More festive than apple juice, and far less troublesome at 30,000 feet.
As I’ve warned many parents in the past, you can’t always expect regular milk to be available on flights–even on those with breakfast service, the only “milk” product offered may be a powder to lighten the color of your coffee. Fruit juice, however, is almost always available on flights and is, unfortunately, almost always the first thing flight attendants offer young children.
Let’s face facts: A mere 6 ounces of regular apple juice (no sugar added) dishes out the equivalent of five teaspoons of sugar. That’s the same sugar content as 6 ounces of Coca-Cola.
Would you knowingly feed five teaspoons of sugar to a toddler on a flight? Or six ounces of Coca-Cola?
Here’s a better option:
Ask your flight attendant for a cup of fruit tea, or peppermint if your child prefers, and a second cup with only ice for your child. Let the tea (with zero grams of sugar) steep on your tray before pouring part of it over the ice. Some of the ice will melt quickly, cooling the tea.
I add half a packet of sugar each time I fix the “fruit tea cocktail” for one of my kids, and I like to make sure they see me do this–they think it’s such a special treat to get straight sugar added to their drinks(!).
Little do they know…
For more tips on safer, saner air travel with a baby, toddler, or young child, visit the online flying tips index here.
Related posts and pages:
Five ways airlines can make happier travelers of us all
Safe journeys,
Shelly Rivoli, author of the award-winning Travels with Baby and Take-Along Travels with Baby
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Above: Getting ready to make Costa Rican coffee in the “sock.”
You may be asking, “What does making coffee have to do with traveling with little kids?” in which case I will give you an enormous grin and reply, “EVERYTHING.” But if you’re reading this blog, chances are you already know that. 
In honor of National Coffee Day today, I thought I’d share a little tip for those of you contemplating a Costa Rican family vacation. If you’ll be staying in a vacation rental home as we did some portions of our trip, you might need to know how to make coffee without the regular plug-in pot — or you might just prefer to do it for fun, especially when you return home and invite your friends over to see your Costa Rican coffee maker in action before wowing them with your trip photos.
It’s really very simple. Just heat water to boiling in your kettle…
Above: A well-seasoned “sock” is thought to enhance the flavor – I think it does!
Fill the flannel-like “sock” with ground coffee – about 2/3 full for a decent-size pot.
Above: Slowly, lovingly, deliciously brewed coffee.
When the water reaches boiling, turn off the heat, then slowly pour the water into the sock. You will probably need to wait to add the last half of the water bit, by bit, as the coffee brews and slowly filters into your carafe.
Above: Looking out at the dry jungle of the Nicoya Peninsula from Casa Vista,
The only thing left to do now… is to enjoy your cup of authentically brewed Costa Rican coffee. And with surroundings like this, how could you not?
Related posts and pages:
- Review of Casa Vista vacation home in Costa Rica
- Visting Doka Coffee Estate in Alajuela, Costa Rica
- 5 ways to ease your arrival in Costa Rica with kids
- See more family-friendly Costa Rica features from Travels with Baby
Safe journeys,
Shelly Rivoli, Author of the award-winning Travels with Baby and Take-Along Travels with Baby www.travelswithbaby.com facebook twitter about the author
Subscribe to Travels with Baby Tips
Curious about this content? See my editorial content disclosure.
- The Aloha juice and smoothie truck at Hanalei, Kauai.
Sometimes you can search all day in vain for a little local color. Other times, you may find it parked smack dab in the middle of a parking lot. Here, at the Aloha Juice Bar (on wheels!), we found a veritable rainbow of refreshment options–mango-banana-pineapple smoothies and then some–just what you need after hiking back to the car with kids and kit along the hot sand beach at Tunnels. Watch for it on your left as you drive east through Hanalei.
And if you haven’t yet seen my little guy sporting the Huggies Hawaiian diaper, benefitting the National Diaper Bank Network, don’t miss Dressed cute for a cause in Kauai.
Dressed cute for a cause in Kauai
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Sometimes, you’ve just got to go with it, even if “it” means ice cream for lunch.
Traveling in Costa Rica during the Easter Holy Week, you can expect some things with certainty: You will have the pleasure of seeing many crosses decorated with purple shawls and flowers in front yards, you will likely cross paths with a religious procession at some point in your journey, and you will have a hard time finding anywhere to buy food over Easter weekend.
When we embarked on a long day’s drive on winding mountain roads on Good Friday, I had underestimated just how long or far we would drive before finding our next meal. Fresh out of snacks and getting low on water, we discovered that even the mini market at a self-service gas station was closed for the holiday. The fabled city of Zarcero was a ghost town dotted with occasional colorful souls drifting between the church and family gatherings.
Every kind of shop imaginable was shuttered on each block we circled in the town.
When I saw a temporary stand doing business at the edge of the church square, I nearly drove onto the sidewalk in anticipation. The assortment of large root vegetables, however, held little appeal for the kids and seriously raised my mother’s eyebrows. We were hungry and growing hopeless, and nowhere near our destination.
“Ting! Ting!” Enter the ice cream man.
That’s when we learned that, while it is against city ordinances to run shops or restaurants on Good Friday in Costa Rica, it is perfectly acceptable to sell ice cream and popsicles in the church square. Eating ice cream for lunch on Good Friday, we reasoned, could therefore be no sin.
Good Friday, indeed. It will always have special meaning–and I suspect, ritual–for our family.
