Thoughts on Jet Lag and a Baby

When Darren heard that his work needed him in Europe for a month, and it seemed like it would work for Grant and me to tag along, I was equally parts thrilled and terrified. And the need for Darren to leave before me, leaving me to survive the flight with our 11-month-old wiggly piece of luggage on my own, added to the terror. I wasn't worried enough to skip the trip, but I did spend an embarrassing number of hours searching the internet for tales of other globe-trotting infants. Nothing was particularly reassuring. The general consensus was that it takes kids about 1 day to adjust to 1 hour of time change. We were crossing 9 time zones. Yikes.

My fears were compounded by the difficulties our little guy had sleeping as we camped and visited family, all within 3 hours of home! Instead of sleeping when he is tired and has missed a nap, like I would, this baby starts waking up early from naps, and waking up much more at night. It took weeks to recover from our August travels.

I was prepared for the worst, and was pleasantly surprised by how well both he and I did. I had been moving Grant's bedtime earlier to reduce the shock, so he was actually going to bed as early as 5:00 pm before we left. Our flight left at 6:00 pm, but he was too enthralled with the new environment to be willing to sleep. I had called the airline, and had expected to have a bulkhead seat with a bassinet. They couldn't reserve it in advance, so I was recommended to arrive early to have the gate attendant make the reservations. We were plenty early, and the gate attendant was able to get us a row of 3 seats all to ourselves! It turns out there are benefits to flying around September 11. She told me that the bassinet could be set on the seat, but this turned out to be wrong. I really, really wished that we had not checked the car seat with our luggage, but had waited to check it at the gate if necessary. I tried this on all the other flights of our trip, but all other flights we took were completely full.

It was really hard to get Grant to fall asleep in such a different environment, but he finally did, and me and all the other passengers were insanely jealous of his cushy accommodations. Sadly, he was not so appreciative. Every time he stirred, he would wake up, and I had to nurse him back to sleep. This happened about every half hour. I gave up before long and held him for most of the 10 hour flight.

So it was a short night for Grant, and a non-existent night for me, but we arrived in Amsterdam at 4:00 local time or so. Grant took a little nap on the train to Nijmegen, we both took a little nap at our hotel, then we went out for a late dinner, and went to sleep for the night around midnight. We woke up around 10 am, and were pretty much on local time. Much better than I expected.

The return trip was another story. Our flight left at 10 am, we only managed to get Grant to take one nap, and we fell asleep at about noon local time when we got home. It took almost two weeks to get to a normal schedule. But if it had to happen, at least it was when we were home, and not while we were traveling. I'm not sure how I could have avoided this. I might try another night flight going back home, but it might not turn out any better.

There are several good lists out there on the web that I consulted when packing, but really, you know what your baby needs for food, clothes, medicine, etc. But the best baby accessory that we brought on this trip was the PeaPod. It has almost completely replaced our Pack and Play. Weighing in at only 2.5 pounds, fitting into my suitcase, and taking seconds to put up and take down, it was the perfect baby bed. In addition to its fabulous portability, Grant really, really liked it. Normally he has a hard time sleeping in a new place, but the PeaPod was a contained little cocoon that kept him happy even when we were changing hotels every night.

We even took it to church and stuck him in a little classroom for a nap! So awesome! I wish we had empty classrooms at our church here! The only problem with the PeaPod is that Grant likes it so much, I still haven't been able to get him back in his crib a month after returning. I'm afraid it is going to involve a lot of crying, as indicated by the couple of attempts I have made. If I didn't think that we would wear out the zipper soon, I might not ever switch back. He's so cute rolling around in there, rubbing against the sides.

I saw several blogs/websites recommending bringing a high chair for Europe, so we decided to get one. We really only needed it in Paris though. Every restaurant in Holland and England had baby chairs, although some were better than others, just like here. People in Paris seemed delighted to have a baby in the restaurant, they just didn't have chairs for them. I'm not sure why. If we had spent more time in France, it would have justified hauling along the bulky, heavy chair, but we ended up with only one day there. It was the lightest, smallest chair I could find that I thought would work, but it still took up as much space as all my clothing, and weighed a lot more.

Other things I was really glad to have include my front carrier and my stroller. The ErgoBaby works on both the front and the back, and it was great to have for walking in England and for having along in Holland when we got off our bikes.

