous amount of times each day, not to mention how much I use the internet for work and blogging, so when I knew I wasn’t going to have it for nearly two weeks I was a bit apprehensive about how I would cope but it was really nice to have a break. I read books instead, something which I never find time for at home.
Sixthly, being pregnant on holiday is not much fun. You can’t drink, you have to make sure everything is cooked properly, you have to worry about whether fruit and vegetables have been washed in dodgy water and therefore think you have caught stomach bugs all the time, or maybe that’s just me?! The sun made me too hot, too tired and gave me a headache and I couldn’t go in the hot tub.
But luckily Iyla had a great time in it…
And lastly despite all my negativity we had a really nice time. It was so nice to have a break and forget about the daily grind back at home. Iyla loved it. Dad2BabyInsomniac’s mum owns the house that we stayed in and it is lovely, we are so lucky to be able to go there and Iyla settled in really well due to it being just like home, she even got to watch the CBeebies bedtime hour every night!
She had great fun in the pool…
And loved dressing up in Nanny’s accessories!
I know exactly what you mean about a lot of the things- I have got so much worse about flying, I consider myself pretty well travelled and every time I get on a plane I get worse and worse- I am even worse now I have Mads. I don’t want it to stop me going on a flight but I spend the entire flight with my heart beating and I sometimes think it just isn’t worth it.
Yes holidays are definitely different with a toddler in tow, not bad different but just different. I was a massive sun worshipper before Mads and I struggled with the fact that you couldn’t just lie down and relax- but at the same time it was lovely to watch her face as she tried new things and experienced the beach, pool and sea. And I was pregnant when I went in June and that is definitely not fun. Normally I am not fussy at all and I enjoy Spanish food but I was worried about how things were cooked.
Glad you had a nice time still though- like I said it is different but still good.
PS With the baby arriving next year my feet are staying firmly in the UK.
x
Katie recently posted..23 Weeks Pregnant…Bump Diary.
Holidays are definitely different with a baby or toddler in tow! Although parents are on holiday it’s hardly a break, you still need to keep your kids entertained! But like you say, great to be away from the daily grind. We think Holidays are where the best memories are made for families and if you can keep revisiting this same place (as it is family owned) then your baby will have so many amazing memories of family fun time together. It’s great that she has her home comforts there too, it will feel like home from home and is so easy to keep her safe from the dangers of the sun when you can freely stroll in and out without worrying about losing your place by the pool. Sounds like you all had a fantastic family holiday, and despite your fear of flying will have plenty more too
I naively thought our first family holiday would be a break for ME. Instead, I ended up more knackered than I was at home, and felt like I needed a couple of weeks to recover when we got back home. He wasn’t sleeping at night (he wasn’t at home either, but there were one or two more wake-ups than usual on holiday), he had no routine (we went with the whole of Sam’s family and were going along with their routine because we only had the one car and Sam didn’t want to stay at the holiday house and miss out on time with them), the ONLY time I got a break and time to sunbathe/swim was naptime which never happened because we were going out every day on all day exercusions so he napped on the go. It was bloody knackering, and still I felt unable to moan about it because we were lucky enough to be going away at all. I also went to Cyprus where I was solo-parenting and had flu. The least said about that the better.
After all of this, I still found myself wishing we had been able to get away for a week this year. I think holidays with little ones are OK if you do it on YOUR terms and go for the most hassle-free option.
Chloe (from Chloe Witters) recently posted..Turning Two
I have had some, ahem, interesting holidays with my children. The one where I was pregnant in Cyprus and completely went off Greek food was interesting. Basically when you go on holiday with kids you need a holiday afterwards to recover.
purplemum recently posted..A Phone Theft
Gosh, that does not sound relaxing at all! Jellyfish stings are the pits. I hope he recovered OK. Glad you got a break even if it wasn’t all it could have been. x
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