Dublin with 2 children

We all went on an autumn holiday last week. David was working in Dublin and after much thought and angst I decided to travel with children out to see him and the fair city of Dublin.

Well I can tell you now that a city break when there is just the two of you is quite different from a city break with the addition of a 6 and 8 year old.

My 8 year old spent the whole of the flight out asking questions about what we would do when we crashed. Quite matter of fact he was, merely curious as to what the procedure would be. How will we get down from the wings once we've walked out onto them? Why do women have to take their high heels off? Where will the oxygen come from? I eventually told him to shut up.

Then there was the argument about which bed in the hotel they should have and then there was the argument about who should sit next to the window in the Dublin tourist hop on-hop off bus and then there was the sulking about walking 100 yards between the bus and the museum and then there was the tantrum about the arguments.....that was me.

Then there was the need to go to the loo 2 seconds after we'd left the museum with the free and easily accessible toilets. I won't tell you how we solved that little challenge. There was also the curious incident of not eating perfectly great food that we had paid a fortune for and me putting on weight before my very own eyes, eating it up so it wasn't wasted.

But we actually had a good time. We got to see David/Daddy. The weather was sunny. Dublin is beautiful if not that child-friendly and the 6 and 8 year old were beyond excitement at taking off and landing in an aeroplane for the first time ever (although they sulked at all the queuing when really there wasn't that much waiting around). They loved staying in a hotel for the first time ever (the room key cards held endless fascination even if there were fights and yes I mean fisticuffs as to who opened the damn door) and were wide-eyed about riding in a taxi for the first time ever ("so this is a taxi is it?" the 8 year old said in a very sarcastic tone as he got into his first Irish taxi).

Ah well perhaps we'll leave the next city break until they are 28 and 30. We'll go on our own and they can go on their own.