mountainman Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 We are going to be in the car for 8 hours straight, how can i keep my kids from saying are we there yet every minute? :confused: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris in VA Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 My parents used to drive us from Ohio to Connecticut to see family, and we always got a cigar box full of penny candy to tide us over. I don't recommend that, but it was fun! :001_smile: Books on tape, card games, playing car games (like, going thru the alphabet letter by letter--looking for A on a license plate/sign, then looking for B--etc. Or playing Geography--name a place, then the next person names another town/country/river/city/state, etc that starts with the last letter), reading, doing paper puzzles (crosswords, logic grids, hangman, wordsearch)....All of these tide us over. We also listen to a lot of music and do some singing. We sleep, too, and do a fair amt of talking and staring out the window. I don't do dvds. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LifeLovePassion Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 I got books on tape. We bought dd1 a mp3 player for her birthday. THey can listen to their stuff while the grown ups stay sane. I laminated auto bingo, some maps, the dot game and tic tac toe so we can use wet erase markers and baby wipes and reuse. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bry's-gal Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 Books on tape!!! They are a must for our family on any sort of road trip! I will also pack a back pack with things for each girl. I try to hit up the dollar store or the dollar bins and get a few new things for them! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mountainman Posted June 22, 2011 Author Share Posted June 22, 2011 Those sound like some good ideas, we will be sure to try some of them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kchara Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 We like portable DVD players and a couple of new movies. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
weat4 Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 I just drove from Phoenix to Iowa with our 4 kids (12, 7, 7, and 7) by myself ~ ah!!! Books on tape were fantastic and I gave them $5 in quarters ($10 for my 12 yr. old) in a little plastic container and I told them they could keep them and spend them when we got to Iowa if...............they didn't bicker, complain, ask when we were going to be there, etc., etc. ~ if they did these things, they had to give me a quarter. The kids were FABULOUS! The boys each lost a quarter, but the girls kept them all and that is the reason I am still sane. :O) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FrogMom5 Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 Pack a small backpack or tote with new things in it for each of them. I'm not sure how old your dc are but, include the ideas people have already posted-books, crayons, activity books, small games and so forth. Add a few treats too. Surprise dc with these once you're on the road, maybe after a story on tape or when they begin to get restless. Another idea is to give them a camera or sketch pad to record their trip. Again, depending on their ages and the number of children you have. They may have to share the camera. My dad was in the military and when we moved, we went by car. We used to sing together. Sing family favorites or sing along with the radio. You can also tell stories together, play I Spy or 20 Questions. I'm not sure if it's really called 20 Questions. We pick a category, one person thinks of an object (or person, animal, etc.) and everyone takes turns asking a question until the object the first person thought up is identified. Have fun on your trip. Denise Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EJCMom Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 We recently took a trip from Washington state to California, and I made up these roadtrip binders for each child. They had age-appropriate activities, i.e. mazes, coloring pages, word searches, hidden pictures, etc. that I printed for free from various websites. I also found a free road trip bingo game. I printed one for each child and laminated them and put dry erase markers in their pencil pouches. They played that bingo game several times over the course of the trip. Also, I don't know how old your kids are, (mine are 6, 5, and 3) so this may be a little bit of a young child idea, but something that I did that was a surprising hit with them was I put a ziplock baggie full of multi-colored pipe cleaners in each binder. They used them to bend into different shapes as a no-mess craft activity. They had so much fun with it! I also brought a couple of books (in case we finished the first one) to read aloud instead of books on tape. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
milovany Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 You didn't give ages, but water spray bottles will work *great* with some, especially if it's hot and you don't mind if things get a little wet (and you set down rules about spraying each other). Yes, books on tape. Another thing we've used on a regular long car trip we take is pipe cleaners. A package of those can hold the interest for quite awhile. Playing the alphabet game, if you're in an area where there are signs and other things outside the car with letters (race to find A, B, C ... X, Y, Z in order). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
