It has already been over a month since my travels to London and finally I found some time to type it all up.
It was my second time travelling to London with the kids. I love this city. Very child-friendly, lots of parks and the public transport makes everything easy to reach. You need to be prepared for a lot of walking though !
I’ve been invited to be part of the panel at The Wrap Show, where we would discuss / talk about differences between different babywearing schools. A highly interesting topic and definitely something I would love to talk about more often. Learning from others and consuming all the information.
We flew in on Thursday. Celine and Alice were placed in two seats in front of me where I couldn’t reach or really communicate with them. Alice took her chance and picked on Celine which made the (short) flight no fun.
From the airport we still had a lot of travelling to go by train and subway and offcourse one of the kids always has to pee when there’s no toilet around…. Which made us leave the subway and eventually head to a McDonalds to use the bathroom. We had no time pressure, but still I struggled to let go of my plans. Dragging our suitcase(s) through the city and trying to keep all three kids together is pretty hard (even when I’m wearing one of the three).
We would be staying at my friend’s place and once we made it there we took a short nap before heading out again.
I planned on doing some sightseeing, but the kids were grumpy and tired so we just walked a bit around the block.
The next day we went out in to town early. Just walking through the city, checking out some stores and the beautiful buildings. We went sightseeing around Soho, Piccadilly Circus, Oxford Circus and Tottenham Court Road. I’ve been invited to a picknick in the Park and on our way we watched the guards at Buckingham Palace and saw the birds at St James Park.
The Wrap Show
The main reason why we travelled to London: the Wrap Show. People were flying in from all over Europe and some travelled from the USA (or Australia!) to be there. There were some little things which I hope they improve if there will ever be a second Wrap Show, but overall it was a fun day! With the workshops being in the same space as the market place it was hard to hear eachother talking and when the first workshops started the lines outside were still very long, which ment people would miss out because once they are in they’d rush to buy all the limited edition stuff before they head to their workshop(s).
The location was nice. The kids play area offered my kids enough fun and everything being contained in one big hall ment they could wander around by themselves a bit.
I really loved the photobooth! My girls have been taking lots of pictures there!
There was also a tester-area where wraps of different brands were available to try out. Brands that couldn’t be at the Wrap Show send over some of their prototypes or wraps that have been released. This made it possible to feel and wrap all the different blends! Some being much different than you’d have thought of seeing it in pictures. I hope I will see this tester-area idea at other events too. I could have spend all day there!
In the evening there was a raflle and more time to chat with those who attended or had a booth. My kids were pretty much done so on our way home they almost fell asleep. It was a long walk from the subway!
I’ve bought a Davaï Paris babywearing coat and a Connecta carrier. There were lots of other products I liked, but can’t have all the wraps 🙂
On Sunday we went to the Dr.Seuss exhibition at Discover. Discover is a children’s play center were kids can explore and run around. It was so much fun! As a Dr.Seuss fan I think I liked the Dr. Seuss exhibition more than the kids, as they couldn’t understand the story telling in English (still working on that part.. ) and had to look at the other kids to imitate.
Going around London is pretty easy by subway and bus. All the escalators were a bit of a problem at first with the kids. Both Alice and Celine were scared and more than once I’ve asked strangers if they would mind giving Celine a hand. Luckely people were very friendly and happy to help.
On Monday we went to a playground and to the woods. Looking for fairies! We love being outside and the kids had a lot of fun!
As our flight back would be very early Tuesday morning I booked a hotel close to the airport for our final night. Getting there took us about 1.5 hours so I was very happy I didn’t have to do that around 3am in the morning 🙂
The girls both carried their backpack and took turns towing ‘trunki‘ whilst I carried Emile and had my handbag and suitcase. We left during rushhour which wasn’t the best idea but we made it to the hotel and had a big family bed so all turned out well…..
Around 5am we took the shuttlebus to the airport where we had to wait in line for security for almost 1.5 hours.
My worst experience at security lines ever. Apparently there had been some issues with the computer system or equipment which caused the longer lines.
Usually I get priority when travelling alone with three kids and they don’t let me stand in line so long. You can probably imagine how hard it is to keep the kids entertained for such a long period. I’m happy the girls are pretty patient and they could sit on the Trunki suitcase when we had to wait. (taking turns)
London, we’ll be back!