jayne3411

hello everyone

We are a family of five the youngest being 8 months old when we travel. We are booking with singapore airlines on the air bus. Of those of you who hav travelled with a youngster, how comfortable are the bassinets on the plane and is there enough room for you bearing in mind its such a long flight. Would you recommend that we book an extra seat for the little one or is it fine with the bassinet? we are stopping at singapore but only for a few hours, other kids are 8 and 10 so no problems there. Got to go to validate the visa, just unfortunate timing. thanks any input appreciated

jane

Burkins

Hi

We travelled in November with a 14 month old, we didn't have any spare cash to bookan extra seat for him so used the bassinet instead.

It was fine, the row where the bassinets are have more leg room so there was room for him to play on the floor without escaping into the plane. When he did go to sleep I just popped him into the bassinet and he slept in there. We also flew with Singapore Airlines.

gail.crease

We flew with our son to Australia when he was 6 months old. He was a good size and only just fitted in the basinette. So if your baby is big he/she may not fit in well. It was quite small and he didn't sleep that much. If your baby likes sitting up and is quite active you'll have to watch they don't fall out. There is a strap to keep them secure but only when they are lying down. If there is any turbulence you have to take them out even if they are sleeping and put them on your knee. We flew on Emirates and the hostesses were very good. We had a 3 year old and she was entertained quite well with the movies. Remember you'll have to open all baby food and bottles and taste them in front of the security.

Gail

Burkins

We ordered the baby food from Singapore airlines, you just had to ask the air hostess and she brought it to you with a clean spoon.

Not sure if they are different sizes with different airlines but my little boy fitted into the bassinet with plenty of room at either end.

jayne3411

thanks great advice, she's only little so should fit ok, with regard to the baby foodif we take sealed jars and sealed yougurts on would we need to open them? have you tasted them, not pleasant: what is the food for babys like on singapore airlines do they have sealed jars of baby food?

thanks again

jane

davidb1989

hi when are you flying? as we have booked our flights with singapore airways with a bassonet on the 4th of july iv heard they are very good

Toe Dipper

Our youngest was 2 months old. Bassinette was fine.

The biggest problem was having to get him out of it and put him in the lap belt during "seatbelts on". This woke him up, but a quick feed sorted it all out.

The other big problem is your own stress levels. Chill out and forget everyone around you. If you chill, so do the kids!

Oh, - don't bother with the extra seat. Waste of money.

TD

jayne3411

we have to validate the visa by october and i basically needed to do it when it was best to take kids out of school and when it was the cheapest and that for us was in May 4th, just hope the weather isn't that cold then, can't see the point of going on hols unless theres sun . And we have to treat it as an holiday because the way the economy and house sales are going we won't be using our visas anytime soon . Our luck theyll probably expire before we can use them, very bitter sweet. but enjoy your hols or stay

jane xx

rab

At 8 months the bassinet will be fine even if your child is on the large size. They are pretty big. We flew on the new A380 Airbus with SQ with our 6 month old last year and it was brilliant. Plenty of room, free toys and bibs and stuff and the usual good SQ service. The first leg from ADL was even better as there is more room in the side section bulkhead seats on the 777.

Make sure you have something warm for when you get to London, when we got there there was a delay getting the push chairs off, so you go off quick but have to wait. We also bought a lightweight pushchair which was fine but unnecessary - they don't seem to worry about the size or weight of them I don't think. Now we have two pushchairs and only ever use one.

When the plane hits turbulence they are supposed to ask you to take the baby from the bassinet. A standard announcement is read out saying this. In reality we just took it in turns to lean forward for a while and put an arm across the sleeping baby and show we were attending to her. The last thing they really want is to wake up the baby - so I think the cabin crews ignore this a little which is good for everyone.

rab

gail.crease

We were made to open and taste every sealed jar we had. I pointed out that it would all go off but they didnt' care in London. This was 2 years ago and they may be a bit more relaxed about it now. I didn't know at the time that the airlines provided baby food.

rockpeblar

We flew over on a validation trip with Emirates when our son was 10 months old and he wouldn't fit in their basinette. When we flew over again 2 months later with Singapore Airlines, they had 2 different size basinettes and we found that he fitted in the larger version which meant we had a much more relaxing flight

cinderella

I saw a young mother having to do that last November. She had to open everything and taste it. At London Heathrow.

smvh

would it be possible to get a bassinette big enough for a 18 mth old he likes his sleep !?

fallen angel

Basinettes are usually prioritised for families with younger children so an 18m old may or may not be entitled to one depending on other passengers. Unless the child was small I would doubt it if they would fit in lengthways. They are also weight restricted but I don't know what the limits are.

We have extensively travelled with under 2's. Took DD1 around the world when she was 15m old (13flights in total of which 3 were over 6hrs), she couldn't fit in the bassinet at all. Personally I wouldn't let a child play on the floor. I don't believe it is safe as turbulence can be encountered without warning and could cause a serious injury if child was to bang themselves on seat or something.

The best thing you could get for the trip would be a sling, they are fantastic for flying as the pushchair can get packaged securely and go in the hold from check in, then when you get to destination you just pop baby in the sling and it doesn't matter how long the pushchair takes to come through as you've got both hands free and baby safe. I have a 21lb 7mo and we're still happily using a Moby sling but also have a BabyHawk which is more structured. Some people find over 6m olds are too heavy in a wrap sling (such as Moby).

As for food, Boots or similar airside you can buy the food before boarding but after security so you wouldn't have to open the jars. I believe they can make you open and taste, so rendering the jar useless so it would be worth trying to get the details and contacting them to reserve items if you have any specific requests

jayne3411

Very good advice, fallen angel and we have a sling so would be ideal and save on dragging buggy. we plan on booking the airbus because been told it has more leg room and with baby makes sense is this actually the case, just hope for niceish weather now, thanks everyone for advice

jane xx