veggiegal Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 You've gotten tons of great ideas. I'm not sure how old your kids are, but if they are young you could try giving the kids a way to keep track of how far you've gotten. You could give them a string with beads, each bead equals 50 miles (or whatever scale makes sense), so every so often you tell them to move a bead over. Or a chart with squares to colour in (like a game board), so the kids can see, Oh, we've gone 3 squares, and there are 5 more to go, etc. If your kids are older, they can have a map or trip-tik and keep track that way. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LifeLovePassion Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 fidget toys are good. stress balls, mini slinky's, etc. I also have loaded up on prizes to award along the way from the party favor section or $1 spot. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jennifer in MI Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 We've driven cross country a few times and we're doing it again this summer (MI - Los Angeles - back). We found less is more. We brought some washable markers and let the kids draw all over each other and themselves. (It came right off in the pool!) We had LOTS of pipe cleaners. My older boys all have iPods and we loaded them up with movies. This summer we'll load up the iPad for my dd with all her favorite games and movies. That's about it! On our last trip, I made up maps for each child of our trip and where we were going to stop. That was fun! On the first page, I had a page of boxes. Every 50 miles, they were to cross off a box. When the page was full, we were there. It was a nice visual for them. One trip I bought a "gift" for them for each day. These were VERY simple things. One day, everyone got a bag of packing peanuts and we had a "war" with them. That was the best $1 I spent! Bubble packaging also worked very well. One day they got paper clips and made chains all around the car. So, little, fun stuff that took up time. I usually waited until we'd been in the car around 2 hours before giving them their new stuff. Good luck! I love car trips!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RahRah Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 I just drove from Phoenix to Iowa with our 4 kids (12, 7, 7, and 7) by myself ~ ah!!! Books on tape were fantastic and I gave them $5 in quarters ($10 for my 12 yr. old) in a little plastic container and I told them they could keep them and spend them when we got to Iowa if...............they didn't bicker, complain, ask when we were going to be there, etc., etc. ~ if they did these things, they had to give me a quarter. The kids were FABULOUS! The boys each lost a quarter, but the girls kept them all and that is the reason I am still sane. :O) LOVE this idea! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sebastian (a lady) Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 We are going to be in the car for 8 hours straight, how can i keep my kids from saying are we there yet every minute? :confused: Books, including good stories and TinTin graphic novels iPods with audio books (Jim Weiss and Narnia are favorites) Audiobooks on the radio. We've listened to Teaching Company, The Underground Economist, Stephen Ambrose, and many others. We pick something that the driver will enjoy and have been pleasantly surprised at how much the kids will listen to and pick up. Nintendo DS (though we usually have a rule that these only come out when it's too dark to read or if we've been driving multiple days). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stacie Leigh Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 I try and put away some small simple toys ahead of time so they don't see them for a while before the trip. My kids love matchbox cars, notebooks & crayons, and portable travel games that are self contained in the car. Target had the travel size Hungry Hungry Hippos on sale for 3.99 and I had a 3.00 off coupon so we paid .99 and they can take it in the car and play. My mom used to get brown lunch size sacks and fill them with inexpensive mini notebooks, a new set of cheap crayons or markers (if she trusted us) some stickers, a small snack and such. That was always exciting for us and helped us look forward to the travel time. She also used to let us know ahead of time what the seating arrangement would be so there was no arguing and she would set up a rotation so that at certain intervals, a more desirable seat would be swapped to someone who had been sitting in the back. Good luck and have fun! