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Baby Hints & Tips

Toddlers and Car Trips

Toddler in Car (Custom)Car trips! How do you keep your toddler entertained on long car rides? We’ve just spent 4 hours in the car & I have a headache from all the ‘chatter’! Lol. I did all the right things, stable table, colouring books, reading books & food yet we’re STILL bored!

  • Great games for long car trips are spotto (eg I need you to look for a blue car) and eye spy (you can do simplify this for younger children by saying the starting sound).  Stop regularly at planned intervals and have a big run around and then hopefully they will also have a sleep in the car. Have fun and make sure you look out the windows and interact with them. Even a good old fashioned sing a long. There is so much fun to be had on a long car trip if everyone gets involved. Simone 
  • Not every second has to be filled up with “stuff” – a little bit of silence is never a bad thing and teaches them to get by with the thoughts in their own heads for entertainment.   Katie
  •  I took my almost 3 year old son (and then 4mth old daughter) on a 9.5 hour (one way) road trip. He slept for a little, when we went through the countryside I pointed out things outside – cows, sheep etc and then made him count them. My iPad was a godsend. The talking friends app kept him entertained for a couple of hours!    Choni
  • Balloons , puppets.    Josi
  •  We play car cricket and play eye spy and animals with each letter of the alphabet.    Kate
  • Hate to say it, but iPad!    Kylie
  • We have refused to buy our kids a dvd player. At the moment we look for animals, clouds, tractors etc, we play eye spy with colours as they are a bit too little for letters just yet but as they get older we will do letters and play number plate cricket, we sing (even if Little Mister says “let the man/lady sing the song mummy” lol) and food If it’s a really long trip they end up falling asleep anyway.    Natalee
  • All my trips are done with just myself and kids. We chat and when I get over it I play music. If they annoy me the rule is mum turns the music up and sings louder.  They read books etc. When I get tired music goes off n we chat about the names of towns, make up rhymes, play number plate games. Point out animals, interesting things even awesome trees, mountains etc etc. Let the kids see the countryside instead of just a screen.   Kristy
  •  DVD player and iPod touch.    Sasha
  • DVD player is the only way I survive!    Holly
  •  iPad, movies and earphones.    Emily
  •  My ds will just entertain himself. we’ve done heaps of road trips (longest being 13 hrs of driving in 1 day) and have had no problems.   Kai
  •  Favorite toys and music? It’s good your kids don’t get car sick from reading books then. I’d never have given that.    Melissa
  • DVD players, once my 15mth old is old enough, he will get his own, the same with lil girl. Oldest got one for Christmas and he uses it when it’s nap time.    Jodie
  •  We just recently did the big west (perth) to east (Northern NSW) with a 18month and 2.5 year old .we did have the DVD player but I found the audio books that you can get from the abc shop were fantastic!!! Could not rate them highly enough. Also the magnadoodles from Kmart were great because the kids were able to draw but there would be no texta/ crayons on them or the car seat s.    Leanne
  •  DVD Players are a must.    Rosalie
  •  Do a 10 hour return trip about once per month with our 18 month old. He hardly sleeps in the car so we sing lots of nursery rhymes, talk about cars & trucks on the road, stop at a playground for a break & provide lots of healthy snacks during the trip.    Tania
  •  DVD player.   Toni
  •  My kids sleep . Even the 7 and 8 yo.   Megan
  •  Music. Mine usually get bored and fall asleep. We’ve never actively “entertained” them even on long trips of 6-8 hours. I let them choose which CDs they want on in the car and they can either sing along or just listen.    Sandra
  •  iPad with easy Apps and videos.    Rebecca
  •  I spy.    Apreinia
  •  What about good old fashioned sing alongs.   Sairs
  •  Portable dvd player, a game console that ge can use.   Natalie
  •  We have recently traveled from Adelaide to Townsville. My boys are 1 & 3 and spent most of the time reading books, playing on the magna doodle, magnet books, playing with finger puppets and drawing. We had a DVD player but only used it from about 3-4pm onwards when they had reached the cranky part of the day. Tried to have breaks at playgrounds every 3 hours.   Jo
  •  DVD player or in our case we put movies on the iPad biggest lifesaver ever and the best part is our daughter usually falls a sleeping watching it anyway.   Aleesa
  •  DVD player or IPad with movies or Dora.    Jorja
  •  We just recently did a drive to Adelaide, 10-12 hours in the car with a 6 month old and 2.6 year old. Our main things were books and portable DVD player! Also short stops for breakfast and lunch, and they had a couple of decent sleeps.    Kelly
  •  We save the iPad for if the kids get really over the drive and we still have a while to go. I pack an activity bag each for my boys (2.5yo and 4yo). Include books, stickers, colouring, small toys, snacks and I usually try and include one new small toy as a surprise.    Vicy
  •  In car DVD player but you have to mix it up chage DVD often and stop for a bit do same colouring play find game like find me a horse or a house with a red roof so on.    Kirsty
  •  Portable dvd is our best friend, we take it anywhere we think the kids might get bored (long car trips, out for dinner etc) just as a back up and they love it.    Nicole
  •  We did 7hrs broken up by a breakfast stop and a couple of wee stops and both my 3yr old and 1yr old didn’t have any dvds or app just a colouring book that eldest didn’t really use he just looked around and talked about things. The way home was similar but we left around 10.30am and stopped to get some lunch. We did a lot of traveling by car when I was young and never had dvd players then so we feel our kids don’t need them (we traveled from south of Perth all the way into the North of Western Australia).    Marianne
  •  We went to Sydney a year or so ago and we just played games like ‘spotto’ and they slept a fair bit too thank gosh lol! I’m dreading getting my P’s as I’ve promised my Dad we would come up for a visit in Queensland so that will be interesting as I doubt I’ll have them anytime soon so I’ll most likely have my 4th by then too haha!    Sarah
  •  The silent game. Who can be quiet longest? Winner gets an ice cream.    Elizabeth
  •  DVD player.    Rachael
  •  Ipad, earphones, movies or favorite tv show!    Katie
  •  I frequently do trips alone with a 1 & 3 year old. I can’t safely “entertain” them while driving so we have built in DVD players in the headrests. They love watching Dora, Diego, movies etc and it makes a long trip go quicker for us!!    Karen
  •  Our 2 year old every since birth loves car rides he looks out the window and I say what hes looking at he loves it when I tell him to look at the cows than we start to moo we just took a 4 hour trip and so so loved it.    Nicole
  •  We have done 15000km in 6 weeks with 5 kids aged 10, 8, 4, 2 and 9m (8000 of those in 2 weeks) and we don’t stop often, we usually travel for 16 hours with 3 10 minute stops. In car dvd player, colouring books and lots of rest time.    Simone

How do you entertain your kids on long car trips?

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