Its vacation time for us and we're heading on a little road trip. Do you have family road trip memories? Did you love them? Or was sitting in the hot backseat with your sibling a setting for disaster?
I have very fond memories of the road trips I took with my family growing up. Even though we would be in the car for hours, my brother and I loved it. Dont get me wrong...there were many times that the imaginary boundary line was drawn down the middle of the backseat where my stuff was on one side and his on the other...but for the most part it was good times!
One of my favourite memories is making "forts" in the backseat with my brother out of our sweatshirts, pillows and blankets. Not sure how Dad saw out the back but I'm sure he didn't care...as long as we were relatively quiet and not screaming at each other.
One of the best parts of the trips was our surprise backpack. My mum would pack our backpacks with tons of new stuff "to do" in the car. We were allowed to open our packs when we got out of the city and on our way. Sooo...seeing how Mr. Fix-it and I will be bringing our kids in tow for hours in the car - a backpack of fun "to do" stuff is in order.
Nana just bought our big guy this new backpack for school so we're using it a bit early. So cute eh?
If you are looking for a road trip sanity saviour...here are some ideas from what I've created for my big guy:
1. Keep Things Organized
You dont want little pieces, random craft items and crayons all over the car. I bought a binder to hold a notebook for colouring as well to hold a pencil case full of crayons and markers. I also bought a tray for the carseat that will allow my big guy a hard surface to colour on and eat his snacks. I haven't tried it out yet, so hopefully it will strap on okay.
2. Keep Them Entertained
Oh the portable DVD player...a lifesaver! These little gizmos are fab for long car trips. You can also attach headphones to them if you have multiple children watching different DVDs. Our DVD player just attaches to the headrest and voila...an hour and a half of movie entertainment and no "are we there yet"?.
While I'm a huge fan of the DVD, I would get the mommy guilt if my big guy watched it the whole trip. So I've packed books, colouring books, crafts etc to keep my big guy busy along the way:
I also made "I SPY" games and printed them out. I just created a few pages of clip art for my big guy to look for on the road (ie: cows, barn, stop sign, red car, truck etc). Super easy and my big guy will love it.
You can also go on this website for printable roadtrip games...http://www.momsminivan.com/
3. Snacks and Treats
Who doesn't get the munchies in the car? Its a good idea to have yummy snacks for everyone in the car. Hungry kids = cranky kids! Obviously its good to have healthy snacks but I can't help it if a few chocolate bars and chippies also happen to jump in our bag!
4. Surprises!
My big guy loves the Dollarstore. Who doesn't love the Dollarstore? I picked up a few cute toys or little things that I thought my big guy would like (ie: dinkie cars, playdough, silly putty, slime, trucks, Pez (I used to love Pez) etc) and wrapped them up. Throughout our roadtrip I'll give him one to open.
All wrapped up...hopefully he wont notice that some of them are wrapped in birthday paper ;)
I suggest organizing your road trip items and snacks in plastic ziplock baggies. That way they are organized and you can see what and where everything is.
That's it. Hope this gives you some ideas for your next roadtrip with little ones. As long as you have a few things to keep them busy, your roadtrip will be fresh.fabulous.sophisticated.
Its hard to make a "roadtrip backpack" for my little babe but I'm hoping he takes long naps in the car and is entertained by his brother in the backseat ;)
I'll be away for a couple of weeks but will be thinking up lots of blog ideas on our vacation and hopefully bring back some inspirational design ideas.
Until then,
Keep it Beautiful.
Twitter: keepitbeautifu1
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