Traveling Wild: Visiting Champagne

Visiting Champagne!

I've wanted to visit the Champagne region for a while. Sparkling wine is one of my most favorite alcoholic beverages. It's just so tasty! But only sparkling wine made in this region can actually be called champagne--and it's known as the best in the world. So when we had the chance to take a day trip to the area with Stacy and Jason, you better believe we signed on for that. Plus we got to go by train, which is always fun.

Wilder's first train ride

The very beginning of Wilder's love affair with trains. 

Wilder was not yet the train fanatic he is now, but he still thought the train was really cool. More about train travel in another post. This ride on the TGV was short--only 45 minutes--and it was a scenic trip. When we got to Reims, we picked up some croissants (definitely want to carb up before visiting wineries!) and joined our tour guide Cris at the van. We reserved a car seat for Wilder in the van and off we went to the town of Hautvillers.

vineyards

like a painting

learning about champagne

Wilder liked the vaulted ceiling

The bottles have to be turned so precisely, twice a day.

The church in Hautvilliers, where Dom Perignon is buried.

doll baby in the church

little angel

sorry last one. So cute!

beautiful vineyard

Cheesin'

The crew!

We learned about Dom Perignon--a monk that was influential in improving champagne (who knew!?), and we got to see the church where he was buries. We saw the vineyards for Moet & Chandon (my favorite), and we learned about the process of making champagne. There is SO much to the process--it was fascinating! After just a few minutes in the van, we arrived at the first of two champagne houses: Ferrand Lemaire. We tried several brut champagnes, and they were delicious! I was worried about Wilder missing his naps on this day trip, but he napped for 90 minutes while I wore him in my Tula in the morning.

babywearing - handy for nap time!

Next, we went to J.M Gobillard & Fils  and tried a bunch more samples of champagne. It was all good. After that stop, we headed back to the train station and were home in time for Wilder to take his afternoon nap. It was such a pleasant excursion, and we came back with LOTS of delicious champagne to enjoy the rest of the trip.

magnums o' champagne

There are a lot of wineries in the Champagne region - if you get the chance to go, I would definitely recommend our tour guide Cris Event to help you navigate winery tours. He did a great job!

Traveling Wild: Exploring the Paris Market

Marche Presidente Wilson

Today I'm going to talk about one of my favorite parts of traveling: FOOD! Prior to having Wilder, when we traveled, we ate out every meal, unless we saved leftovers or something. But eating out with a baby can be challenging, and we knew going to France and Italy that meals would be much more leisurely. If you have kids, you know that there's an invisible timer that turns on when you arrive at a restaurant, counting down until your child is D.O.N.E. and you will have to leave. Most of the time, Zach and I eat at home with our kids. If we eat restaurant food, it's usually takeout.

When you're traveling, eating out is often your only means of getting food. But if you stay with friends, or in an airBNB flat (more on that in another post) you have the luxury of a kitchen and dining area. We learned on this trip that, just like eating at local restaurants, visiting local markets is an excellent way to get to know the region. In fact, I think I can now say that visiting markets is my favorite way to get to know an area!

From the supermarket, with the variety of food and interesting packaged foods (Nutella!) to small shops where you can grab a pastry and coffee or snacks, to the incredible Marche President Wilson (market) that we visited twice on this trip--each market offered its own special allure. The market we visited in the 16th arrondissement (near Trocadero) was a dazzling experience for the senses: brightly colored flowers, neatly arranged fruits, aromatic herbs, juicy rotisserie chicken with potatoes (a MUST try), tantalizing cooked food from all over the world, fresh meat and seafood, spices and even some clothes and such. If you're a food lover, you really need to visit the market. So many vendors were excited about their wares. We met a salt vendor that told us exactly which salt to use for which dish, when to apply it and how much. I came home with several kinds of salt with a little wooden spoon and I use it in my cooking all the time. It always reminds me of France!

mushrooms!

Here's the salt guy- what a character!

I don't know what this is, but it sure was pretty.

Crepes!

Pretty flowers

Hello fishie!

SCALLOPS OMG

Bass!

The vendors will clean your fish for you. Thank goodness!

I've been told that there is some kind of market just about every morning, all over Paris. I actually went looking online to find the name of the market we went to and discovered dozens, in just the neighborhood where we were staying! Check out this website for a list of markets. I can't recommend visiting a market enough!

I'd say the experience of relaxing in a French flat with friends and family, good food and good wine can rival the stress that eating out with a baby can bring. It's good to do both, but this was really our first trip to cook so much in-house.

Here are some of the meals the four of us cooked at the Gulledge's flat in Paris.

