Creative Ideas for Hitting the Road!

While escaping from the daily routine may  sound like a fun idea, traveling with children can often make trips a bit less memorable than desired.  Building Healthy Families asked around and collected some favorite family travel tips for your next out of town adventure!  We would love more ideas and encourage you to add your own by commenting below.

• WINDOW AS CANVAS If you don't mind wiping the windows, let the kids use dry-erase markers to color pictures. My kids love to play tic-tac-toe. A baby wipe clears it up fast -- makes the kids great travelers! 
• PIPE CLEANERS We get lots of mileage out of a big bag of colorful pipe cleaners. Both my kids make different things out of them; the little one practices his colors and counting with them. Add some large beads and you're set. We use them on planes mostly. The kids make things for the passengers and everyone seems happy
• TOYS BY THE HOUR I go to the dollar store for little things for them to play with, then wrap them up and give the kids their own backpacks with the presents inside. They can open one every hour and enjoy a new surprise. 
• NIGHTTIME TRAVEL Even if it is a baby toy, kids have fun with ANYTHING that lights up. Our dollar store has neon glow bracelets and sticks (the kind you'd purchase at an amusement park or nighttime parade) that kids can connect and make bracelets or necklaces out of. Glow-in-the-dark star stickers are fun to get out too. Have them use their mini-flashlights on them to get them to shine. They can stick them above their seat in the car (if they are big enough), or you can have them do it before it gets dark when stopping for gasoline or something quick
• MAD LIBS We just finished a trip with a 6- and 8-year-old. The big hit of the trip was Mad Libs. The kids took turns filling in the answers and loved reading the funny stories. 
• FREEZE 'EM FIRST Make mini banana-nut bread loaves, freeze, then thaw in morning and slice for snack; great with peanut butter and slice of banana on top ... Mix fruit or jam into yogurt and freeze in small, snack-sized Ziploc bags for frozen yogurt on the go. Cut a hole in the end of the bag for easy access/eating.... Make a batch of pudding and add coconut, nuts, marshmallows, crushed cookies, or sprinkles. Pour into molds. Freeze several hours until firm (stays nice as it thaws!)