Summertime means vacation time for most families. Whether you are just driving over the river and through the woods to grandmother’s house, or packing your passports for an overseas adventure, traveling with children requires some advance preparation. Keeping busy little bodies and minds occupied while they are confined to car or airplane seats takes both patience and creativity. Lucky for you, I’ve discoverd some inexpensive, easy-to-make, boredom busting travel activities.
1. Good Behavior Reward System
When Melissa of 320 Sycamore packed her 5 children in the minivan for a cross-country roadtrip, she made sure they would have things to keep them entertained and to reward good behavior. Find out how she turned dollar store purchases and a simple backpack into a travelling entertainment and reward system for her family.
2. Bubble Wrap Scavenger Hunt
Are your kids obsessed with bubble wrap packaging? Use that bubble wrap to make an easy, fun vacation scavenger hunt. A step-by-step tutorial for this activity is available at Ohdeedoh. This is one you can let the kids help to make.
3. Travel Folios
Stitch/Craft shows us how to put together simple travel game folios. Lightweight and easy to pack, these do double duty as a sturdy writing surface and game storage. 
4. Magnetic Game Tins
At her Yellow Pear Blog, Erika demonstrates how she repurposed small tins into magnetic games, to prepare for a long journey. What great little travel kits!
5. Homemade Travel Desk
If you want your kids to have everything they could possibly need to keep them entertained for hours at a time in the car, then check out this project at Chez Beeper Bebe. A homemade travel desk is portable, colorful, and versatile–and it transforms into a pillow!
Hopefully these inspiring will help you have happy, safe travels this summer. Do you have some favorite travel tips to share?
these are great ideas!
Love the bubble wrap scavenger hunt. Who wouldn’t have fun with this? Thanks for sharing all these great ideas!
We are heading to FL next week, so this is perfect timing!! Thanks for sharing:o)
And don’t forget that sharing a book is another way to pass the time. I posted some of my favorite books on this post http://sweetwaterstyle.blogspot.com/2011/07/stay-sane-on-your-road-trip-read-aloud.html
Sometimes you can even find a book related to the area you are traveling to. I would be glad to help you find one. Keep Reading…it is almost time for school again!
I just discovered your lovely blog. I look forward to popping by again for some inspiration! I’m just new into blogging this year & have put together a daily blog on design, fashion, food, travel and anything pretty.
http://scrapbook-melissah.blogspot.com/
I had a lot of fun putting it together maybe you would like to check it out if you have a spare minute.
x
Melissah
One word. Audiobooks. We load up their ipods with them because they’re much more engaging than dvds. There are lots of sites where you can get them, but we use this site a lot because the short stories are original and free. Here’s the link if anyone is interested. http://www.twirlygirlshop.com/short-stories-for-kids