Hazelnut crusted fish with olive oil mashed potatoes and mushrooms Stacy and Jason picked on a mushroom hunt in the country. We also had eclairs and champagne!

Pork loin wrapped with bacon, haricot vert.

Those scallops!

The bass and more haricot vert. We had a sumptuous meal with the scallops as appetizer and more champagne!

Next post I'll talk about our day trip to Champagne!

Traveling Wild: Adjusting to Jet Lag

ZOMG IT'S THE EIFFEL TOWER! This is a few minutes from Stacy and Jason's flat!

Our first day with Wilder in Paris was pretty uneventful. We arrived at Stacy and Jason's flat in Trocadero around noon, had lunch and Wilder went down for a nap. When he got up, we went for a walk in Paris! 

We went to the local market and picked up things for dinner. We went to Passy Plaza and visited a toy store, a Monoprix supermarket and an eclair shop, where we got some of these beautiful goodies.

eclairs like you've never seen!

Not your average cheese selection

We came back, gave Wilder some dinner and he was out like a light! We enjoyed a nice meal at the flat with Stacy and Jason, finished off with the eclairs. After turning in for the night, Zach and I looked forward to finally resting.

Perfect little sleeper...

Ha!

Our usual way of dealing with jet lag going to Europe is as follows: stay up late the night before packing. Turn our clocks to Europe time when we get on the plane and go to sleep when it's night in Europe while on the plane. Wake up on Europe time, be tired for the day (NO NAPS) but stay up till a reasonable bed time. Sleep well, wake up and no jet lag by the second day.

What happens with a baby is completely different. We stayed up late packing, got on the plane and didn't sleep well (if at all) because of the baby. Powered through that first day (though we took a nap, oops!), went to bed at a reasonable hour and... at about midnight, Wilder was up. It's morning back home! He's wide awake. Party time! No sleeping! It took two hours to get him to go back to sleep that first night. I rocked and nursed. Nursed and rocked. My arms wanted to fall off. Eventually he did go back to sleep. I got up early to go to a meeting with Stacy, and I was so tired! Wilder slept in till nearly lunch.

After lunch at the flat we visited the Left Bank. 

We got hot chocolate and did a little window shopping and partook of some STRONG coffee. Thank goodness!

Nectar of the gods

Traveling Wild is so stylin in his baby Ray Bans

The highlight of that second day was visiting Shakespeare & Co. A famous bookstore frequented by such literary greats as J. Fitzgerald Scott and Ernest Hemingway. 

It was crammed full of all kinds of books. I bought A Moveable Feast by Hemingway, just because it seemed fitting. We stopped at two more dessert places (tired parents love sugar!) before heading home. Wilder was so very tired, but he was a little trooper. He went down for a late nap and we made another delicious dinner at the flat.

That evening, again, Wilder was up in the middle of the night for two hours. We shared a room with Wilder for much of the trip, and the one benefit was being able to tag team trying to put him to sleep. The third night in Paris, it took Wilder three hours to go back to sleep in the middle of the night. I wish I was kidding. We tried everything. He napped fine during the day, but his little body was so confused by the time change. 

Luckily, by the fourth night, Wilder seemed to have adjusted to the change. I would like to say it's because of our mad parenting skills, but we didn't do anything. The main point I can share is that jet lag is no joke with kids. NO JOKE. It is hard to get over. Coming back to the US, he had much less trouble. I hear going west is easier. That could also be because he was in his own bed.

I don't have much advice, but here's some things we learned:

Jet Lag is Tough. If you are traveling with kids, be prepared for having a hard time adjusting to the time change. As parents, the whole staying up that first day technique doesn't work well when you might be up in the night. The really nice thing about having kids on a trip is built in down time thanks to naps. I would definitely recommend taking a short nap that first day. But short! Not lots of hours long! Just enough to recharge.

Put your family on the new schedule ASAP. I would also encourage you to do your best to eat at the right times for your new time zone and work on the right bedtime. You can't make a baby sleep when they're not sleepy, but you can encourage going to bed on time. Wilder was more than happy to nap, even in a new place. And if you baby wear or bring a stroller, they can nap. So middle of the night was our only issue.

Domestic travel is a bit easier, but still needs an adjustment. We have only experienced an hour or two time difference when it comes to domestic travel. Going west seemed to be easier than going east. Again, we tried to implement the new bedtime as soon as possible. Going west, we would let Wilder stay up a little later the first day or so since he wasn't tired yet.

Good luck, parents of kids! Actual travel and jet lag were the hardest parts of taking trips with Wilder. The rest was a lot easier to navigate!

