The Wild Things : How we survived a 2 day road trip with children...

After our last tumultuous journey to and from Switzerland we decided that this time we would drive. No embarrassing tantrums on planes, no dramatic train changes with prams, suitcases and little wriggly children. Not again. Just us, our belongings and one car. Road Trip!!!

So I decided that this time I would be prepared for all eventualities.Naturally this means that I went straight to Pinterest and typed in 'road trip with children'. I became obsessed. I kept clicking and pinning. Clicking and pinning. And the more I planned the more I found myself feeling excited. The more I realised just how itchy my feet had been...
Here is how we survived it:
1. Are we there yet?
I printed off a map of the journey and at various points we placed a sticker on so we could see how far we had traveled. This prevented all the are we there yet? stuff.

Yes okay I laminated it! I used to be a primary school teacher and I couldn't help myself!

2. Travel sicknes

Isaac projectile vomits Exorcist style 2 hours into any car journey almost without fail. Which is...fun.

Notice the bands on Isaac's arms? They are acupressure bands and they apparently help to prevent sickness. We had readily available change of clothes and disposable sick bags. I also put a few drops of Ginger essential oil in the car which is supposed to help with nausea. Actually its more accurate to say I spilt it all over my seat and it stank for hours. So I'm not sure how helpful that was. Lastly we stopped every 2 hours to stretch our legs, do toilet stops and have a snack which I think helped. And you know what? We had a sick free journey there and back. Whoop whoop!

3. Fun bags

I gave them Fun bags and various points in the journey. It gave them something to look forward to and something new to play with when they got them. They contained stuff like colouring books, small party bag toys, books to read, peel off stickers for the window, some healthy-ish snacks etc...

They also had a small present for the hotel so they had something to play with....

I regretted the title of the bags quite quickly as Tim made a joke about my 'Fun Bags' every single time they were mentioned. And I mean EVERY single time. Basically it turns out my Fun bags are awesome...

Isaac has wanted glasses for ages so one of his fun bags included these fake ones. He loves them so much I'm afraid he will never take them off...

4. Behaviour

I had two pegs on the dashboard. The idea was that if they were misbehaving I would take theirs down which meant next fun bag was delayed.

But they weren't really needed as there was too much to play with and too much to look at outside of the window...

5. On board Entertainment

We played the usual games like 'I spy', 'Who can see the Sea/mountains first' or 'I own everything outside on my side of the car' (which is a game originally invented by me and my big brother when we were little). We also bought those DVD players that go on the head rests so they could watch movies at various points.

The journey became part of the holiday rather than something to get through before the holiday begins. We made some good memories I think...

Crossing the channel on a ferry to France...