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TXMomof4 Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 Ihaven't looked at other replies, so I may be replicating recommendations, but here are out magic car trip activities. Wikki stix on a cookie sheet Magnets on a cookie sheet (make sure they will stick!) Colored pencils and paper MP3 players - cheap, cheap ones - loaded with books and songs THose were the favorites in the car. Of course, our new van has a dvd system in it, so they will happily watch movies for 8 hours straight. I hate that though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RahRah Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 I've traveled a lot with DS - he's such a great road warrior! We'll see how well baby does in October when we do our first major road trip with him. With DS, it's fairly easy to keep him entertained throughout the trip - things I do or have done: 1. Have stopping points laid out in advance, especially stops at children's museums and science centers. An annual pass with reciprocal admissions across the US is invaluable for this! 2. Road trip gams - license plates, car colors, A-Z find, I Spy, 20-questions, Name that Tune, etc. all pass time nicely 3. Storytelling - DS and I will orally build a story, taking turns to add to the story and then the other - this is one thing he absolutely loves doing when we're traveling....we've made-up so incredibly silly stories, many which he still tells people 4. iPhone (and now iPad) movies, picture books and a ton of songs works well for some quiet time in the car 5. Audio books, like SOTW and almost anythiing from Jim Weiss collections 6. Stained-glass windows - washable markers on the back passenger windows is a ton of fun, cleans easily and keeps DS occupied for well over an hour at a stretch! One thing I do is put some blue painter's tape along the bottom of the window, where it goes down into the door, so that doesn't get marked up. 7. Arts & craft supplies and a lap desk are great, as are mini activity books by Dover.....along with stickers, pipe cleaners, and floam 8. Small "gifts" along the way - something new (inexpensive) that DS wants/likes that he doesn't have Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jamee Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 We've always let the boys pack their own little back packs with the stuff they wanted. No crayons though, since those melt. We did 8200 miles last summer and the video games didn't even come out until we got to GA, about 3/4 of the way through the trip. Make sure you have plenty of snacks and water too. 8 hours isn't really that long. Are there some places you can stop at every couple hours? Maybe something big at the three/four hour mark? Food, National Park, Museum, something crazy? (we're known to go out of our way to see strange and unusual things: world's largest ball of twine in KS, Corn Palace in SD, Lincoln's birthplace in KY.) I'd look to see what's along the way so that you can get out and stretch. One thing that helped with my oldest on our last trip was showing him how the mileage markers work. He was able to count up or down to where we needed to go, the next stateline, etc. Also a good chance to work on navigation and map skills.;) have fun! We love road trips and our kids have been doing them since they were just months old and we've never had a DVD player. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nono Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 We had LOTS of pipe cleaners. Can not recommend them enough! My kids make mobiles and hang them all over the car. I'm sure we're a sight going down the highway, and if you happen to see us, please wave! :D :auto: :auto: :auto: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChristusG Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 I went to Target and bought two clearanced cookie sheets (one for each kid). I also bought some magnet sets (like these: magnet playsets ). They love making scenes and walking their magnet people around on the cookie sheets. The cookie sheets also doubled as a hard surface to color on or do crafts on. And with the edge of the cookie sheet, the crayons didn't roll off. Pipe cleaners Small $1 crafts from Michaels I loaded up the kids iTouches with some new games, apps, TV shows, etc. I bought a few new DVD's from the $5 section at Target. A new coloring book for each kid. I gathered all the kid CD's and brought them with us. The kids could jam out on the headphones even when I didn't care to hear any more kids music. A few special snacks that I don't usually buy....mini M&M's, gummy snacks, etc. Travel bingo...like these. No mess. A container of play doh and a few small cookie cutters, a knife, and a spoon all put into a ziploc baggie. This can be used on the cookie sheet...just have a wipe handy to wipe it down afterwards. Something that really helped is the ziploc baggies. If I grabbed a craft at Michaels, I'd put the craft and everything it needed into the ziploc bag. I'd put several crayons in there with it, tape, etc. That way, all I had to do was pull out the bag and not worry about rummaging around, attempting to find everything. The key is not to present all this cool new stuff at once. Maybe once an hour or two, depending on how bored the kids are and how far you are driving. I hate road trips so I was prepared LOL. