Parenting Pointer: When Traveling, Split the Time Difference

We enjoy traveling as a family, but as everyone knows, getting little ones (or even larger "little ones") to adjust to a new time zone can be pretty hard. Once they get settled, it is basically time to turn around and go home.

Instead of completely converting over to the time zone of your destination, try meeting it half-way. It makes your transition time much more stress free on your trip and getting back to life as normal is a bit easier when you return home. Example being...when we traveled to CA last time, we changed the kids schedules one hour back vs. two. So, if we usually eat at 12:30 here, they eat at 11:30 out in Cali. If they usually go to bed at 8:00 here which is 6:00 out there, they go to bed at 7:00 instead. Otherwise, we would essentially be asking them to stay up quite late and then wonder why they have a melt down.

When doing this, they quickly adjust their "internal clock". Likewise, when we return, it usually takes less than 24 hours for them to be back to our normal routine.