My 32nd birthday weekend was awesome. Hubby and I had a date-night Friday and then Sunday, my actual birthday, we went to brunch and pumpkin picking and played in the backyard. In lieu of traditional birthday cake (and knowing I’ll be eating my body weight in Crumbs cupcakes starting tomorrow!) I ate pumpkin chocolate-chip pancakes and iced pumpkin donuts. It was all fabulous and a perfect fall weekend.

I got extra time with Maya, too, due to Rosh Ha Shana being Thursday and Friday being my standard day to work from home. No complaints here, especially since Little Miss got brave all of a sudden and began pulling herself to a stand! She also channeled her inner yogi wby mastering downward dog, and figured out that that awful move called The Worm works especially well to get from Point A to Point B when one cannot yet crawl! She is close … backwards is just the direction she seems to appreciate most–and I blame that on us for making them sit backwards in a car for two years 😉

But changing her diaper and clothes is getting REALLY frustrating. She flips and squirms and even the toys that usually would distract her aren’t. She’s also begun to cry if you take away, say, the iPhone from her (she loves watching videos of herself and looks at me all puzzled when she hears my voice on the vid but doesn’t see me moving my lips in real time. It’s so funny! Anyway, we’ve entered a new phase–and this is the phase of mobility.

Which brings me to my next point … travel with baby.

Maya has been on quite a few trips in her short nine months on earth: two plane trips to NJ (at 6 weeks and 7 mths, respectively), a trip to El Salvador (at 7 mths), and a looooong road trip to Annapolis, MD, last month (at 8 mths).

She has been an amazing little traveler and super-adaptable, happy, easy-going  …(though by the end of the 11-hr car trip she was fussing to move about, and who can blame her, really?)

On her first flight in Feb., she slept the whole time, though I did have a bottle handy at all times just in case (sucking helps their little ears). On the 7-mth flights, she slept some and moved around a little in our laps–but was still really well-behaved and calm and again, a well-adjusted and happy camper for the most part.

But here’s the thing. Tomorrow, I’m taking her back to NJ yet again solo while I attend a work conference (and my sister babysits!) and then this weekend I’m in the wedding of one of my BFFs. [Long story short, I’m going alone b/c with school, work, and recruiting, hubby doesn’t have the va-k time and ability to take a trip now … but yet my MIL is here anyway for three weeks …! I’m not even going there …]

And though it has only been two months since her last trips, I’m suddenly nervous she will not be as good a traveler now that she’s more mobile! I’ll bring the requisite bottle, puffs/Mum-Mums, books and toys … but I’m going to be traveling solo and have tremendous anxiety about this now.

I know I shouldn’t;  if she cries, I’ll deal … and I don’t mean to project a situation that may or may not come to fruition … but I can’t help but be a little worried.  I know each kid is different (and each stage is different), but still.

That being said, I welcome any tips other parents have for more-mobile babies on planes! We’re heading into unchartered territory here!

Thanks in advance, and wish me luck.

Goodbye Michigan, and hello Big Apple 🙂