Road Trip Success with 3 Kids

We are off to Arizona for a long weekend to visit friends and meet up with some family that's escaping the cold of March in Chicago. I consider myself almost a pro when it comes to traveling with small children in the car due to the fact we have a trailer and have been road tripping with that since I was 8 months pregnant with my first little princess, I prefer flying and a nice hotel but my husband LOVES the trailer and so do my kids, annnnnnnnddddd I guess it has grown on me. Here I am getting off topic.

Keys to keeping the kids happy in the car.....

*Make their area comfy for them. I ensure that there are blankets and pillows to cuddle with when they get sleepy

*DVD's, Ipad, your choice of electronic device. We have family iPads and the time that is allowed playing on them is limited at home however in the car is a bit of a different story. I don't start out the ride with here's your iPad, however, it is there within my reach for the meltdown time that is bound to happen. I have a Chevy Suburban, that I LOVE and it has built in DVD players which is a huge lifesaver for any trip longer than a hour.

*New toys. The Target dollar section is your friend right before trips. I just grabbed some travel felt boards and some reusable Doc McStuffins stickers. The crayola mess free color wonder markers and books are wonderful too.

*Snacks and Drinks. We always have a small cooler with juice, water, coke(for mommy) and sliced apples, string cheese, uncrustables, etc. I also make a toddler/preschool friendly snack mix, chips, goldfish and so on. Pick your poison and make sure you pack extras cause if your kids are anything like mine they all of a sudden get "so starving" in the car.

*Try to leave at a time that works for your family. When we road trip we usually try to wake up eat breakfast and take our time getting ready to leave around 10am (after traffic, husband hates it) and then the kids are guaranteed to take nap about 1-2 hours into our drive.

*Plan to stop. Before kids my husband had the eye on the prize and it was hard to even convince home to stop so I could go potty but now he knows with 3 kids it just happens, someones gotta go potty or we need to change a diaper or something spilled.

My best advice to you is just to go with the flow. If your over prepared then it will hopefully be a piece of cake and you will have conquered the open road with the family. Other times the kids will cry and need a million things and ask a million and 1 times "are we there yet"