Road Trip

My husband is a truck driver and we also have 4 kids(14,8,5,3). We go all the time. This website has great ideas. www.momsminivan.com We also printed a map of the states to color as we went through each one. Once we hit 11 states in one trip! That way the kids know where they have been. Scrapbook it later. A journal for the older one to write down how bored they are and the occasional cool thing. A great thing for little kids to play with especially with the 11yr old sort of watching is bandaides. It sounds funny but there not usually "allowed" so there neat and sticky. A little messy with the tabs though but quite entertaining. Also try post its. Color and stick it! We sing alot of songs....your husband may opt for Dora after this! Good luck and have fun! A.

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Hello N.,

When my girls were little and I took road trips to Texas, I made sure I had plenty of snacks, music, books and coloring books, playing cards and the travel size board games. Hope this helps you and have a great and safe trip.

V. O.

Dear N.,

I too have taken road trips (only 11- 13 hours),I found that you can find "travel size games & books" for the kids the 11 yr. old could pack a back pack, of thing he/she, likes to do, maybe a CD player of fav. music(with headphones) maybe you could find CD players for the younger kids ,then your husband wouldn't have to listen to kids music, check with walmart or similar store,I have seen "travel packs for (age appropriate) kids. Snacks are always good, juice's, carrot sticks etc., then theres the old stand bys "I See A " you could gear it towards the younger kids , (I see a big red truck, as a fire truck goes by ), I hope this helps, good luck

travel games! they are smaller than regular sized games and have a magnetic board and pieces. maybe some color wonder markers and books for the toddlers. and a couple of new rattles for the baby. new things always keep them entertained!

I did a road trip with my little one. I took a look of books and other little toys. Try to get them involved in playing game. Like I spy a least for the older ones.

20 hour trip is a VERY long way without stops, how can you do that? I see why you are stressed, I would be freaking out! Have you done it before??? I complain about our 5 hour drives to see the grandparents. I hope this trip will be worth it

Here are some helpful ideas

Leappad Plus Writing Pad $39.97 at Toys R Us. I got this for my 4 year old son for christmas, he loves it, takes it when we travel, he can write, play writing games and it has music.

For the youngsters LeapFrog Little touch pad $28.89 Target. Same as above, teaches them words, etc with a touch of the pad. Also has cushion underneath to set on their cute little knees.
These always work for us, and our boys enjoy them, I will say they don't last a long trip, but thats when the DVD player does come in handy!

You might want to take a quick trip to Toy's r us and see what else they have.
And I'm sure you know, to take Plenty of snacks and drinks, pillows, muzzels!!!!!! just kidding!

I wish your family Good Luck and most of all be safe and watch out for the other driver!!!!
K.

We've taken many trips in the car from San Diego to my mother in law's house in Virginia so we have tons of ideas for stuff to do in the car.. hopefully some of these things can work for you!

How about playing "roadtrip bingo"? You do have to do a little prep work but the payoff is great!
- Use 8x11 pieces of cardboard or heavier paper
- Draw as many squares as you like;keep it at 4X4,3X3,5x5 etc.
- Cut out of mags or draw things you know you'll see on the way. Can be blue car, tree, cactus, sunset, cows, anything really. You can make it age appropriate, and harder/easier for age.
- Every time someone spots one of the items they get to cross out the item on their board (my daughter brought stickers but we've also used a marker that has been tied to the board.
- I went to the 99 cent store and wrapped up some small trinkets for the winner of each game.

Also, online if you google "kids worksheets" there are TONS of sites where you can print free worksheets that are math, english, spelling, coloring, history, grammar, fun, puzzles, word problems, etc. I just spend an hour printing a whole bunch and buying a folder or three ring binder and that's my daughters worksheet book for the trip. She loves independently working on it.

Another idea is to buy some really colorful yarn and large beads and tie a big bunch of yarn to your headrest in front of where they are sitting and let them string beads from the back of your seat. They can also braid the yarn, knot it, whatever they feel like doing...

I also buy some cheap trinkets that are things to do and pull them out as prizes for "no whining hours" and for just the right time when everyone is starting to wiggle too much.

Spacing activities out is the best idea. Still, it's okay to balance them with "quiet hour" when she is told that it doesn't matter what she does but everyone will do their own independent things.

Good luck mom! And if all else fails... keep their mouths full with food! :) don't feel too guilty for a ton of dvds.... it happens to the best of us.. hopefully, you and your husband will actually be able to converse!

take care,
S. L.
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I heard a good suggestion once...travel at night. They will sleep through most of it.

I drove cross country from California to Florida with a 2 year old, a 10 year old, and a 13 year old. I took the snacks, special activity materials like markers and pads, magnadoodle oh and the special markers that only color on their special paper for the little guy.... Also lots of books. And I had action figures and small toys the younger ones. Gameboys or Leapsters are a life saver. But the thing that really saved the day was the dvd/video player.

The sad fact is that the Sonoran desert stretches from just outside L.A. all the way to east Texas. And it is the most repetive godawful boring stretch of road/scenery I have ever driven in my life. We even stopped to see "The Thing" even though we knew it would be lame lame lame, just because we were that bored.

So don't take Dora. Get some good quality kids movies that the whole family likes. They last longer... and they have a plot that the grown-ups in the front seat can follow along with by listening... which really does cut some of the boredom. We had actually recorded our movies onto video tape because we could put three long movies on each tape, which kept me from having to change it over so often. But there are two of you... so that will help.

