Car Ride Games!

[lportuondo]

Those of you who have ever driven to disney world with kids, you know how restless the kids can get. I was wondering if anybody has any games to keep the kids busy during our upcoming 4 hour car ride to disney. Any suggestions are greatly appreciated!

 

[Grumpy's Wife]

We play the ABC game. You have to find something that starts with an "A", then a "B", "C" and so on by just looking out of the window. It's pretty easy in the beginning. When you get to the end of the alaphabet it gets a little harder. It should take a good 1/2 hour to 45 minutes off your drive time. Have fun.

 

[ardig123]

how old are your kids?

 

[beckmrk04]

OOh- good thread. I have a looong ride coming up (16 hrs) with a 3 and 5 yr old. Any suggestions would be much appreciated, espcecially since they are my nieces, and since I don't have children of my own yet, I don't have a ton of ideas. help!

 

[Goofy4Disney]

I've printed out some Disney word searches, Epcot games (matching currency, national holidays, etc to it's Epcot country), Disney trivia, color sheets, mazes and the like.

The Disney store also has a few traveling games that might be what you are looking for.

If all of that fails, we are bringing our portable DVD players and PS2 for them to entertain themselves with for the rest of the trip. *Note*- I won't fill them in on the fact that we've brought the DVD/PS2 until AFTER they've tried the rest!

 

[CA Disney Fans]

Besides the alphabet game, my DS enjoys games that involve naming certain athletes, i.e. name the players from certain teams, certain positions, starting pitching rotations, etc. He's liked a version of this game since he was 4 naming catchers and goalies (and their back ups).

 

[dsnymomof4]

I spent so much time planning and buying things to keep our 4 kids busy on our 18 hour drive last July. I made each one their own notebook that had journal pages, coloring pages, mazes, etc. I bought them coloring books and disney colored pencils, arts & crafts, and bought them new games for their gameboys. They did do a little bit of the coloring and arts & crafts, but mostly, they watched DVDs on the rental van's dvd player (we also brought one). DS12 spent most of his time playing his video games. So I would say definitely invest in a DVD player - it really kept them occupied. Have a great trip!

 

[Soccerpooh]

My DSs (11 & 7) love to play the "Cartoon game". Dad gives them clues about a cartoon character, and the first one to name it gets a point. He also does it with sports teams and Nascar drivers. They beg him to play it everytime we get in the car. Good Luck- I'm jealous you only have a 4 hour drive- ours is 20!

 

[ardig123]

I also have a long car ride coming up in Oct. with DD3 and DD7. I have been planning activities (way in advance). 1 thing I am doing is buying them each little gifts at the dollar store such as sticker books, stamp sets, invisible ink books, card games, a Mr. Potato Head (more than $1 but figure they can buy the parts for it in DTD) and then I will wrap them up and give them a surprise each hour. I figure spending $2 an hour on little gifts is well worth the quiet time it will buy me.
I have some more ideas for activities and games... I will post them a bit later once my daughter goes to sleep.

 

[Enchanted]

We have this really fun game called "Are We There Yet?" I'm not sure if they still sell it in stores or not, but you could probably make up your own version just as easily. The game is a set of cards, and everyone gets a certain number of cards (We usually count a "round" as ten cards. We have a 20 hour drive, so we play several "rounds" before we arrive in Florida.) On the cards are random things to look for outside the window. For instance:

A broken down car on the side of the road.
A van with a ladder on the back.
Someone (in another car) sleeping.
A billboard advertising a television station.
A herd of cows.
Another vehicle with the windows rolled down.

The first person to find everything on their cards wins. The only rule is that you can't use anything or anyone in your vehicle to count for any of your cards. The more random of stuff on the cards the better because it makes the game more interesting. I think there's even one card that asks you to find someone picking their nose! We always have a ton of fun playing it, and usually the entire vehicle as erupted in non-stop giggling. Enjoy!

 

[beckmrk04]

We have this really fun game called "Are We There Yet?"

That sounds like so much fun! I am going to look around for it. I don't know if my nieces are old enough to get into it, but at least it'll give dh and me something to do! Thanks!

 

[LauraAnn630]

Im sure everyone knows about the license plate game. We try to find a plate from as many states as we can.

Im interested in what other people are doing to entertain the kids!

We also choose a color and look for cars that color.

 

[kimberlym4]

Some good ideas!
We have almost 20 hours too so 4 seems like a jaunt across town!
To me the issue is more the ride HOME. They are excited on the way down but much more easily board on the return trip. So I pack a small bag of games/stuff to do for the ride home that they can't see until the return trip so they don't get board with it. Maybe a deck of cards (go fish), a new game for their game boys, a sticker book, the good ole Invisibile Ink books - what are they called? - where you use the marker to make the invisible words show up??? maybe a new book or magazine for my 10 year old.

I've also gotten travel activity books from Amazon that are full of different activities.

Even with all that - you can bet we'll still have DVDs! I don't know how my parents did it with us 30 years ago!!!

 

[jennifer293]

I spent so much time planning and buying things to keep our 4 kids busy on our 18 hour drive last July. I made each one their own notebook that had journal pages, coloring pages, mazes, etc. I bought them coloring books and disney colored pencils, arts & crafts, and bought them new games for their gameboys. They did do a little bit of the coloring and arts & crafts, but mostly, they watched DVDs on the rental van's dvd player (we also brought one). DS12 spent most of his time playing his video games. So I would say definitely invest in a DVD player - it really kept them occupied. Have a great trip!

I second the DVD player. We had a 12 hour drive and it was the BEST thing ever. No more "are we there yet" comments from the back seat. I invested in a lot of DVD's over the past year so there are a bunch they have not even seen yet, so that should keep them pretty busy this trip...

I wish they had "Jack's Big Music Show" on DVD because little DD LOVES it sooo much!!!