Baby food jars = 4 oz. Not 3.4 oz like the TSA guidelines for liquids, but the are considered a liquid and are allowable to take through security. It just may require additional screening.
I need to preface this by saying I am completely and totally fine with additional screening. No big deal. I don't understand why the additional 0.6 oz makes a big difference, but I am *hopeful* there is some in depth complicated scientific reason and not just a random number that someone at the TSA came up with.
We have flown 3 times recently with baby food. Each time the tops of the jars needed to be swiped and my hands need to be swiped and run through some machine to ensure they are not dangerous. However, when leaving Iowa we got the FULL additional screening.
The security guy wanted to open up EACH jar of baby food to test it. I told him 'no'. We had enough food for 3 meals in there and opening them all was not going to happen. (Again, I'm not upset, it just cracks me up....). So, they did the swiping my hands & testing them thing.
Then, we were separated. Marty & Elijah were put in one 'holding' area; Gavin and I were in a second. Each of us were patted down (Gavin & Elijah included) and all of our belongings were searched. As in, take out all the items in each carry on bag, the diaper bag, etc and visually inspect it. It was all totally fine and probably took 15 minutes or so. Which did make it so we made it to our flight right as we were boarding, but still totally fine. I did ask the guy searching all of my belongings how the extra 0.6 ounces made us a big security risk (in a very nice way), but he didn't have an answer.
Anyone know why 3.4 oz in the magic number? So strange.
Part 2: Disney vs. DIA
We ended up with an extended layover at Denver International Airport. It kept getting more extended as the day went on. BUT what a better place to be than an airport! Really, if you are not in a hurry to get somewhere.... an airport is just as cool if not cooler to a 4 year old boy than what Disney World is. At least our 4 year old. Pretty similar too - once you are there you have a wide variety of overpriced food, but all the rides are paid for.
Highlights for Elijah:
- Riding the train, elevators, escalators and moving sidewalks an unlimited number of times
- Watching the airplanes take off and land
- Watching a new movie on my computer
- Eating overpriced french fries
- Building with new LEGOS we brought along
- Mommy & Daddy's undivided attention when we took him "exploring"
- Throwing a ping pong ball up the empty down escalator and watching it bounce back down
Highlights for the rest of the family:
- We weren't in a hurry and had a TON of fun things to check out with Elijah. It was great!
- Marty found some football on TV and got to relax while Elijah watched a movie
- They serve beer. Good beer. New Belgium beer.
- Gavin climbed all over our carry ons and could pull himself up on the chairs. So fun.
- Chasing around a ping pong ball in an empty area for Gavin. Really? Doesn't get much better than that.
- Gavin LOVED watching all the action outside. Planes taking off and landing, luggage carts running around. Good stuff.
A few photos of the day (I honestly didn't manage to take many.... we were pretty busy "exploring" a good portion of the time).
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| Nap on flight #1. He was NOT in a snuggling mood that day. |
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| He is mastering pulling himself to standing AND is soooo proud of himself. |
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| Naptime. Only lasted about 30 minutes when someone walked by with a crying baby. :( |
I love it am so glad that you guys had fun. Thank you so much for giving me the time to see the three of you. You guys although tired looked really happy and Gavin is so big loving the army crawl and now learning to stand on lugage awsome... I am truely blessed to have you both as friends and family.
ReplyDeleteNikki
Way to harass the TSA employee ;)
ReplyDeleteBut really, glad you were to able to take a long day of travel with such a positive outlook!