Flying Cross Country Solo with Five Kids

So I want to just start off with the obvious, which is that flying with kids is hard.

So I solo fly with my kids a fairly reasonable amount.

I was trying to think through exactly how many times.

So my oldest is nine and a half.

We've flown several times a year, sometimes quite a lot, up to five times a year for different things with various different legs.

Sometimes they're three-legged journeys.

And probably about 20% of the time I'm flying solo with my kids or maybe a little bit more than that, especially when I go visit my parents online.

because we try to visit them more frequently and my husband needs to work, I will sometimes go by myself entirely.

And then often he will come with me for the first few days and then he'll have to return for work.

And then I will go back home with the kids.

So I think the first thing I want to just say is that this is obviously hard.

I've posted some pictures on Instagram of just me with the kiddos in the airport by myself.

And I get a lot of comments saying, You know, and they're very kind, very, very kind things that make me feel good about myself.

Like, you know, you're super mom, you're crushing it.

And I so appreciate those comments.

That is really kind.

But I think I want to start off by saying I am not crushing it.

I'm not super mom.

And that flying with kids is really hard.

And that what I'm going to share is just God's grace, things that have really blessed me in my flying.

But this is a really hard thing.

One of my favorite lines from the memoir Cheaper by the Dozen, which was originally published in 1948, but it's set kind of during the turn of the 20th century, is when the dad, the father of 12, who has been serving in Washington, D.C. during World War I, asks the mom about her travels from the East Coast to the West Coast to visit her parents.

And I think it's so funny.

Yeah.

Because she says, it was fine, dear.