Monday, November 30, 2009

Poop and the traveling baby...

Traveling with kids is hard. It's something that I never really pondered until we had Isaac. I always felt bad for parents flying with kids; seeing them struggle through security, a baby screaming during the flight and the grumps sitting near them giving the parents the evil eye. Marcus and I decided a long time ago that we would not fly with Isaac until he can carry his own stuff. It's written in stone and we aren't budging on that one.

Kids need a lot of crap when they travel. We thought that when Isaac got bigger we wouldn't need so much stuff. What the what?!? They need MORE stuff?? Heck yes! We were drowning in toys to keep him occupied, more bottles, food for lunch and dinner, more diapers, you name it, we had it. We just got back from a 10 hour drive to Iowa to visit my parents for Thanksgiving and while the trip went amazingly well, the question of traveling with a very active 10 month old was weighing heavily on my mind.

We tend to worry about the craziest things. I wasn't worried so much about how he would act (he did fantastic, btw) but rather how in the world would I change a poopy diaper on the road. I never really paid attention before but there really aren't a lot of gas stations or other places that provide a diaper changing station in their restrooms. So what is a parent to do? Change them on their lap...in the car.

We are at the stage where Isaac doesn't want to lay still while his diaper is being changed. I've had to get pretty creative with distracting him with various things to keep his attention while I get his gross, smelly diapers out of the way. His current favorite is holding onto his diaper rash ointment and twisting it around.

So this is what I decided to focus my worry on. Poop. My already tall child wiggling around on my lap, trying to balance him and change diapers that would knock a grown man down with its stink. I decided to just go with it, deal with it, and stop worrying about it.

And wouldn't you know it...I didn't have to deal with one poopy diaper. Not one. God certainly blesses us in crazy ways...even when it comes to poop.

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