When we were planning to travel, I knew packing things to keep the girls entertained was of high importance! While also not taking up a lot of space! We needed things for planes, trains, layovers, downtime in hotels, and more. We ended up bringing an additional backpack at the last minute. These extra items really helped when they lost our luggage … still yet to be delivered! Here is our kid tested travel hacks:
What kid travel hacks we planned, that worked:
Headphones that will work on the plane and that the kids will like!
We prefer to limit screen time, but this felt necessary for the plane! As a bonus, these headphones don’t work with anything else! Funny thing though, the two-year-old didn’t want to use them! She would rather just watch the movie … in silence. My guess is that these may be a better fit for kids a little older. While they are not made for adults, I was able to use them. They just sat on one side of my head. This worked out because then I could hear the girls if they needed me.
Games
Charades
The charades game is such a versatile tool that was a huge hit! I specifically remembering playing this while waiting for our rental car! The office was closed for lunch, and we were stuck in a small office surrounded by parking lots with nothing to do. It is all words so the five-year-old knows what she needs to act out. It also works for the littler ones because you can use the cards to teach them words and sounds. I have also used this as an educational tool with the five-year-old since it teaches about animals, actions and objects or nouns and verbs. Such a fantastic option and every kid loves the spinner! If you’re tight on space, you could easily put the pieces in a zip-lock bag but it is fairly lightweight, so we have not yet.
Trouble
This option is fun for me because I played as a kid. The older one likes it because it is teaching strategy. It can take a while for a game so it is better for older kids. It is hard for both kids to press the ‘popper’ for the dice so they may get frustrated. Lastly, the little pegs can fall out easily so I definitely wouldn’t pull this one out on the plane. We have been playing this at the houses we host and the hotels. Or other times when we know we have time to finish a game or can store it between playing. It has a lid that encloses the whole thing, so it is very compact. I like this option, but it does depend on age and how long your child will set.
Various Card Games
We also brought a themed Go Fish game and Old Maid which is one of the older girl’s favorite games and she is getting good at playing! I like any of these games because they can be educational in the sense of matching, counting and strategy. The younger child also likes to get involved because of identifying the pictures and matching. You could also use this to practice art, play memory, try to build a card castle and more so it is a good open-ended option!
Journals and coloring tools
This was a huge hit, and these journals continue to be a favorite! Our five-year-old loved drawing pictures, writing stories about them and coloring in the cupcakes and unicorns. We are four weeks into our European trip, and she is still using this journal! Of course, it works for the two-year-old because she will copy what her big sister does! Crayons have been the best because honestly, they can’t color themselves. Enough said, but we did bring some markers that are the washable kind.
We are also doing homeschool activities while we are travelling and find that both girls really enjoy completing pages in educational workbooks like the one above! They will wake up from naps on the plane and ask to do some more pages! We don’t center her home-schooling curriculum around workbooks, but it is another tool we use, and she really does enjoy them so she will enjoy doing a few pages each day and little sister is coloring in her notebook to stay involved. They have these books for all grades and really do a good job of focusing on what that grade should be learning while being fun.
What kid travel hacks that we didn’t plan for, that worked:
Kids are incredibly imaginative and creative if given the chance! We have done so many activities that I hadn’t planned and that helped during the downtime or travel time. Best of all, they mostly required nothing! We could play anywhere! Some of our favorites …
Freeze/Statue – this game was made up by the five-year-old where she pretends cars are alligators and you have to freeze anytime one drives by, so they don’t see you. It can take a long time to walk down the street but it sure is fun or funny and the kids enjoy it!
Dance Party – the girls love music so we have a playlist of kid’s songs and now and then they will pull it out and dance. Just another way to get moving when you are stuck sitting!
Flower Shop – the girls pick flowers and set up shop on a big rock or bench at a park and hand them out to people walking by. Bonus, they get lots of interaction and you are definitely making someone else’s day!
Lava Floor – we all know this one, but we use it on everything, the cracks are lava, the yellow paint is lava, the green tiles are lava. There is a lot of walking in Europe and the kids are not always keen on it! This helps distract them when you have a few more blocks to go!
There are many more and I will be sure to add them to social media when we play so I don’t forget for you!
What didn’t work:
I think it is too soon for these with my kids. I loved them and it can be educational, but we need to work on knowing nouns, verbs, etc. and this will be a great tool to teach that so we will save it for a little while later on our travels
Sometimes … anything! There are days when everyone is just tired, too much travel is going on, someone didn’t sleep long enough and just nothing is going to work. We have learned lessons from these days for sure! How to see it before it happens, how to plan for a travel day, how to plan LESS on a travel day (my fault here for sure!), how to plan park activities in-between to let the girls run off some energy and so on.
Travelling in a car to a train to a plane and back to a train is not fun for little ones. It can be exciting at first, but it is not easy to sit for that long. So, plan some kid travel hacks wisely, have an extra amount of patience that day and if it doesn’t go smoothly … people have been exceptionally kind or helpful and a good night’s rest with a slower day after will get you back on track. Not every day can be a “vacation” day, we have down days and normal days in-between.
Enjoy all the days and take extra care when planning the travelling days!