Oh, and forget the travel at night thing. I tried that too, driving through the night until Phoenix and all that happened was I was so exhausted I hated the trip that much more. Guess what, "travel at night" doesn't actually mean travel all night. Whoops. It means, travel in the evening -- head out in the late afternoon and they snooze off and on until you stop around midnight. But the reality is that this only works when you have babies and toddlers who fall asleep in the car all the time.

But with my three nobody napped in the car, not even the little one. So even travelling late into the evening meant we stopped at a motel and the kids were so wired from being cooped up for several hours at a stretch that they couldn't go to bed until they'd run around like wild things for an hour. We almost got thrown out of one hotel because they were doing this at 10:30 at night. When other guests wanted quiet.

Do yourself a favor, take a ball or something you can play with at rest stops. Let the older ones run around out there playing chase, kicking a ball. Then get back in and drive some more. Little bottles of bubbles are great, to pass out at the rest stop.

Oh! And on the return trip, because we were ALL sick of the driving driving driving... I told them all they could get a little something when we stopped at the cheesey gift shops that dot the highway between El Paso and the CA border. I gave them a spending limit, like a dollar or two per stop, and they could save it and wait to get something really cool later in the day.

It may sound expensive but it helped keep them out of the junk food, which costs about the same. (Snacking on our own pretzels and juice instead.) And it helped them be more excited, wondering where we would stop next and what we would see there.

Also the kids that bickered the most, my oldest two, couldn't sit next to each other. And if they bickered anyway, they were given a talking time out -- meaning thy couldn't talk at all, to anyone for 15 minutes (remember they are older). If this didn't work I would threaten to pull the car over until the bickering stopped (I learned this on a road trip to Mexico when they were little, and it was very effective). They of course want to get somewhere, not sit along side a boring interstate looking at yet more tumbleweed. Don't know how well this would work for the early preschool set. Maybe a more theatrical "Ooops! Daddy can't drive with all this noise. I'm going to have to pull over and wait for everyone to get quiet!"

Playing "I spy" helped a little. As did talking about where we were going and what we would see there. Or telling stories about road trips past. Any kind of "quality time" chatter.

Good luck!

My family usually drives to LA every other month (6 hrs) and we try to plan the trip around nap time, or even night time and hope there is alot of sleeping on the way. We always bring lots of snacks, and coloring or activity books, and you can even get little games that are hand held. I often find it isnt the way there but the drive home that is worse. If you have a tv it is a life saver, but as u said who wants to listen to Dora all the way. Hope you have a fun/safe trip.

N.~
Best of luck with your road trip! I often drive a 7 hour trip to visit family every few months by myself. I usually hit the dollar store and stock up on goodies for the kids. I put together 2 bags per kid. One for the ride going & the other bag for the return trip home. I usually try to buy 1 toy per each hour of the trip, so they can have a new toy every hour! This is also a great tool to help your little ones learn to watch the clock & telling them at what time they will get another toy or when your stopping or when it's time to eat. These cheap little toys work just as great as pricy ones! Plus you can toss the ones at the end of the trip they didn't really like!
Best of luck,
J.

I used to take lots of road trips with my children when they were young and to keep them entertained we would sing songs, count animals that we saw, look for & write down all the differant states licencence plates, bring each of them their own traveling bag with toys, coloring books, books and their very own snacks (let them pick what they want to take in their bag and throw in a few surprizes) and we went to the library and let each of them pick out a book on tape to listen to along the way. here's our favorite song: the world outside our window is as bright as bright can be. fiddle dee dee outside our window is as bright as bright can be. next verse you make up. change world to sky, clouds, flowers, grass, animal, car, tree etc. and bright as bright can be to blue, green, clouds are white, fluffy, grey; flowers are ??? car is???. animals are ???, the point is to make it up as you go and let the kids take turns adding to the song. and most importantly have fun.
Hope this helps.

Hi N.,

We have traveled to TX and from thear to Mexico. We alwasy plan on leaving avout 7 or 8 pm so that we don't have to worrie about trafic and so you miss traffic in LA. It always works out beacaus the kids sleep all night I help drive while the kids sleep and my husbens gets to rest we just stop to gas up and have the kids use the restroom. We have made it to El Paso Tx in 18 Hr stay the night to rest then we head out to Mexico. We went las April with 8,6,1 yearold and I was 7 month pregnet. We read books,colored, sang, played i spi, talked to the kids about when thay where babies thay loved to hear what hapened and the thing thay did. they also liked finding shapes from the clouds. I wish you a safe and fun trip.

D.

Hi
I think you should plan out your time on paper for intstance from 10:00-11:00 am car games ..how many red trucks or watch a short movie on a portable dvd player.. Then 11;30 snack time..and so on that way the time will go quicker and they will anticipate the changes in the schedule also for the older one give him/her bonuses for helping with the little ones...
good luck!
M.

Hey N.,
That should be interesting going on a nice long road trip. Well I suggest getting some road games for the older kids to take and some crayons and coloring books. Also, go to a book store and get a book on road games. If you are near me ( I am in Escondido, CA) I sell Discovery Toys (educational games and more) and I have some games that would be perfect for your car ride. LEt me know!

Good luck,
B.
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Dear N.,

Well, first of all, umhuh about Dad being bored with 'Dora' - tough. Secondly, ten hours in a car would not be cool if you were a child, would it? Stop before that to have a swim and a bath and a nice dinner, and a bed to sleep in. Otherwise, just suffer, because you and Dad have made the children suffer. C. N. Yes, I am mean. O.K.?