My stroller is a BOB Motion, and while it isn't especially light, I love it. It collapses easily, and takes up much less room than a jogging stroller, yet it has good wheels that handle rough terrain and some jogging (although it says not to). I was able to get it on and off buses and trains (although I didn't brave a subway). I considered getting an inexpensive umbrella stroller, but I did a lot of walking, like up to 10 miles a day in London. It was totally worth it. If I generally spent more time in cities though, I would consider one of the Maclaren lightweight strollers. I saw quite a few of them, and they look ideal for city use.

Has it really been a year already?

After committing the requisite birthday carnage by tearing up newspaper wrapping and devoring the most sugar he's ever experienced in one sitting, the little guy is asleep. It was a really fun birthday. I'm patting myself on the back for picking great presents, because Grandma had to lure him away from the new toys by showing him his cupcake, which she just may have let him sample early.

He got a pumpkin spice cake, with cream cheese frosting, and he did his best to lick his tray clean. And this was right after dinner, where he expressed disdain for every offering. Apparently he recognized that there was birthday cake coming soon.

This video is pretty much only for diehard Grant fans, who won't be too horrified by the family rendition of "Happy Birthday."

Darren got him a remote control car, which was initially frightening. But Darren showed him how to work the controls, and now he thinks it is pretty fun. He also got a wooden train, with lots of little pieces to put on and off, which is one of his favorite things right now. And some rubber balls. The video is a little long, but it's worth it to watch him play. Although it's hard to hear his squeals over our laughter.

He's changed so much!

I love one-year-olds! So much fun.

And yes, his birthday actually was yesterday. I had a concert. ("Ode to Joy", it was awesome). So we abandoned Grant to a babysitter on his first birthday. But he convinced her that he should get to stay up late, because it was his birthday after all. So they partied until 10:30. And I'm pretty sure that I can get away with it, because he probably won't know until he is at least a teenager and reads this. And by then, he'll have plenty of other parenting failures to throw at me, so this will pale in comparison.

Back in Nijmegen, Salt Herring and Bicycles

Amsterdam is a short 90 minute flight from London, but it still took all day because of the long train ride from Cheltenham. Lucky for us, Volmar (Darren's coworker) picked us up from the airport and took us out to dinner with his lovely girlfriend, Sindy. They also showed us their spiffy new home, which was quite spacious for such a densely populated country. 

Back in Nijmegen, with no jet lag, and feeling much more oriented, we thoroughly enjoyed exploring the city. On Saturday with Darren we found a fun street market, and fun street foods, like salt herring with onions. Yep, that's me, proudly eating my raw fish the way the guy at the stand said it's supposed to be eaten. Grab it by the tail and take a bite. As you can see, Grant preferred his teething biscuit. Also at the market, we found zoute drop (salty licorice), stroopwaffles (thin waffles sandwiched with caramel), and lots of fabric. The fabric was odd to me. I'm used to finding finished handcrafts at markets, not crafting supplies. The prices were great, but my luggage space was limited!

The history would just pop and and surprise me at every turn. Like this ruined tower in a park by the market. Built in the 8th or 9th century on top of Roman ruins from 100 BC. Just, wow.

We couldn't get a picture to turn out well here because of the light. But it is a castle that we visited with Volmar and Sindy. It felt like something out of the Sound of Music, and it was built in the 12th century. It's surrounded by a moat (squeal!). That length of history is just beyond my comprehension.

 You can't visit Holland without remarking on the bicycles! I loved it, they were everywhere. As many bikes as cars. In Utrecht, near a university, there were way more bikes than cars or pedestrians. There are bike lanes, and even bike signals. It took a little adjusting, and I had way more close calls with bikes than with cars, especially when I was walking. But as soon as we returned from England, my first priority was to rent a bike. I only saw a handful of people wearing helmets, but I couldn't refrain from strapping one on Grant. Hopefully he'll forgive me for making him wear his sister's pink-flowered helmet, without requiring therapy.

Nijmegen had a fun little bike museum, with examples of every bike ever invented, starting with a model of a design that was supposed to be by Leonardo da Vinci, but turned out to be a fake. It was an impressive collection though. Crazy high-wheeled contraptions, examples of a half dozen gear inventions, chrome plated beauties from the '50s, and more. 

