need ideas for car travel with small kids...

[deanna]

Leaving in a few days for many, many hours of driving and would appreciate any and all suggestions for keeping a 4 yr old and 1 yr old happy and occupied en route

Also need some help with my packing list. I found one online, and it had some great ideas that I never would've thought of (like towels to clean up spills and plastic bags for wet clothes, etc.) Any other things you've found useful for long car rides?

[OakEmber]

Definately kids music...and maybe a book on tape for your 4 year old. Sometimes they can surprise you...in the spring we went on a 5 hr road trip with our 3.5 year old and the toy bag we packed sat on the seat the entire time! She was busy watching the scenery Things like a magnadoodle would be great, that way the pen is attached and you won't have to keep reaching back to pick something up off the floor.

[hjohnson]

A portable DVD player is a good suggestion. Also packing some toys that they haven't seen and are new to them are good.

[party_of_seven]

Ah! I am the queen of horrendously long car trips with small children. I have been from Idaho to Texas and back 3 times with small children. I have been from Texas to missouri 3 times, and from Idaho to missouri 3 times. And I have been from Idaho to Seattle once and back. My kids have logged some serious miles and lived to tell about it .

I highly recommend the portable dvd player....its a godsend! We still use ours often. The kids love to charge up the battery when there are storns coming...that way when the power goes out they build a blanket fort and curl up in there and watch a movie. We take the dvd player camping, and I have been know to take it in numerous other occasions when I needed the kids to be quietlt occupied(waiting on car repairs, long meetings etc)

The travel size magnadoodle is great too(no worries about crayons getting left in hot cars) The leap pad is good too.

I always bring lots of healthy snack foods too....grapes, apples, crackers, cheese sticks, granola, stuff for sandwiches, drinks. My stomach just can't handle a bunch of fast food. I also like cds of children's music, and short chapter books to read to the kids(70-100 pages). Rand Macnally puts out a children's road atlas too so that they can keep track of where you have been and where you are going....it even has lots of fun ideas for games to play in the car.

I bet that http://familyfun.go.com/ has lots of ideas for games to play on the road too.


Oh, I love staying at hotels that offer free breakfast in the mornings, and a pool is great too. We always try to get off the road early enough to take the kids down to the pool for a little bit so that they can work out all of their pent up energy. The free breakfast in the mornings makes it easy to get everyone fed and happy before going back on the road in the morning.

Hope you have a great trip!!!


Good luck!

[Ann-Marita]

This may be too late for this trip, but maybe for next time. And, Warning: this involves eating fast food.

A friend keeps ALL the little toys that come with kids' meals at fast food places. She says her children don't even know they come with the meals. She wraps them in gift wrap or the colorful Sunday newspaper comcs. Then she doles them out during the trip. The wrapping is so the excitment of the new toy lasts moment or two longer. AND they can look at the comics, too.

I don't do fast food all that often, so her plan doesn't exactly work for me. I have bought cheap toys at thrift stores and that works just as well.

[sarahsmommy]

We just got back from a 6 hour car trip to the beach with my 2 y/o dd. It could have gone better. :

Things that kept her entertained for a while: silly putty, singing along to a new sesame street cd (favorite hits or something), putting a diaper on her baby, packs of stickers, eating chex mix.

I'd also just ordered a lot of new golden books off ebay that she hadn't seen yet. So reading those to her took up a lot of time riding.

[yoyo65]

We (my 2 boyz and I) just got back from East St Louis, Il. We live in Minneapolis. It was about a 12 hour trip. My advice:
I agree with the DVD player. I just wished the brand new one I bought 2 days before the trip had worked more than 2 hours!!! Whatever you do, DO NOT BUY ANYTHING FROM AUDIOVOX!! Their customer service is terrible! They would not do anything for me. I suggested they call ahead to a store which carries the same product and have one waiting for me in St Louis so I could trade it in. They would not do anything and acutally accused me of stealing it or running a scam! And here we were on our way to my MIL's funeral!
Make frequent rest stops along the way. Take a potty break, get out and stretch, hopefully there is a playground nearby, If you are ok with fast food, try to find one's with play areas. Bring an outdoor toy to play with. We had a basketball.
Put in some music for yourself also and SING REALLY LOUDLY! Bugged the crap out of my kids, but it kept their minds off the long trip for a little while.
I put their snack food in individual zip bags so there would be less chance of any fights over stuff. Lots of juice boxes. I put my 4 yr old in pull ups even though he is well potty-trained, just in case.
Bring their favorite books, toys, etc. For DVD's, I went to the library and borrowed quite a few, too bad we didn't get to use them.
Be felxible and spontanious if time allows. We made a diversion to a model train musuem about 2 miles of the freeway in the middle of farm land. Totally a last minute decsion but well worth it.
That's all I can think of for now. Good luck and be safe!

[Rainbow]

We're about to go on a long trip as well- I'm going to copy and paste what I wrote for another thread My girls are 3 & 16 months and we're driving about 13 hours. Our first long trip!

We're leaving friday for a trip. We're planning on letting DH come home on Friday and sleep for two hours or so while I take the kids somewhere to get worn out. Then we'll ship out, we have two who sleep pretty well in the car so that is our hope. Then when DH gets tired we'll stop at a hotel and let everyone get more sleep. I figure me and the kids can go to the pool in the morning to let DH sleep even longer. I hate to drive so I'll do anything to help him feel rested! We hope not to leave until near nap time. But still, I'm sure there will be plenty of awake time since it is a 13 hour drive.

We bought a TV for the car- we don't have one at home so I think this will really keep their interest. We got it used off ebay for a good deal. I also bought some mini toys - kinds we don't have at home- so hopefully they will be really interested in them. A mini magnadoodle, mini bumble ball, those "peek inside" blocks. I really hope these little toys help spice up the ride. I'm planning on giving them a new one every hour or so. rotating them.

I'm vegetarian so there isn't a lot fo fast food I want to eat- so I'm trying to take as much as possible. Lots of dried fruit- dried pinapple (basically candy) even. the co-op has so many varieties and we just basically grabbed one of each. I'm ashamed to admit that fruit leather would be no "special treat" so we're leaving that at home- but it is a great idea if yours isn't used to it. I'm taking the fruit & nut granola bars, shelled pistachios, coconut crackers fromt eh asian food store, some trail mix (I think I'll add raisins, almond slivers, cashews, sunflower seeds, japanese crackers, and a few pieces of chocolate even), I'm going to make some "hearty" biscuits with tofu sausage & cheese baked in, and hopefulyl some other stuff if I can think of more.

So basically we are doing lots of snacks, new toys they've never had, kids TV and kids music (which they usually have int he car, so nothing new).

[deanna]

Thank you!!! I really appreciate all the great ideas. We are leaving tomorrow, and I am stressing out completely! Guess it's time to just go to bed and get a fresh start with the packing in the morning. Round trip will be 30+ hours in the car--wish me luck!