Veteran travelers - do you have any tips for conquering jet lag?

Traveling Wild: Flying with baby

photo by lamouredeparis.com

Howdy y'all! I'm about to start a new series here at Through Abby's Lens. I'm going to recap our first international trip with Wilder - to (where else?) France and Italy... and a little bit of Switzerland. Traveling with a baby is a LOT different than traveling as a couple. Zach and I learned a lot of things the hard way, as well as through research on the good ol' internet. My hope is through this series, I can encourage other families with young children to just take the plunge and go on that trip. Taking your kids abroad (or heck, even across the state) can be an intimidating thought, but don't let the fear of all the extra logistics get you down and keep you at home. With some extra planning, a huge helping of patience and some compromise, you can continue to travel, avec baby.

Cinque Terre with Zach in 2008-our first international trip together!

Travel is one of Zach's and my core family values. We make it a priority, and when we had Wilder, we decided we didn't want to let go of traveling the world. In 2014, our dear friends living in Paris, Stacy and Jason Gulledge (If you don't know who they are, you must be new to my blog :-)), messaged us and our Supper Club cohorts to talk about an international rendezvous. My brother-in-law Grant and his wife Jashley were up for a Grand Tour of Europe, so we decided to make the trip happen... with Wilder, a 10-month-old baby. So in October 2014, we headed across the pond.

About to leave DFW airport for France!

One of the biggest obstacles to traveling with a baby is transportation. We'll talk about cars and trains in other posts, but for now I want to tackle THE PLANE.

Lake Annecy! photo by Stacy Reeves

Babywearing vs. a stroller
First, to navigate the airport, I highly recommend babywearing. For this trip, I wore Wilder in a Tula soft structured carrier. Zach prefers the Boba 4G carrier, and we brought that too, but I ended up wearing Wilder most of the time. Wearing your baby in the airport keeps him/her contained and (usually) happy, it gives you free hands and it makes navigating stairs and such much easier than a stroller. We did not bring a stroller on this trip, and while my back and shoulders hurt at times, there were maybe three times where I wished I had one. The rest of the time I was thankful I was wearing him. That is just my preference. A stroller may work better for you.

If you do bring a stroller, travel crib and/or car seat, some airlines will let you check them for free. American did for us. Usually you can check the stroller at the gate, so don't worry about giving that up when you check in. But you do need to confirm that with the airline. You also need to make sure you designate on one of your tickets that you have an infant. Children are free under two years, but they DO have to be on someone's ticket!

Planning the flight
Planning for the flight is vastly different with a baby vs. without. Before baby, I would pick what books I wanted to read, which seat would be most comfy, which movies I wanted to watch, and decide if I wanted to watch more movies, or get some rest? Which drink do I want? Did I bring my passport? Flying with baby: I planned what toys and activities would occupy Wilder on the flight, and what would fit in the diaper bag, we picked seats that would be convenient with the baby, and I realized that rest and movie watching were probably not going to happen in my particular situation.

Flight time
I've been told flying during bedtime and naps is the best idea. I think that depends on your child. That seemed to work for us, but know that they won't sleep as well as they do at home. We didn't have a choice on our flight to France, so we flew overnight. On the way back, we flew during the day. I would say both were hard. I didn't sleep much on the way there, but Wilder did sleep in my arms. So I arrived exhausted. On the way back, we didn't sleep much either because it was daytime, and that required a lot more entertaining. So we arrived exhausted. Jet lag will be another blog post, but it's NO JOKE with babies.

Seating arrangement
 I've heard several theories about seating for airplanes with a child under 2 - a lap baby. One said to choose different rows so that your child has a new view. We wanted to be together, so we didn't do that. Another suggested getting a window and an aisle seat, so the center seat would most likely be empty if the flight wasn't full. We did request this, and I highly recommend it. We found having the two of us as buffers and Wilder in the middle to be the best situation. We have flown several times with Wilder, and all of the times, we found that staff was surprisingly helpful. They were very kind and accommodating. It's worth having a conversation at check in, and at the front gate, about seating. You can find out if there's a row with an empty seat, sometimes people can get moved around--really, it's amazing what can be done if you ask politely and have a baby in tow. It's ALWAYS worth an ask!

Many people recommend buying a seat and putting a car seat in it for your child. If you luck out with an empty seat near you, you don't need to pay, but it's a gamble. Wilder was under 2, so we didn't buy a seat. But the good news is you can wait till you get to the gate to check a car seat, so you can find out if you'll have an empty seat at that point. Next time we fly, I will most likely put the car seat in a seat for Wilder. How many times can I say "seat" in a paragraph? whew!

