How to Pack to Travel with Little Ones

Our family travels a lot with our littles (3.5, 2, and 1)! I’ve learned a few helpful tips for making sure you have the things you need when your 3+ hours from home and have to entertain for that drive time.

The 2 big things I can share that make this endeavor easier for us are simplify packing and thinking through travel entertainment!

When packing clothes I layout my kids clothes in piles. One for every day we will be gone. One outfit for each child {shirt, pants, panties/diapers, socks, bows, etc}.

After I have all of their clothing for each day lay out I fold them, stack them, and wrap them all together with masking tape. I then label what day the stack is for {this helps if the hubs or another family member is trying to help you ready children one day}.

I then have a pile of pajamas according to how many nights we’ll be staying {including diapers} and labeled as well. We use PJs at least 2 nights so that cuts down on the amount of items we have to pack.

 

 

I encourage you to think through what you’ll be doing while out-of-town as to have appropriate clothing for your littles and be positive. Be positive that someone if not everyone will have an accident {or 2} so have emergency clothes in the car. Don’t store these in your packed bag. Stick them in a gallon sized plastic bag under the seat. Include pants, shirt, panties, socks, and a Wal-Mart bag (for soiled clothes).

When packing food I like to take a small ice chest with our juice, milk, sandwich meat, and cheeses (saves on eating while traveling and they don’t spoil while away) and picnic basket with snacks meals like crackers, fruit snacks, animal crackers, and bread. And how many jars of baby food I’ll need during travel. Three items I LOVE and recommend: snack cups, name bands for cups, and jar pack! These snack cups can hook to car seat straps by using a couple of toy rings. The bands we got at inchbug.com and they can fit on all size cups are dishwasher safe. The jar pack is like an adorable little lunch boxes and helps me remember everything I need for my baby’s feeding while traveling (even to local restaurants).

When packing travel entertainment I think about 2 things
Limited space: We don’t take things that are expensive or sentimental that we would hate to lose, {we do travel with ‘sleeping buddies’ but pack them in our bag for bed time} or things that they can’t hold on to easily in the car.
Lose-ability: Big things that don’t travel easily due to limited packing space or things they, again, can’t hold easily in the car.

EXAMPLES of must-haves when we travel are as follows: tiny dolls (and little baby bottles)- 1 for each girl, magnets from the refrigerator on cookie sheets, tiny books that fit in the nook next to the preschoolers car seat, and a couple of DVDs! We try to limit the amount of “screen time” even when traveling but sometimes you run out of songs, drop all the dolls, books, and magnets and mommy will yak if she climbs to the back seat again.

I hope these are helpful tactics that can ease your travels with little ones. We travel so often that these simple ideas have become second-hand and are constantly being adapted for our children’s ages and interest. Have fun travels this holiday season!

I challenge you to do the extra planning ahead so you can enjoy the travel and the rest of the trip!