Vacation Travel Tips To Keep Me from Going Insane?
In two weeks, we are going on vacation. We are going to the beach! I'm sooo excited about getting there but not so excited about the drive. It will take us 8 hours to get where we are going. Of course, we are going by car with a 5 yr old and a 22 month old and two other families driving alongside us.
Our 22 month old has never been in the car for longer than 3 hours and most of the time those 3 hours are pure torture for him and for us. If he doesn't sleep then he screams. I need some serious help in getting him to cooperate for 8 hours. Our trip will probably turn into a 10+ hour trip from all the stops and breaks. Our 5 year old will do just fine. He has been on this trip, at age 3, before his brother was born He will be happily watching his Spongebob Squarepants movies on his portable DVD player.
If you have ever taken kids on a long trip, please tell me how it went.
>Go to the Mom blog Homepage
In two weeks, we are going on vacation. We are going to the beach! I'm sooo excited about getting there but not so excited about the drive. It will take us 8 hours to get where we are going. Of course, we are going by car with a 5 yr old and a 22 month old and two other families driving alongside us.
Our 22 month old has never been in the car for longer than 3 hours and most of the time those 3 hours are pure torture for him and for us. If he doesn't sleep then he screams. I need some serious help in getting him to cooperate for 8 hours. Our trip will probably turn into a 10+ hour trip from all the stops and breaks. Our 5 year old will do just fine. He has been on this trip, at age 3, before his brother was born He will be happily watching his Spongebob Squarepants movies on his portable DVD player.
If you have ever taken kids on a long trip, please tell me how it went. >Go to the Mom blog Homepage
Our 22 month old has never been in the car for longer than 3 hours and most of the time those 3 hours are pure torture for him and for us. If he doesn't sleep then he screams. I need some serious help in getting him to cooperate for 8 hours. Our trip will probably turn into a 10+ hour trip from all the stops and breaks. Our 5 year old will do just fine. He has been on this trip, at age 3, before his brother was born He will be happily watching his Spongebob Squarepants movies on his portable DVD player.
If you have ever taken kids on a long trip, please tell me how it went. >Go to the Mom blog Homepage
7 Comments:
Our daughter wouldn't have anything to do with being in a car until just a few months ago (she turns two next monday).
She would cry and become hysterical for hours. No amount of distractions or consolling would make a difference.
I think she just couldn't relate to another time when we couldn't pick her up and hold her when she wanted to be held.
Good luck though. I'm sure you'll find the trip will be worth it in the long run. Have you tried children's music (Raffi, or Fred Penner aren't as obnoxious for parents...actually, I kind of like Raffi).
John D
What about buying some new movies for the dvd player? Something that you know he would like but has never seen. Maybe some kid cd's. If he doesn't get carsick what about books?
We just drove from California to Canada with a 21 month old! She really loves books so that totally helped. We also talked about what we saw out the windows. So she now knows about cows, mountains, stars, moon and farms.
We sung a lot of songs too and I read to her by riding in the back seat!
Good luck and I hope you have a great trip!
Hello! I travelled on a 21 hour drive w/ a 2 year old awhile ago, & my friend gave me GREAT advise: go to a dollar store & buy enough toys to have one for every 2-3 hours or so, but don't tell the child you have them. Wait until the chld gets bored, & you give them 1 toy. This will occupy them for at least an hour, hopefully, as it's something new. Once they're bored of the toy, sing songs & do silly stuff to occupy them for as long as you can. When they're REALLY bored again, pull out another new toy, & continue the process! It works well! We also timed our trip to do a big part of the driving during the night so he would sleep! And during hte day we stopped every 3-4 hours & kicked a soccer ball with him to let him run off energy!
Best of luck! Enjoy the beach!
Robin-Lee
Hello ladies!
I thought you might find it useful, there is a new social site TripWiser.com - they provide thousands of predefined itineraries for travel inside the United States. You can customize any of them, add whatever you need, there is an integration with Google map, and they specialize in family travel. If anyone is interested, here is the link: http://www.tripwiser.com
Thanks I will check it out, any specific family trips with babies?
Amita
You are a brave woman. It will be worth it once you get there. I brought books on tape from the library for my kids and that took care of a couple of hours. I also stopped at a lake en route, let them swim, gave them lunch and then they fell asleep for 90 minutes. A nice break for everyone. Then, I drove like crazy. I also let them watch movies like Thomas the Trai I took lots of snacks that take a long time to eat like See's Lollipops. Music, the best all time kids CD is Philadelphia Chickens. Seriously, I can listen to it and laugh with them. Good luck.
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