Driving with kids in cars: My favorite activities

So, for our Oregon trip I asked several friends for suggestions about how to keep the girls occupied on the long car ride. I also looked for ideas online that would help. I came away with a lot of things. I had a whole bag of things prepared for us to do and I didn't even get through all of it by the time we got home.

I wanted to share some of my favorite activities that I'm sure we'll use again.

Car BINGO-This we played all the way there. I think we printed it off the Family Fun website. I had to explain what some of the things were to Shelby but overall, she had fun looking for things.


Homemade bendaroos (pipecleaners)- This was one of Shelby's most favorite activities and she asked to play with them many times. I just took some pipecleaners and cut them in half and it made a ton to play with. I helped her make a few things and she used her imagination with the rest.


Funny Faces-I have always wanted to make this in felt for Shelby but have never gotten around to doing it. She had fun with this for just a little while; not her favorite.


Chicka, Chicka, Boom, Boom Tree- We love this story in our house and we like to sing it as a song. I printed this template out of the tree and got the magnetic letters at the dollar store, along with the metal tray. We sang the song in the car and I thought I had brought the right book to read it but when I grabbed it, I realized it was the Chicka, Chicka, 1,2,3 book instead.


Farm animal sounds magnets-Erin has such a short attention span at this age, it was hard to find something to keep her attention. Luckily we had this little game from when Shelby was younger that she played with for a short while.


Stickers-what kid doesn't like to play with stickers?


Car mat-The night before we left I had this crazy idea to look for one of those car mats, like the carpet kind that you can play with toy cars on, only portable and printable. I didn't even know what to call it to google it but I found one easily, I couldn't believe my luck. I printed one out for each of the girls and they both enjoyed playing with it. I had a big bag of "things that go" manipulatives from when I taught school (trains, cars, planes, buses, etc.) that I had to go with it.

(Here's the link for the car mat, or whatever you want to call it. I just used the first page and enlarged it a little bit to fill up the whole page.)

Other things we did:
*watched a little tv (they surprisingly didn't have much attention for it)
*colored
*sang songs
*played "I Spy"
*slept
*read stories

*I also got a great idea from my friend Rachel to have a small snack and a different toy/activity each hour. I found these perfect containers at the dollar store that came ten to a pack and measured about 1/4 cup. I used a variety of treats ranging from candy to nuts. It was the perfect snack size for the girls and I prepared them ahead of time and stored them in a bucket.