It’s a tough life: the kids take a load off…
Kate recently took one of our family holidays to Thailand with her two children in tow – including her 3 month old daughter, Lara. She sent us some thoughts on what might be useful to other clients. Over to you Kate:
“Firstly breast feeding mothers- my top tip for you is every time you order a drink order three. Sounds excessive but I found that i become dehydrated really quickly. Generally I drink a lot of fluids, but just trying to adjust to the heat and then trying to produce milk really required a significant amount of fluid through me. I found that trying to keep Lara hydrated as she was trying to adjust to the heat too meant that she was drinking far more than usual. On top of all that having her attached to me in the heat was like a little hot water bottle strapped to my body- mmm again requiring more fluids to keep cool. So back to first thought- when ordering a drink- order three. Other top tips are pretty standard traveling with kids stuff- always take a water bottle and snacks. I found heaps of great local snacks so no need to pack your any from home (apart from for the plane!). Same with nappies- tescos is everywhere in Thailand and so comes good nappy choices- I personally liked the brand Mammy PoPo. I just packed enough for journey and first day and then shopped whilst there. We really appreciated getting a villa e.g more than a hotel room for the first two days of time acclimatization for our kids. It means than when they are up at 3.30am thinking they are starting the day you can at least leave the bedroom with one lucky person asleep and go to another space to hang out. If you can have this extra space i really recommend it. Having a kitchen etc also means you can make food at 3.30am too! I have not yet found a way to explain to a three year old the intricacies of time zones so I just tried to go with the flow for first couple of days. We have been pretty successful with running the hell out of the kids during the day to tire them out and trying to limit day time sleeps. For little kids and dehydration of course you are offering water all the time and i also found a juice mix with lots of water really helped getting enough fluid in. We found the Thais very child friendly. The Thais we had contact with would often take our baby off us in restaurants etc and go off with her for cuddles. It was so lovely.”
Kate – thanks so much! For the record, Kate and her family stayed in The Shasa Samui which is a superb beach hotel for families.