We got a bassinet, and a bulkhead seat. We asked for the bassinet at check in, and the gate. They were kind and gave us the bulkhead, with a bunch of empty seats around us. So we had three extra seats on the flight there. That was a blessing, because we had a lot of stuff (lesson learned) and we were able to give Wilder some space. The downside to the bulkhead was that the bassinet was attached out of my reach (yay leg room) and it was very shallow. We didn't end up using it because I was afraid he'd fall out. I didn't bother getting it for the return flight. I know some friends have had great success with a bassinet, so I would recommend getting one, just in case. On the flight back, we had one empty seat in between us and it worked well too, but the space was more cramped after getting spoiled in the bulkhead. But... it was slightly easier to get to our things because they were in front of us. So, it was a tradeoff.

Takeoff and landing
On takeoff and landing, I had been told to nurse the baby to help his ears. I brought a cover for my own comfort, so that is what I did for some flights. If Wilder finished nursing before we took off for some reason, I gave him a pacifier. The sucking helps with baby ears, and it helps calm them.

So excited to be on his first international flight!

Food and activities
Wilder was newly into baby-led weaning on this trip, so we brought some easy snacks for him. I discovered that he LOVED eating puffs out of a pill dispenser. SO much... I did not bring enough puffs. He ate it all on the flight.. and we quickly ran out in Europe. FYI, you cannot buy baby puffs anywhere that we could find in Europe. We definitely looked in three different countries... So if puffs are your baby's jam, stock up!! Other things we brought: cheerios, orange slices, strawberries and quartered grapes. Now that he's older, he really likes pouches, so I would incorporate those. We tried to bring low-mess snacks, and hand wipes, and a bib. We'll talk food later, but BLW is a great way to travel with a kid!

Toys... I picked up some things at the dollar store so he would have new toys, but many of them were not a hit. It's really hit or miss on what toys/activities are small enough that they will like. He was too little for stickers or coloring. Mostly, we read books over and over, and played with jumping frog toys. I would recommend experimenting with toys ahead of time to make sure to bring toys that will occupy your kid. I brought things and realized he was either too little for them, or had outgrown them. It's worth putting time in before the trip so you save space and don't end up with a bunch of toys/activities that don't hold your child's interest. Pinterest is a great resource! We brought a Kindle Fire, but we hadn't had it long enough to find good games for Wilder, and he was mostly uninterested. If we were to fly now, he would love the iPad for hours and hours, but he's two. It just depends on your kid.

Favorite sleep sack - so helpful!

How he slept... (flight back)

Handling air time
For the actual flight, Zach and I tag teamed EVERYTHING. Traveling with kids is a TEAM sport. Not to scare anyone, but it is not easy to fly internationally with a baby/child. One of us would hold Wilder while the other ate or went to the bathroom or napped. Most of the flights, I held Wilder in my arms, because that's the only way he would go to sleep. It was a struggle, and it is exhausting. Diaper changes are a great way to walk around the plane and let baby see new sights. It kills time too. Win on all accounts. I brought one diaper for every hour of flight, and some extras, just to be safe. Also an extra shirt for me and an extra set of clothes for him. Plus spit up cloths for mess. Bring their favorite blanket - we love Aden + Anais muslin blankets because they are versatile, fold up small, they're lightweight and warm/cool when you need them to be. We also brought an A+A muslin sleep sack (lighter weight for warm times) and a Halo sleep sack that he lovessss. It's like his lovey, and he knows wearing it means sleep. Don't forget a neck pillow for yourself! We flew across the US when Wilder was 4 months old, and I wore him in a Boba wrap for most of the flight. That was great because he went to sleep and if he fussed, I could easily sway and bounce in the back of the plane.

Babies sometimes cry on planes. It's going to happen. We just did our best to calm him as soon as possible. Everyone was really understanding. I worried so much about people hating us for our baby crying, but in my opinion, if you are actively doing your best to calm your child, people will tend to be more forgiving. The instances that make people mad (in my experience) are when the child runs wild, cries nonstop with no consoling, throws a tantrum and the parents do nothing. Do your best, and people are usually nicer about it.

Final word on the actual travel
One thing I learned this trip was that going to multiple locations is difficult. Much more difficult than going without kids. Packing up and going on a plane/train/care and disrupting baby sleep, confining the child to a car seat--it's all a challenge. If I could recommend anything, it would be to pick one place and stay there. And I say that... but we never do that. lol. If we go abroad, we go all over the place. But now we know what we're in for. Travel days are the hardest part of the trip. Once you get there, it's a lot easier!

I hope this post was helpful. If you have a travel topic you want me to tackle, please let me know!