We just took a 19 hour road trip from Louisiana to Michigan.
Here are some of the things we did to make road trip go smoothly.
Months before we left I started pinning things on Pinterest about
traveling with kids. Then a couple weeks before we left I started buying things and putting the items we wanted to bring in a big tupperware bin. It made it really easy to organize a couple days before we left and the night before I loaded everything up in the truck.
I put most of the things in pencil cases I found at Walmart & Target.
The boys both had their backpacks packed:
- tag pens (loaded with the audio of the books they wanted, you can listen to the story without the book) and only two of the tag books.
- pencil case with a couple hot wheel cars
- one or two books
- outfit for the day (we left at 3:15am so left them in their PJ's and changed when we stopped for gas)
kid travel neck pillows from Amazon
I bought them because Reece's head falls forward in his car seat when he is sleeping. But neither of the boys used the pillows, Keith and I did though.
I got these for playing on the iphone, leapster and tag pins.
The smaller ones fit Reece (2.5yrs) prefect and Grady (5yrs) could still fit in the smaller ones but the larger ones fit him better.
Pipe Cleaners
Pack a new bag of multi colored pipe cleaners (about $1 or so) and let their creativity run wild. They can make letters, flowers, animals, chains, jewelry, twist ties in their hair, practice braiding, and by the end, just balls of many colors.
the boys never touched them on the trip but will be good to use at home
Doctor on Call
A Box of Bandaids and a rubbing alcohol pad. Let them play “Dr”. They can rub on skin & use it to disinfect their seats while they are playing. Both boys loved this.
Pocket Paper Dolls
Reece played with these
Mini-white board
Color with dry erase markers (these can stain your carseat cover or kids clothes) or with the new Crayola wipeable crayons (these don’t stain but hard to wipe off).
Post-It and colors
draw on them and stick them anywhere. Reece just had fun taking all the sheets of page off the pad.
Sewing Cards
Reece loves putting stickers all over his body and no one touched the wikki sticks
Color wonder markers and color pencils
they used both
Coloring books, Notepads and Twistable colored pencils
Grady spent a long time coloring one spider-man page and would stop and come back to it.
Aluminum Foil modeling
Give everyone a sheet of aluminum foil. Have them mold it into anything they want: animal shapes, Frisbees, balls, jewelry, crowns, headband, necklaces. We never needed to pull this out.
we all played this for a while
I bought two of these one for each of the boys and they loved playing. But the flipping does make a lot of noise that could disturb napping people.
Books on CD
Take some books on CD. The whole month before the trip I have been checking out books on CD from the library and coping the CD to our playlist. I also bought a couple new
Disney books on CD for the trip to surprise them. We had a ton of stories to listen too.
 |
photo by: Reece
|
Photography on the Move, Leapster and iPhone
Let them take pictures of what you are driving by with a disposable or better yet, a digital camera (if you trust them with it). I loaded our OLD iphone with apps for them, videos, audio books and made them a playlist of there favorite songs (it stays on airplane mode so I am hoping they will NOT be able to make emergency calls).
Movies
Laptop, external hard drive (loaded with movies) and Auxiliary Cable (to connect to car stereo for "drive-in" theater experience)
Travel Sheets and clothes pins
I took an old queen sheet we had a cut it into 4 equal rectangles then sewed the two cut edges on each sheet. They were the prefect warmth napping in the A/C in the truck. They also made GREAT sun blockers. The best part was they rolled up really small so stored them in the truck doors by each boy.
Just in case Kit
A first aid kit with tylenol and motion sickness medicine (for both kids and adults). Keep this in the middle console of the truck.
Storage space: Bring LOTS of ziplock baggies. They are great for everything!
Easy wipes: Diaper wipes are a road trip necessity (even if your kids are potty trained!). These are great for cleaning faces and surfaces, even as a form of entertainment if you are desperate.
Car Seat Safety Program W.H.A.L.E. “We Have A Little Emergency”: Our pediatrician was giving these out at the beginning of the year.
Cups NOT for drinking
I use plastic cups for snack service. They can be easily held by a child or stored in a cup holder when not snacking. No liquid allowed in these! I had a bag of all different kind of snacks each stored in big ziplock bags. I also made a Cereal mix and trail mix then just scooped a cup full of whatever they wanted.
Stay at Hotels that have a Pool & Breakfast included
Plan ahead and only stay at a hotel that has a pool. This gives the kids a great chance to unwind and helps insure that they will wear themselves out enough to get a good night's sleep at the hotel!
With Breakfast included it makes it easy to feed the family and hit the road early.
Bring a Travel Potty in the car
For those toddler emergencies when you can't find a clean bathroom anywhere! Our
travel potty folds up flat, and can even store wipes and extra liners.
We had a wonderful drive to Michigan and back. The boys did way better then we expected, we did not here one are we there yet. On the way to Michigan we stayed at a hotel in Illinois. Reece really did not want to stop till we got to Frankfort. He also did not nap till about 3 or 4pm after we woke them up at 3am to start the drive.
On the way home we drove straight through. We left again around 3am and got home at 9:30pm. That was with an unintended LONG lunch (45min).
We also had a wonderful time in Michigan as well. I will posting about the trip soon.
One thing I forgot to do was Make a map of our journey
Create your trip map and track it with the kids.