I especially got a laugh out of the bathroom doors. It took me a minute.

Bourton-on-the-Water

We were originally going to avoid this town, because it was described as being very touristy. However, it ended up as probably our favorite day, maybe because we were so delighted to see a parking lot. Other towns still had many tourists, but nowhere for them to park, so they park in the middle of the street. Ok, I'll stop grousing about the driving. Bourton had a nice big parking lot, the streets were just full of people, and because of all the people there were lots of fun shops. We particularly enjoyed a shop with wool sweaters and all things Scottish, as well as some rather quaint candy shops, and of course, the bakeries. But what really draws people to this town is that it is built along the banks of the River Windrush (isn't that a pretty name?). It's a gentle, shallow, pretty little river, with ducks standing in it, and many little bridges. If Grant was walking, and the weather were a little warmer, we wouldn't have been able to keep our feet dry.

A fun little attraction is the Model Village. It is a 1/9th scale replica of the village that some crafty person built in the 1930s. It was just a little too small for Grant, but he still enjoyed it very much. We just had to restrain him from going into Godzilla mode and tearing down stone walls or toppling buildings.

Walkers are Welcome

I haven't seen the show, but apparently the zombies in "The Walking Dead" are referred to as Walkers. This provided wonderful mental images when we frequently saw signs around many villages saying "Walkers are Welcome!" Probably not what the chamber of commerce had in mind. But seriously, this was one of my favorite things about the area. Apparently in England there is a "right to wander". So as long as you aren't poking about in people's personal property, you can walk through any field and generally go wherever you wish. This has been encouraged by the establishment of innumerable public bridleways or walking paths. There are stiles and gates providing easy access, and lots of maps published of circular walks. One of the most famous and popular walks is the Cotswold Way, which goes 100 miles from Chipping Campden to Bath. Walkers stand out a bit in their sturdy clothes and boots, and we saw lots of them. It turns out that our B&B is right on the Cotswold Way, and our hosts said that a little over half of their guests are walkers. There are walking tours, and companies that will move your luggage for you, and there are people who do it all on their own. We didn't see anyone carrying camping gear, or the large packs we use for backpacking though. It's very convenient to have all these charming little towns and pubs every couple of miles.

We did a very short circular walk of 4 or 5 miles around Chipping Campden. There were woods, which felt a little like Robin Hood, fields that envisioned Tess of the d'Urbervilles, and some nice views over the town, like we were walking through a Jane Austen movie set. We also thought we were lost a lot, and encountered more mud than we expected. I thought the biggest difference from the movie sets was that most of the walkers we encountered appeared to be retired. I guess the Tess's, Mr. Darcy's, and Little John's of our era are employed in other activities than walking through the countryside. Dang.



If I were to plan another trip to England, I would love to come back to walk the entire Cotswold Way, with another couple days in London, without a baby, cute as he is.

Seven Years

Monday was our anniversary, and while it was tempting to remain holed up in the B&B, we decided it was time to venture forth. Over the weekend we had realized that while the full English breakfast was wonderfully filling, it didn’t quite last all the way until the next breakfast. Between our stomachs, the compulsion to do something to celebrate our anniversary, and the rumors of enchanting villages from a bygone era, we found the courage to “hire” a car, to use the local vernacular, and then drive it, ourselves. Well, Darren drove, but I helped by shrieking in terror regularly. I'm sure that made our anniversary extra special for him. After our limited experience of watching drivers in the English countryside, we were suitably terrified. The rental place had no difficulty convincing us to purchase the extra insurance, and Grant got buckled in extra carefully.

With the help of Google and a touring map from our B&B, I navigated us along the scenic route, Darren drove, Grant napped, and we made it to our destination of Chipping Campden with no major damage, other than fried nerves. We may not have fully appreciated the bucolic charm of the picturesque villages through which we passed, but it was certainly an adventure not to be forgotten!

According to the guide books, the Cotswolds grew quite wealthy around the 16th century by producing wool. There are still lots of sheep. They built beautiful and sturdy buildings out of the local limestone, including lots of fabulous churches. Even the tiniest villages sported large, elaborate churches, which are known as "wool" churches. The area eventually fell into a recession, which lasted a couple hundred years, during which virtually no development happened. Now it has some sort of protected status, and it feels like stepping back in time hundreds of years...  if you can pretend the cars are horses.