As it happened, fewer than 5 miles south on the highway, and beyond the city limits, we found a fantastic hillside restaurant turning a tidy profit by serving the Ticos traveling over the holiday weekend. Remember this if you find yourself on the road to Zarcero Easter weekend.
For more help planning your family vacation in Costa Rica, see other Travels with Baby tips here.
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Safe journeys,
All content of this blog (c) Shelly Rivoli 2007 – 2011
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| Decisions, decisions. Good thing we’ll be back tomorrow. |
All content of this blog (c) Shelly Rivoli 2007 – 2011
My entire life I’ve watched my family—and later my in-laws—set up camp kitchens in the wilderness to put my own at home to shame (this includes a rafting trip we took through a remote wilderness area where we camped in a different site each night and all the food and gear traveled in our boats). We all have different talents, and I can accept that mine has never been cooking. Rather than beat myself up about it when we pack up for a car camping trip, I like to recall the advice of Henry David Thoreau:
“Our life is frittered away by detail. Simplify, simplify, simplify!”
In that spirit, I offer a handful of our family’s favorites that have vastly simplified car camping trips with our kids. And so far, I haven’t heard any complaints.
- Applesauce Cups – They require no refrigeration, come in their own child-size bowls, work for babies through big kids (and parents), and the cups rinse clean under the spigot and go into the campground recycling bin when finished. Need I say more?
- Bag of Mini Bagels – Get a kid-pleasing variety such as cinnamon raisin or blueberry and set one on top of an applesauce cup and you’ve made breakfast! To fancy it up, set out your jar of peanut butter (the no-refrigeration required kind) or a small container of cream cheese.
- Can of Black Olives – Again, no refrigeration required, and with a pull-tab can you won’t even kick yourself for losing that can opener somewhere in the trunk of your car. Tip: Dump into a bowl and set out as an appetizer before you start cooking to help keep kids happy and out of your cooler until dinner is served. I’m always stunned how they continue to regard this as a treat!
- Pre-Popped Popcorn – Whether you pop your own before leaving home or pick up a bag of pre-popped popcorn from the store (I am hooked on T.J.’s white cheddar!), it makes a great kid snack mid-afternoon or evening campfire alternative to marshmallows. Yes, you can do Jiffy Pop Popcorn over the fire, too, if you’re camping where campfires are permitted. Tip: Since Jiffy Pop seems to be hit or miss with seasonal items at the store, you can always order online if needed.
- Cheese Sticks or String Cheese – Individually sealed cheese sticks or string cheese give a protein boost between meals and keep just fine at the top of your ice chest where they are conveniently located for small snack thieves who might otherwise disrupt the delicate balance of your overstuffed cooler. When heading out for a hike, toss a few in the family daypack.
Safe journeys,
Shelly Rivoli
Author of Travels with Baby and the new Take-Along Travels with Baby
http://www.travelswithbaby.com/ Travels with Baby on Facebook
All content of this blog (c) Shelly Rivoli
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I recently saw a tweet from @SoulTravelers3 that read, “Family travel is often about doing ordinary things in extraordinary places.” It got me thinking.
Traveling with a school-age child now, it’s things like watching her do homework on the airplane or on a balcony in Spain that sets my heart a-flutter about family travel as never before. It’s easy to see how the “Soul Travelers 3″ have not stopped traveling since they left home with their 5-year-old in 2006!
But for many people considering whether or not to travel with their children as babies and toddlers, it’s having to deal with the ordinary things that era of parenting entails–diaper changes, feedings and snacks, bedtime routines, babyproofing, and possible tantrums–in extraoridnary places that can be a most daunting. And I can tell you from experience, it’s not always easy.
Yet there is also a certain magic in it, especially in the way doing these same mundane tasks a parent must do one thousand times over just once in one unusual place helps crystallize a key experience that might otherwise blur into the weeks, and months, and years of overseeing a young child’s development.
I started to recall breastfeeding in Bangkok–after trying so hard to find a quiet place to sit down where curious onlookers would stop coming up to play with my fair-haired baby. Then changing a diaper on the ground at Pompeii in a place I thought no one would notice–when a large tour group suddenly began passing by, and later trying to brush the volcanic soot off my flannel-backed changing pad. And helping my daughter learn to walk as she insisted on going up and down and up and down the steps of a movie theater during the Cannes Film Festival–when we thought that she would sleep.
And here? Our family’s weekly ritual of making a pancake breakfast, but one time we’ll surely never forget, as we sat in the outdoor dining room perched in the trees at Casa Vista, with tropical birds coming to rest at eye level, red squirrels on the fly, howler monkeys in the distance, and an iguana on the roof.
Ordinary. Extraordinary. And some of my favorite memories as a mom so far.
This post is part of Photo Friday at DeliciousBaby.com.
Related posts and pages:
Breastfeeding in Bangkok
Review of Casa Vista, Manzanillo, Costa Rica
5 Ways to Ease your Arrival in Costa Rica with Kids
Thanksgiving in Andalucia
Santa Teresa, Costa Rica: 5 Best with Kids Under 5
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Safe journeys,
Shelly Rivoli Author of Travels with Baby and the new Take-Along Travels with Baby www.travelswithbaby.com Travels with Baby on Facebook
All content of this blog (c) Shelly Rivoli
Bronze Award Winner in Travel Blogs from the North American Travel Journalists Association
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