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J-rap Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 Not sure how old your kids are, but we traveled across the country several times with our 5. Some things that kept them busy: The girls would spend hours and hours making, cutting out, and then designing their own clothes for paper dolls during long car rides. When the drive took several days, sometimes I'd have a little paper bag they would open every day. In the bag would be maybe $5.00-worth of various cheap but fun things they could do in the car, little things I'd get at the dollar store: craft things, fun markers... just take a look in the toy or party-favor aisle of your local dollar store. One of our friends once designed a notebook with a whole checklist of things they had to look out for along the way, and questions they'd have to answer about things that they saw. For example, there might be a particular famous bridge, or a well-known little cafe, or whatever, that my friend knew we'd be passing en route. They'd have to watch for it, sometimes draw it, and check it off the list! Or maybe one question on the checklist would be: "In a 10-minute span, which color car did you pass most often?" It took a little time for her to put together, but it kept my kids occupied for many hours! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChrisN in NY Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 We have loved listening to Adventures in Odyssey CD's in the car. I have bought travel games, including a couple handheld battery operated games (like Battleship and Wheel of Fortune). For our last road trip to VA, I bought the Focus on the Family Radio Theater edition of the Chronicles of Narnia. The kids also pick some books to read and other little things to do. Mad Libs were good for a few years. When I have driven with the kiddos by myself, we stop for lunch in a restaurant. It really helps break up the trip, and for me is worth the extra time. HTH Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
msk Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 If you happen to have a kid who's just learning to write letters, the LeapFrog Scribble and Write is a lot of fun. My 5yo spent several happy hours with it on a recent trip, and we've hidden it for a few weeks until our next trip. My mom made me a tote bag with many little pockets in it for long drives when I was a kid, and we stuff it with the types of travel-friendly things people mentioned above before long trips. When we get home, we stash it away again so it all stays somewhat novel. I sometimes buy a couple of new Whimzy Pets to give my 5yo about halfway through a really long drive, she LOVES that. She enjoys Imaginetics type play scenes too, although the teeny magnets fall off more often than she'd like. My 1.5yo's favorite car activity is currently putting on and taking off velcro sandals-- she'll do this (intermittently) for hours! So much for travel toys there! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
justamouse Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 A long rope tied to the bumper and in line sates or a skateboard. :D Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miselainia Posted June 25, 2011 Share Posted June 25, 2011 We love pipe cleaners, audio books, drawing on paper, origami, read alouds, magnadoodles (we take turns drawing pictures of each other), and singing either camp songs or singing along to our favorite songs on mp3s or CD. This does it for us from Utah to West Virginia and back every year. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mommy22alyns Posted June 25, 2011 Share Posted June 25, 2011 Two words. DVD player. :auto: Just take away my homeschooler cred right now! We also did books, crayons/colored pencils and coloring books, and... um, Leapsters. :D Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
matchpenalty_2 Posted June 25, 2011 Share Posted June 25, 2011 We like to listen to the Jim Weiss recordings on long trips. The kids love them and it makes them use their imaginations! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
keptwoman Posted June 25, 2011 Share Posted June 25, 2011 Audio books are a must for us. I always take enough to have the majority of the trip covered. We play "road kill bingo" each person gets a different type of road kill, or blown out tyres and they add up how many they see :rofl: Kangaroos are a good one, them and blown out tyres are always prevalent. Other than that, DS games, colouring in and iPods. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nono Posted June 25, 2011 Share Posted June 25, 2011 Two words. DVD player. :auto: Just take away my homeschooler cred right now! Hey, we're with ya, but ours doesn't fire up until 2-2:30 p.m. on the road. We have a whole rhythm of how our day goes in the car, and downtime with DVDs is after lunch. :) Our kids beg to go "traveling all day in the car." They've gotten partial to old cartoons and such on DVD, which they don't get to see unless we're on the road. (Rocky and Bullwinkle, George of the Jungle, that type) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jennifer in MI Posted June 25, 2011 Share Posted June 25, 2011 A long rope tied to the bumper and in line sates or a skateboard. :D :lol: Two words. DVD player. :auto: Just take away my homeschooler cred right now! We also did books, crayons/colored pencils and coloring books, and... um, Leapsters. :D We used to use a DVD player and now each child has his/her own iPod with his own movies. So, take away my homeschooling card too!! :tongue_smilie: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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