In deference to the anxiety produced by those quaint country roads, we opted to continue our explorations by foot. But walking deserves a post of its own, so more on that later. The highlight of the day for me was probably our afternoon tea. I’d been looking for a good place for this everywhere we went, but the timing was tricky. Afternoon tea is served between 3 and 6, and Grant was napping from 3 until 5 typically. Also, Darren wasn’t spending the afternoon sampling every local delicacy, and for some reason he wanted dinner when he was done with work. So unreasonable. Anyway, this ended up being the only day I got to experience afternoon tea. Because Grant had been in the backpack or carseat all day up to this point, he really wanted to get down and move around. The thought of putting him in one of the dainty little tea shops I had been seeing sounded much more expensive, and much less relaxing than I had been hoping for. Some aspects of travel are truly not improved by experiencing them with a baby. I know, shocking. But we found a little hotel with an empty looking restaurant. Not really a good sign when looking for tasty treats, but it worked for us. They so very kindly put us in a sitting room all by ourselves, which Grant loved, and Darren and I got to pretend that we were English aristocracy being served tea in our own sitting room with a fireplace!

Rest for the Weary at Upper Hill Farm

After that whirlwind week of travel, we were really ready for some down time. I was so glad that Darren had arranged for a couple days off. As soon as he was done with work on Friday, we were headed for Paddington Station to catch a train out of the city. And yes, it is chock full of Paddington Bear paraphernalia. I was a bit shocked by the train fare. This train cost almost as much as the one from Paris to London, and it's a commuter train!

Our destination was a 18th century stone farmhouse outside of Cheltenham in the Cotswolds. It actually took a ton of work to find a bed and breakfast that would allow Grant. Much easier to find accommodations for say, a Great Dane. Oh well, we were delighted with Beechfield House at Upper Hill Farm. Paul and Helen had a sweet room for us, fixed us fabulous full English breakfasts, introduced us to Percy, the friendly neighborhood pheasant, drove us down to the local pub for dinner, and even washed some laundry. Ahhhhhh. It was so nice to rest.

By some sweet miracle, our room had a little closed off hallway between us and the bathroom. Perfect for sticking our baby at night! Hurrah! I hadn't quite anticipated how difficult it would be to always share just one room with a baby who sleeps 12 hours at night. You can't really do anything but hide your laptop under the covers and try not to make any noise. It's been especially difficult when Darren needs to get to work, and Grant wants to sleep until 9 or 10. I'm still not sure how to improve this, other than spending way more money on the hotels.

While I had wanted to stay in a smaller town, I think it was good that we ended up where we did, close enough to the train station for our hosts to pick us up. You pretty much have to drive in such a rural area. I had been envisioning peaceful, pleasant drives along meandering country roads, with hedgerows and pastoral views. The scenery was right, but the drivers are crazy! We expected the challenge of adjusting to driving on the left side of the road. But we didn't anticipate one-lane roads with two-way traffic, curves and hedges blocking the view (no one considered sight distance in designing these roads!), and crazy speeds! When our host first picked us up from the station, I thought it was just her driving. But she turns out to be a conservative driver! The method is to drive really fast, then slam on the brakes and swerve into the brush when another car needs to pass. Wow.

We couldn't rent a car on Saturday or Sunday because I hadn't made arrangements in advance, and while I pretended to be regretful to our hosts, I was so relieved! We really didn't need the stress of trying to drive those first couple of days. We got a little hungry, but it was worth it. The countryside right around the house was beautiful, with lots of trails. And that was all the sightseeing we were up for.

I wish I had taken a picture of our "full English breakfast". It includes thick bacon, sausage, fried egg, black pudding, baked beans, mushrooms, tomatoes, hashbrowns and toast. It was awesome, and yes, enormous. Most breakfast sausages don't sit well with me, but this was great. Good thing we planned to do a lot of walking!

Paul gave us a ride to church, which was only four miles away, and we really enjoyed the ward. There are quite a few American ex-pats, apparently there is a software company and something government related in the area. It was a nice, big, friendly congregation with a lot of variety of people.