Over the weekend we went to Nantucket Island for two nights. We booked this back when Anya was only a month or two old. At that time I was still in new mommy shock and I wasn't thinking about how to travel with a baby. A few weeks before our trip I started to think, "wait... we wont be bringing a car over.. we have no car to pack to the roof with baby gear?!".. I started to panic. This meant no bouncer, no swing, no pack and play, no bumbo. "AHHHH", I thought.. "This is scary!" On Saturday we left the house with one suitcase for all three of us, a backpack, a small duffel bag, a stroller, a bjorn and a baby. We drove down there with one stop to feed the baby and arrived at Hyannis just in time to board the fast boat. It was a windy day so Dwight and I had popped some Dramamine on the drive down. Anya was a little peach and fell asleep... and so did mommy! That Dramamine kicked our bums and we were SO TIRED. It was a mistake to take it because the rest of the day we were exhausted. Once we arrived our shuttle was waiting for us and brought us back to the hotel. We relaxed and fed the baby and headed downtown to explore the quaint downtown. Nantucket is a gorgeous town lined with little stores and cobblestone streets. The downtown is right on a harbor with yachts and boats that Dwight dreams about. We went out to lunch and sat outside on a patio and it was a beautiful day. That night we put Anya down to bed at her usual time because she was so tired. We ordered food to the room for ourselves so that she could sleep. We both wish our room had a patio or a balcony because we didn't want to wake the baby. We ended up keeping the door open a crack and sitting out on the stoop (we had a view of a beautiful garden) with a glass of wine and our food. We both wondered for a couple minutes if it was the best idea to bring a baby with us. It was 6:30pm and we were sitting in front of our hotel room trying to be quiet. Over a year ago we would be downtown in some cute lit up restaurant laughing and having drinks on the town. Life is so different now. I am not going to lie.. it is much harder to travel with a baby. Babies this age are portable but they come with a lot of stuff and they are very time consuming. We need to work on her clock and always be prepared.The next day we were up early with the baby and headed to breakfast. The breakfast that was included with our hotel was so nice. It was on a deck outside overlooking the Nantucket airport. You could watch planes take off and land while sitting and eating a yummy buffet breakfast. We headed downtown for the day and enjoyed the Whaling museum of Nantucket. We brought the baby bjorn instead of the stroller and it worked out great. At one point in the day we stopped to feed Anya and she had a blow out diaper. This rarely happens.. and never when we are out.. and I had no extra clothes for her on me. Dwight ran to a store while I cleaned her up. He came back with a onesie from "Life is Good" store.. a whole 20 dollars for a stinkin' onesie.. but it saved us so it was worth it. She took a little nap in the bjorn and we ate some lunch and headed back to the hotel. At the hotel Anya took a longer nap and we rested up for dinner. We took Anya downtown for dinner. We sat out on the harbor and she was a good girl as always. It was fantastic. I went to get her bottle out to feed her before the shuttle came and saw that her bottles had leaked.. both of them (I fill them with water ahead of time and bring formula to add). We stopped at a store to buy a water.. and nope it was closed. The stores close up early on Sundays downtown and the ones still open were clothing stores. We found a store with water bottles and ran to the shuttle.. but we had missed it. We said "Well she is doing fine so far.. guess it will be a later bed time... lets feed her and then go get ice cream!".. we went to get ice cream.. had them in our hands.. saw the cash only sign... yeah we didn't have cash.. Dwight had to run to the ATM.. lol.. we weren't doing well with luck but we were still in good spirits. We took the next shuttle home and Anya was wide awake. I was worried she would start screaming but she was just happy and awake. I finally got her down to bed around 8pm (much later than her usual 6-6:30 bedtime).. Dwight and I read on the couches and had a couple of glasses of wine and hit the hay.. (yes a life so different than before.. yet our night was honestly sooo relaxing and nice)...
The next day we had breakfast.. did some shopping and headed home. It was a great weekend with lots of things for Anya to see. There were many people who wanted to stop and talk to her and see her smile. :o) We had wonderful weather and a fun adventure escaping to an island as a family. Traveling may be different with a baby but I would definitely do it again :o) Here are a bunch of photos from our adventure...
