Travel is a part of our life, just as it was when our kids were little. Our relatives lived many hours away by car, we took great vacations, or we followed Larry to a medical conference somewhere. As any parent of young kids can attest, we dreaded those four ugly words that we always seemed to hear, just after we embarked on a long road trip: "are we there yet?" Sometimes we drove at night so that the children would sleep; its so great to arrive at your destination feeling like a zombie, but the kids are well rested and raring to go! Sigh. It just takes such patience to travel with kiddies. I am nothing if not a micromanager, so I generally had all the bases covered and then some: snacks, drinks in little to-go containers, books, blankets, games, movies to use only as a last resort, and cassettes with stories and songs.
Here is my favorite idea for long trips, especially car rides, where space isn't at such a premium as it is on a plane. Wrap little trinkets and gifts, one for each hour that you will be on the road. Of course this takes a little leg work ahead of time, but it is worth it! Buy inexpensive things from the dollar store or the drug store to wrap. Buy enough for one gift per hour, per child. So as you embark on a twelve hour road trip, you have eleven small surprises wrapped for each child. They don't ask how much longer; they can look at the pile of treats and know if it will be soon or not. Here are some ideas for gifts:
Obviously, everything needs to be age appropriate. Notebooks and stickers can be used for them to "write" you a story. Snacks with many little pieces take longer to ingest. All kids love bandaids and enjoy putting them everywhere. Crayons and an activity book can be done alone or with your help as needed. Silly putty, little cars and bubble gum are fun. A mini clip board turns a child into a teacher and can create some great role playing, even among the kids. Small flashlights are wonderful and can turn a kid into a health care provider - "let me look down your throat", check your eyes, or make shadows on the door. My favorite "toy" is a mini tape measure. I used to always carry one in my purse. First, the kids just love to pull it out and let it snap back into the reel. And then they can "measure" for hours: arms, the back of the seat, the tiny gold fish crackers, my sister's nose, etc. Hopefully the gifts provide a bit of entertaining to pass the time, but what elevates this activity is that the items are gift wrapped; even a packet of raisins is exciting if it needs to be unwrapped! I would wrap each child's treats in the same paper, and try to keep the gifts somewhat similar, since we all know how kids tend to compare. And when you were down to one present left, the children understood that we would be arriving soon. Perhaps you know a busy, young mom who might not have time to assemble this before a trip. Wouldn't this be a lovely gift to present her with to help maintain sanity in the car?! Remember to add some large ziplock bags to hold all the unwrapped treasures.
Idea number two is very effective for airplane travel. For many years, I always traveled with several hand puppets in my bag of tricks. When the kids were toddlers, Larry and I would use the hand puppets to entertain, telling stories and singing songs (what else can you do when you are stuck on the tarmac?!) As the children got older, often they would manipulate the puppets and be the story tellers. Puppets are great because they are limited only by the imagination. They can carry on as long or short as necessary. During layovers in airports, sometimes our kiddies would crawl on the floor between the back-to-back seats; two puppets might pop up over the seat backs and provide us with some much needed comic relief.
Several of these puppets have survived to this day; they make an occasional appearance when we have guests with young kids. This evening we were facetiming with Lauren; several of her tennis teammates were with her as they were returning from practice. I told them I was writing about traveling with young kids and wondered if they had any advice. Miranda thought the best thing would be to leave the children at home! Hahahaha haven't we all been there?!