Tips for peaceful long car drive with kids in the backseat

[Anonymous]

Audio books, games like guessing car makes, trivial pursuit type games.
Or drive at night or very early morning.

[Anonymous]

Audio books. Really, really good audio books.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Op here. They are 9 and 6. My ipad has no data plan, what can they do in the car ride? They are not carsick but just they are bored from looking at same scenery (trees, farms and a few houses) along the highway.

honestly, parent better. Kids this age and in the age of portable electronics should be able to handle a 3.5 hr car ride and last a solid 5 hr without stops, jesus. Why do people allow their children to be whiny brats?

Download a few movies on the ipad and tell them to suck it up.

When I was growing up we drove from Boston to Myrtle beach with 3 kids across the backseat of a sedan.

I completely agree. My 11 year old can do 5-10 hour car rides now, and a 3.5 hour one has never been a big deal. We have NEVER done screens in the car. Mostly, we always have audiobooks on, and when we switch to music, we usually play a made up game we call "Stay or go" where we shuffle music on the iPhone and each one takes a turn of saying "go" to shuffle to something else or "stay" if they want to keep the song. That way, everyone in the car has a chance to get a song they like every 3-4 songs.

Lots of snacks help, and building in an extra hour to stop somewhere and run like puppies helps a lot. I went up and down from DC to New England at least 2x/month when my son was a toddler and preschooler, to help care for my aging parents, and I'd usually plan to stop twice on a 5-6 hour trip to let him run around somewhere, plus use the bathroom. There are also special snacks we ONLY have on car trips, like Auntie Annie's if we can find it at a rest stop, or gummy bears (that just seems to be something we always want if we get a gas station treat snack.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Op here. This is our 2nd road trip ever with kids. All of our relatives & grandparents live local, within 30 min. drive. Their schools are a few minutes away drive from home, and all of camps/classes are within 5 min to max 1 hr drive. I think the biggest 2 problems is DH listening to his favorite metal music while driving & the 6 year old talking nonstop/bothering 9 year old. I can't complain much because he is the driver, and he says that he wants to enjoy his drive listening to his music. No one loves that heavy metal music in the car, except him.

We are flying to CA from DC in August, and I have to make sure that they both have window seats to look at clouds.

Tell your DH he can’t listen exclusively to his music in the car — let everyone take turns choosing a song and rotate in audiobooks too. You’ll have to engage with the 6yo. That’s too long for them to amuse themselves constantly if they’re not used to it. Play word games with them or let them have a movie on the iPad. 9yo will probably join in or read to themselves if you parent their sibling.

And yeah, clouds will only amuse for 10 minutes; make sure you have things to entertain your kids for the remainder 5 hours of the flight.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Op here. This is our 2nd road trip ever with kids. All of our relatives & grandparents live local, within 30 min. drive. Their schools are a few minutes away drive from home, and all of camps/classes are within 5 min to max 1 hr drive. I think the biggest 2 problems is DH listening to his favorite metal music while driving & the 6 year old talking nonstop/bothering 9 year old. I can't complain much because he is the driver, and he says that he wants to enjoy his drive listening to his music. No one loves that heavy metal music in the car, except him.

We are flying to CA from DC in August, and I have to make sure that they both have window seats to look at clouds.

Tell your DH he can’t listen exclusively to his music in the car — let everyone take turns choosing a song and rotate in audiobooks too. You’ll have to engage with the 6yo. That’s too long for them to amuse themselves constantly if they’re not used to it. Play word games with them or let them have a movie on the iPad. 9yo will probably join in or read to themselves if you parent their sibling.

And yeah, clouds will only amuse for 10 minutes; make sure you have things to entertain your kids for the remainder 5 hours of the flight.

+100 Your main problem is a selfish DH. It's not "his drive", it's the family's drive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Screens and devices duh.

And unhealthy snacks!

We limit this at home, but on a road trip - no limits. So easy.

[Anonymous]

Audio books worked for us - books at their level, not yours.

Small pre-packaged snacks (you do it before you leave) that are half sized to their norm - so they get it twice. Pretzels, goldfish, cut up fruit, string cheese or baby Gouda, gorp ( cheerios with a few m&ms and raisins thrown in)…..

Sometimes the old games work- like I Spy and the license plate game.

Having one parent sit in the middle between the two for a leg but not the whole journey.

Download a few movies or tv shows on the iPad.

And absolutely last. Play the quiet game with a prize if they can last for at least x amount of time.

[Anonymous]

We bought a minivan with a DVD player and never looked back.

[Anonymous]

We drove across the country and back again when my kids were 10, 10, 8, and 3. We did lots of 5-10 hour driving days. In addition to everything listed above, the number one tip is just turn the hotspot on your phone on, and let them do their usual stuff on their devices, especially after a few hours on the road. We were able to have all four kid streaming off our two phone hot spots (with unlimited data) in even some really remote areas, and it made the trip much more peaceful.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If they are used to personal screens at home, limit them to almost nonexistent in the week before. Load them up with favorites and new movies.

We always had luck with little surprises from Dollar Tree. Every hour or state line, whichever came first, I’d pull out a “surprise”. It kept them occupied at least 15-20 minutes.

Snacks. Stuff they might not normally have a lot of at home. Even better if they can choose it from the gas station. Don’t give it to them until you’re back on the highway!

