5 Helpful Tips to Keep Your Toddlers Occupied On a Road Trip
5 screen-free activities for keeping your kids engaged.
We can’t afford to go on air trips all the time, and I perfectly get this!
(After all, who’s going to pay the airfares?) Ah.
Recently, my husband asked me for a 3-day road trip to a nearby coastal area, and I was excited at the beginning but panicked a little as I would be having two toddlers along my side.
Still, I didn’t say NO because I’m a heck of a vacation freak and can’t afford losing an offer like:
3 days 3 beaches!
Oh yes, me and my family are water babies.
And guess what, we reached our hotel after a 10-hour drive fully SANE!!!
Surprised?
This is how you can also keep your toddlers engaged all the time so they don’t throw their puffy eyes at you.
1. Distract them with snacks
This is an all-time gold offer!
Keep a big crunchy bag of chips, a pool of candies, and yes, not to forget, keep those sticky gummies.
Do you even know why those gummies should be sticky?
Because kids forget cranking when those gummies stick on their gums.
Moreover, chocolate bars.
Seriously! Hide your inner-hygienic mother soul in a cupboard during a road trip and let children have their time.
I know chocolate bars create a lot of mess with tough stains, but let the kids enjoy them as free-spirited souls.
I’m sure there are many options like ‘vanish’, which you can apply later to serve your clean car goals.
2. Let them roar with dinosaurs!
If you have read my previous blogs, you would have a better idea of my kids’ love for dinosaurs.
So, I kept several small-sized dinosaurs.
They managed to drag at least half an hour playing with those little monsters!
You can keep anything your child likes.
I also kept some of the dinkies.
(Actually, I also love to play with dinkies at times.)
You can try other things like dolls or those bead sets if your girls love to make ponies or dress up their dollies.
3. Engage them in Doodle tabs
I don’t like my children to share screens most of the time.
So, I have already bought two doodle tablets, one for each of my brats.
Doodle tabs are fun; you can draw anything with the stylus without the hassle of keeping a duster for erasing.
I played the guessing game with them by drawing things and let them guess the theme.
You can try a beach theme or a park theme.
You can even play ‘name, place, animal, thing’ or crosswords.
4. Keep them confused in Puzzles
Puzzles are one of the safest hacks to keep your children engaged.
But don’t forget to keep a solid board for joining pieces.
What I did was I bought puzzle wooden blocks. They were just nine blocks, but they made a total of 6 pictures.
Overall, it didn’t require much space to keep and helped children make 9 different objects.
If your children are over 5 years old, you can simply keep the puzzle pieces to join.
5. Let them sticky!
One more fabulous activity that can keep your children busy for hours is a sticker book activity.
There are multiple 1000-sticker books available on kid’s favorite animated movies.
I went with ‘Finding Nemo’ this time.
My son has gone through the movie, so he loved the overall theme of completing the story with the help of stickers.
It is an easy activity that a toddler under 2 years would even enjoy.
Closing Thoughts
Road trips are fun.
They let you spend some quality time with your family.
So, don't just say no to a coming road trip in fear of a rumbling attitude from your kid.
Instead, try these above activities to make complete use of it.
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Hi there!
I’m Fariha, an Engineer by education and a car enthusiast by passion.
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