Road Trip Must Haves When Traveling with Little Kids
Traveling with little kids is tricky, but it can be lots of fun. My three kids and I (with grandparents in tow) took a road trip from North Carolina to New York and back in 4 days! I had to head up to West Point to teach a lecture on perinatal fitness to a mess hall filled with cadets! I wanted to share what we packed for our road trip that involved 5+ hours of driving each day over a four day period.
In the car, we had an 11 month old, 3 year old, and 6 year old! Here is what we packed and found to be really helpful to make it a smooth trip for us while traveling with little kids!
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The good thing about driving is you can bring a lot with you–this is also the bad thing! We needed to deliberate on what we were packing because we had to fit three car seats and three adults into a car with all our bags for a four-day trip.
I was able to pack our clothes and toiletries into one backpack for the kids and I (that I plan to bring to our international trip that we are going on in a week). I packed out Solgaard Lifepack Endeavor, which was big enough for our clothes for 4 days plus toiletries! And we still had a lot of space left over.
This also made it easier to get my bags inside since we were staying in a different place each night, along with all three kids. So, highly recommend a bag that you can pack all your things in!
Important Tips for Road Trips when Traveling with Little Kids:
- Plan for breaks out of the car every 2-3 hours (if not less)
- Snacks. Pack of all the snacks!
- Entertainment for the kids
- Be flexible–some parts of the drive will be rougher than others!
On our 4-day trip, we drove about 6 hours each day (not including stops) so it was a long drive! It was really important that the kids were entertained somewhat, but we also tried to time our drives to when they would be sleeping.
For two of the four days, we drove in the evening after dinner, and the kids mostly slept on the drive which made it easy! On the other two days, we drove during the daytime, and we had to really emphasize a rotation of toys and entertainment for each child.
Another important thing to incorporate was rest stops! We tried to stop and get out of the car every 2-3 hours, which definitely increased the length of our journey each day. But it was important for our sanity, bathroom breaks, and resetting our car. I-95 has a lot of rest stops directly on the highway, especially after you are in Maryland, which makes road stops really easy.
Things for a Baby
We said that traveling with little kids can be tricky, but road-tripping with a baby can be daunting! Fortunately, my baby is a fairly content car seat passenger about 80% of the time, but there are times when she just wants to be held or drops her toy. This is where an extra adult is really helpful! I would have really struggled with this drive if I was solo.
Big things I packed for my baby:
- Snacks (plus a spill proof container for the snacks)
- Easy to drink from bottle (I like this glass mason jar with a plastic straw. It’s surprisingly spill proof, but the straw makes it really easy to drink from for her)
- Toys from home that she really enjoys playing with that light up or have buttons
- Diaper bag easily accessible.
- We normally cloth diaper at home, but when we travel, we use disposable diapers for ease
- Baby carrier for contact naps at our destinations for road stops
- Umbrella stroller
Favorite Toys!
We packed several toys that my 11-month old daughter really enjoyed playing with at home that did not have any pieces to it. This was in case she drops the toy, we don’t lose a important piece to the toy. We found this really fun pop-it toy at Target that sings and makes noise, but there are a ton of great options on Amazon too!
She would play with the pop it toy for about 10 minutes before wanting a snack or another toy to play with. But, it was still 10 minutes!
Another toy she really enjoyed playing with was from her Lovevery Play Kit Subscription box! This was the switchboard, which was a new toy in the Thinker Play Kit for months 11-12. We have really loved the Lovevery Play Kits for all of our kids, as the toys are developmentally perfect for each age.
The toys are high quality and have lasted us a long time! If we lose a few pieces, it’s easy to order new pieces. Their toys are the most used toys in our home.
Back Seat Camera: Day/Night Vision!
For my previous kids, we used a rear facing mirror. But, we couldn’t see them after it got dark. For our baby, we discovered this back seat camera that has been amazing! The camera has night vision, which is probably the coolest feature. It’s much easier to see what is going on with my baby, both day and night, with this camera.
The camera was a helpful tool for me, since I was the driver, to be able to direct other adults in the car to assist with the baby if she needed some help in case they didn’t notice or weren’t sure what she needed.
Toddlers and Little Kids
For my toddler and little kid, we packed a lot of opened ended toys and puzzles for them to play with on the drive. The good news about driving is you can pack a lot of stuff! So, even if you don’t end up using it, it’s not a huge deal because you had the room.
I like to grab special toys specifically for our trips to increased excitement! The common things I will pack include open ended toys like play doh, legos, and coloring supplies. I also found a bunch of puzzles for the kids to play with on the drive.
But I would say the majority of the drive, their iPads provided most of their entertainment. We downloaded a bunch of games, such as Lego World and Toca World, and video streaming services like Disney +, Kids YouTube, and Netflix.
My kid’s iPads have data, so they can stream videos online. For our baby, we download videos with YouTube Premium on a tablet without data, so she can watch Cocomelon and a few of her other favorite nursery rhyme songs.
Top Toy: Play Doh
Play-Doh is the top item that my kids love playing with when we travel. This was a fun kit that I found on Amazon that contained all their mini-Play-Doh containers and had some sculpting tools. Each kid got their own special kit and played with it repeatedly throughout the drive.
I also found some play doh packs at Target that were Halloween-themed that the kids loved playing with too, but I preferred this container kit because it kept all of the toys in a single container that was easy for them to use and build on.
Art Supplies
Another top item for traveling is art supplies! I found this art kit as we were prepping for our road trip. It is on the big side so will probably not pack it for our upcoming international flight, but it was perfect for the car.
This kit organizes the supplies in an easy-to-use fashion and was a great table for my son to use while he was coloring or drawing. Both kids enjoyed coloring as we drove throughout the drive.
I also packed a few coloring books fo their favorite characters (my son loves super heroes and Paw Patrol right now) so they could color their new books.
For my 6-year-old, I got her this smaller art kit with more “grown-up” art supplies. This kit is much smaller and more compact, so we will probably pack this for our international flight.
Travel Puzzles and Games
I also packed a few puzzle games. These games came with a travel bag so it was easy to keep all the pieces together. This was a favorite one for my 6-year-old.
We packed a few different puzzle games like this one for her to play with as we drove. For my 3-year-old, he preferred to play Lego games on his iPad that had different puzzles and games.
Those were the main toys that my kids played with on our long road trip from North Carolina to New York and back! They rotated mainly through these toys and their iPads throughout the entire drive.
Overall, it was a pretty smooth trip! Each kid was pretty content with their entertainment, but all were really happy to finally get out of the car each day. Hope these items help you have an easier road trip when traveling with little kids!