I did this with my kids too on longer road trips. They got something every 100 miles. Sometimes a snack, a magazine, a fidget toy. It didn’t really matter what it was, it was just the anticipation of what it would be that made them want to keep going. As they got older, I would give them challenges every 100 miles and they would get spending money every time they completed a challenge. Long trips have never been a problem.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Screens and devices duh.

Actually I have found the key to be never letting kids use devices in the car. You give them paper and crayons, you listen to podcasts and music, you tolerate them saying "I'm bored." When they whine you tell them "when I was a kid I passed the time by looking at books or daydreaming." Eventually they learn to read and they read in the car, or draw, or listen to podcasts and music, or talk to each other or you.

Relying on devices guarantees they never figure out how to occupy themselves in the back of the car, it in a plane, or waiting in line, or during adult swim at the pool, or after school, or pretty much ever.

It's a short term solution and a long-term problem.

To each their own but this is an insane theory. Turns out you can both daydream and have time to use iPad!

I've found that the folks that put the most restrictions on iPad and screen use end up with the kids that are the most glued to them when they get them and then their kids are always asking to use them or for more time. When iPad use isn't reserved for special times or as a treat, it works out better for everyone.

Mom with older kids who limited screen time when they were pre-teen. Actually, my kids moderate themselves just fine. But keep telling yourself whatever makes you feel better.

[Anonymous]

If the kids get carsick, you need to put the iPads on the back of the headrest of the seat in front of them. If you're gonna use devices.

My kids Love the variety of car games you could play. One game is find words that start with each letter in alphabetical order and see which person gets to Z first. I can tell you that when you come to some letters like Q everyone's looking for the quality inn! And of course you can make your own rules. We use highway signs, names of cars, any roadside attraction. We drove by that they see, etc..

There's also a road rally travel scavenger hunt. You can buy where they have certain things they need to find or see on the road trip to get points.

Or they can see how many different state license plates you identify.
And so on

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Screens and devices duh.

Actually I have found the key to be never letting kids use devices in the car. You give them paper and crayons, you listen to podcasts and music, you tolerate them saying "I'm bored." When they whine you tell them "when I was a kid I passed the time by looking at books or daydreaming." Eventually they learn to read and they read in the car, or draw, or listen to podcasts and music, or talk to each other or you.

Relying on devices guarantees they never figure out how to occupy themselves in the back of the car, it in a plane, or waiting in line, or during adult swim at the pool, or after school, or pretty much ever.

It's a short term solution and a long-term problem.

To each their own but this is an insane theory. Turns out you can both daydream and have time to use iPad!

I've found that the folks that put the most restrictions on iPad and screen use end up with the kids that are the most glued to them when they get them and then their kids are always asking to use them or for more time. When iPad use isn't reserved for special times or as a treat, it works out better for everyone.

PP here and it's not a theory. Time tested my friend.

But in any case I never said we didn't allow screens at all. Kids got screen time at home and we allowed it on long plane rides and at the destination. But early on we decided no screens in the car and no screens at restaurants or other social events (I think there was one wedding where we let our youngest spend most of the reception on a device because it enables the rest of us to enjoy ourselves). We just suffered through the tough years and the kids acclimated and as a result we have never struggled to get kids to self-entertain. They get phones and iPads now but they self moderate and will even tell us "hey get your nose out of the phone" instead of the other way around.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Op here. They are 9 and 6. My ipad has no data plan, what can they do in the car ride? They are not carsick but just they are bored from looking at same scenery (trees, farms and a few houses) along the highway.

Even if the ipad has no data plan, most cell phones do. You can turn most smart phones into a hotspot and the ipad can join the Wifi on the smart phone hot spot. Then the ipad is just using the data plan from the smart phone.

At that age, we had a limit of about 1-1.5 hours of devices at a time. Then we would break the trip up with car games. We get MadLibs and everyone takes turns giving words and the non-driving parent does the Madlibs. We can usually do like 3 of them for about 45 min before they want something else. We also play I Spy and we'll play alphabet games. So we take turns with finding something that begins with A, then B, then C, etc. When your kids are older and reading well enough you look at billboards, license plates, bumper stickers, etc and find words that begin with the letters. Everyone can play every letter or you can rotate and each person gets a letter in order. Or we pick categories and look for as many things that fit the categories as possible. With the 6 year old, you can start with simpler ones like "anything red" and we all just call out things we find that are red. We will try to find license plates from as many different states as possible. So we try to play car games for an hour or so, then they can go back to electronics. We also have a DVD player that I bought that has two screens, one that can mount on each front seat headrest, and we can play DVDs for them. Now that our kids are in middle school, they will download movies from our streaming services onto one of their tablets and then they can watch them off-line.

Another option. When our kids were younger (like 3-7), we would go to a local consignment store and the kids could fill one bag with things to do in the car for the trip. Then we put those things away until the trip. We would do this like 2 weeks before the trip and excitement of getting that bag of toys back would help them look forward to the trip. Then we would give them new toys that they had picked out one at a time and they could play with them. Each one would usually like like a half hour before they got bored. So, for like $30-$40, we got a bag of "new to them" toys that would keep them entertained.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Op here. They are 9 and 6. My ipad has no data plan, what can they do in the car ride? They are not carsick but just they are bored from looking at same scenery (trees, farms and a few houses) along the highway.

You can download movies and shows from Netflix and Prime for offline viewing. I do this every time we fly. They can also play games, listen to audiobooks.