Traveling with 2-year-olds

At the start of the summer, our family set out on a LONG road trip. 27 hours (one way), in fact! Before we jumped into the car, we knew that we needed tons of entertainment options for our active little two-year-olds. A few days before we left, I spent some time brainstorming ideas with my mom and scouring Pinterest. Here are the ideas we came up with, along with an evaluation of how well they worked.

Take It or Leave It

The following ideas were ones that sounded like potentials from the outset. However, the boys either chose to play with these items very little or not at all. First, clothespins clipped onto cardboard tubes (or sliding the clothespins through the tubes). Jaden and Cody aren't too great at opening the clothespins, so they weren't too interested. As far as sliding things through the tubes, I think they found the tubes a bit too short.  

Next idea: Glitter Bottles. They're fairly easy to make (water, glitter, glitter glue & clear glue), and supposedly keep kids interested for a long time as they can watch the glitter "swim around" and eventually settle at the bottom. (In the picture, the first bottle is shaken up, and the second has nearly all the glitter settled.) Jaden was somewhat interested in watching the glitter, but Cody didn't seem to care too much at all. Eventually, all that Jaden wanted to do was to chew on the bottle top. Even though it was taped down with duct tape, I wasn't so sure how much I wanted to trust the duct tape to this glitter concoction spilling all over our car. So, we scrapped this idea, too, after a while.

I had good memories of playing with these "stress balls" when I was younger-- balloons filled with flour. Jaden and Cody, however, hardly touched 'em.

For as much as my boys enjoy taking things apart, I thought they'd LOVE spending time unraveling these string wraps. Unfortunately, not so much. Perhaps the idea would work better if they could stand and unravel the string by simply dropping the stick. For a car idea, though, it wasn't a big hit. (Thanks, Mom, though, for your time spend in winding these up!!)

The last idea in this category was to just bring along some miscellaneous items that the boys had never played with before: paint swatches (to stick their fingers in the holes or to ID colors), a small tape measure, sticky notes (either to simply take apart or to draw on), and aluminum foil. None of these items proved to be entertaining for long.

Likely to Enjoy When Older

These ideas were ones that I really liked, but didn't elicit huge reactions from the boys. I'm thinking I just need to give these ideas some time, though, so I'll try again when they're older.

Fruit Loop Stringing-- The holes in the fruit loops were a bit too small for the boys to manage, so they didn't quite get the hang of the "stringing" activity. However, when Mommy strung some Fruit Loops on the pipe cleaner, it made for a pretty fun snack game. Cody and Jaden both loved the eating part of this activity!

Busy Books-- I absolutely love these books! They are gifts from Grammy and Papa that give me so many good memories from when I was young. I think the boys had a tough time spreading the books out on their laps, though, in the car. So, maybe next time I'll bring some kind of tray for the books to lay flat.

File Folder Felt Boards-- My mom helped me assemble these boards. She was the creative one who did the facial features. The boys somewhat enjoyed sticking the shapes onto the felt but didn't quite get the whole concept of creating a face or a house. Next summer, though, I'm thinking these will be winners for sure!

One other thing that I'm SURE the boys will enjoy when they're older is our tablet. We downloaded a few toddler-friendly games (fruit ninja, ant smasher, bubble wrap, kid xylophone, and a few fisher price shapes & animals ones). For this trip, the games didn't keep the boys' interest for long at all. I guess I should be thankful that technology takes a backseat for these little guys right now! :)

Winners

This final grouping of pics shares the activities that the boys liked the best (that is, it kept them occupied for 5 minutes or more). This first one was dropping pom-poms in a Cool Whip container. Of course, my boys love anything having to do with pom-poms!

Popsicle Sticks with Pringles can-- The boys LOVED hearing the "plink" as the stick dropped into the container. Mommy enjoyed the fact that the boys were getting good practice with their fine-motor skills. After seeing this activity, Grammy actually took it to the next level and created an adorable personalized one for my little niece! She bought craft sticks shaped like people and then cut picture-faces for each member of the family. The group of sticks then became a family name review as well. Love it! :)

Straws into a Parmesan Cheese container-- This idea was borrowed from my sister Kim, and it's already been tried and tested and LOVED by my boys in the car a few times. It keeps them entertained for a surprisingly long time!

Playdough and Cookie Cutters-- The boys weren't too interested in the cookie cutter stamps, and actually not even all that intrigued by the playdough itself either. What DID catch their interest really surprised me. This was the first time I had actually bought play-dough for the boys, and this particular set came in a small case. The boys absolutely loved dumping the play-dough containers out and then fitting them back into the holes of the case over and over and over again! Who would've guessed?

Magnetic Letters on Dollar Store Trays-- The magnets are certainly fun to move around and pop off and on this tray. Plus, the tray is handy for other activities (like play-dough). The boys don't know their letters at all, but we did have fun reviewing the colors of these letters. A good, versatile activity.

Easter Egg Surprise-- This idea came from my mom: hiding candy or snacks inside Easter eggs. What a hit! It certainly made snacktime a little more exciting and made it pass the time a bit more, too. Great idea, Mom!

Our Coloring & Sticker Kit -- I had bought clipboards, thinking the boys might appreciate that for coloring, but they mainly preferred the lined paper pads that I bought. The most popular item in this picture was the sticker pack. Jaden played with stickers for easily 30 minutes at a time. His habit is to place all the stickers right on top of each other in a big pile. He was so proud of his masterpiece and eagerly asked to show it to Daddy time and time again.

Our friend Josh had recently given Jaden and Cody musical birthday cards that went along with their dog party theme. The boys liked these cards at home, so I threw them in the bag as a last-minute thought. Yes, the cards perhaps got a bit annoying after the 50th time of hearing a dog barking out happy birthday, but that's definitely preferable to whiny kids in my opinion! These cards were a surefire way to get the boys out of a grouchy mood.

Store-bought Drawing Pads-- The boys didn't quite get the hang of the aquadoodle (or maybe it was a bit too flimsy for them to keep control of), but they did enjoy the other drawing toy. They quickly learned how to erase their own scribbles too. I'm thinking I might pack this in our church bag in the future, too! 

The only other non-pictured items that worked quite well were:

1. TONS of snacks!

2. Portable DVD player (The boys still LOVE their Praise Baby DVDs the best. We can't thank you enough for this lasting gift, Carstens family! It's been our saving grace for vacations!) We usually only needed 1 or 2 of these half-hour DVDs a day.

3. A HUGE box of toys (pretty much every musical toy in our house, cars, megablocks, and a shape sorter were all among the most popular)

4. LOTS of books, including some new library books (Their favorites were Pete the Cat and Clifford.)

All in all, we were quite pleased, and actually a bit surprised, with how well the boys did on this amazingly long car trip. It was definitely helpful to have a grab-bag of lots of options to choose from whenever the boys needed new entertainment.