We had a road trip planned – a 6 hour drive and I had to be creative.
Most families would say leave early so the kids will all sleep in the car! That only works for the first hour or so, and then what? Other moms told me to put on a movie, but our youngest gets carsick. So that ruled out any movie, device, reading a book or drawing in the car… So we had to think outside the box.
One minivan with 2 adults, 2 teenagers, 1 pre-teen and a 6 year old.
Here are 4 ideas:
- Play games – Our favorite games are: “Name 10 kinds of fruits” or “Name 10 games that you play with a ball, or “Name 10 superheroes” or “Name 10 cereals.” That game doesn’t last as long as we’d like, but it did keep him entertained for a little bit.
- Listen to a podcast. We listened to Kids Trivia podcasts while we drove down the long Pennsylvania roads and allowed ourselves to be quizzed by the kids and host on the podcast. This gave me a break from being the host in our own car games.
- Pack little “prizes” to be opened at every hour. I was able to get Shopkins from Facebook Marketplace for free and I wrapped several of them up in a little package. At every hour, our son received the package, opened them and played for a little bit. This allowed for him to spend some time watching the clock and then he spent more time talking about the characters that he received. On another trip, we used mini stuffed Squishmallows which were also very cute. This could work with matchbox cars, Pokemon cards, or any other collectible item.
- Count motorcycles or try to find cars in rainbow order – Find a red car, then an orange one, then a yellow one, green and so on… or try to count all the motorcycles or taxi cabs depending on what’s popular in your traveling area.
- We also listened to Guess the Disney Song on Youtube. This was fun for all ages as we sang along!