How far have you driven with small children?

[shellynn24]

I am planning to go to Florida in October, I will be going with my DS 4 and DD1 1/2. I will have my friend with me and her 6 mo old. She wants to drive but I am a little skeptical. We would have a drive of about 25 hours. What are some suggestions, stories, or ideas? Please help me figure this out!

 

[mommytotwo]

The furthest we drove with my 2 1/2 year old was around a 8 hour drive with a few stops along the way.
A 25 hour drive is very long especially for children that long. Is the reason she wants to drive to save money? If not, I would fly to your destination.
If you do plan on driving, have a variety of different things avaliable for your children to do. A portable DVD player is great, finger puppets, etchy sketch, ...
Don't forget to bring snacks and drinks-little baggies of snack is a good idea since your children will be able to eat what they want and just close up the bags. Cooler with ice to keep the drinks cold.
And make plans to take several rest stops, bathroom stops, and during those stops, maybe you could play a game or two with your kids.

 

[Slip me a Mickey!]

A fellow Texan! I will be driving also. Our longest roadtrip yet. We are leaving in the evening and driving through the night to Panama City Beach for a couple of days although I am not sure how to fill that time in light of recent events. Then we will make the second half. We drive alot during the night because the kids will watch movies and then sleep through most of it. Alot depends on the children and what they will tolerate. You may want to stop at rest stops and give them a chance to stretch their little legs, if you know what I mean.

 

[Minnie824]

We haven't taken our DDs on many vacations yet, but we'll be driving this fall when they're 4 and 1.5 also! About a 18 hour drive plus stops. We're planning on leaving at 3am to try to get a good start. We're stopping overnight along the way. We have a dvd player in the car. We just hope it'll go well! I'm thinking the way there will be easier than the way back, since they know we'll be at Disney the next day. Usually, in shorter hour trips, they do well...especially when a dvd is playing, so we'll see. Good luck! Plenty of snacks and stops.

 

[Slip me a Mickey!]

oops, getting the hang of this accidently posted twice.

 

[budly]

I would not drive that far with an infant. We took an eight hour drive with a nine month old and there were a couple of hours of screaming despite several stops. The same kid went for 12 hours at 20 months and did wonderfully, but we had a DVD player in the car. I think your kids may be able to handle it with frequent breaks and entertainment, but I would be surprised an infant would sit in a car like that and remain quiet.

Budly

 

[shellynn24]

I would not drive that far with an infant. We took an eight hour drive with a nine month old and there were a couple of hours of screaming despite several stops. The same kid went for 12 hours at 20 months and did wonderfully, but we had a DVD player in the car. I think your kids may be able to handle it with frequent breaks and entertainment, but I would be surprised an infant would sit in a car like that and remain quiet.

Budly

That's the same thing I was telling her. She is a new Mom and I don't think she understands what it takes to drive that far with an infant. I have taken both of my children on long trips and really kinda hated every minute of it! She is wanting to do this to save money though. I see her point in that respect. Plus we don't need to rent a car in Florida. Well, keep the ideas coming!

 

[ahutton]

We've had great success with road trips with our kids. My younger two have gone as young as 3 weeks, 10 weeks, and up through the ages... We leave in the afternoon and make the first day the "long" day, driving late into the night. One of us plays the kids to being tired before we leave while the other loads up. Our first run is usually 4-5 hours. Then we stop for a meal (Junction would be nice - Coopers has a great kid friendly playground) and let them play while we eat. Then we load back up and feed them in the car. We'll stop again in another about 4 hours for gas and to change into jammies for the next run. We drive as late as we safely can, and then sleep at a hotel. I'm a morning person so I drive the first shift and we try to put 5-6 hours on before our first official stop. We continue to let them play when we stop (run, playground, whatever we can find) and eat in the car until we are there. We did a couple trips before a DVD player and it really does make it easier. We also have a plug in cooler for the van.

 

[babytrees]

I think it's okay to travel with one that young....both our daughters started at 6 weeks old driving 10-12 hours....my nephew has been doing similarly since 6 moths...it all depends on your expectations. They will have grumpy moments, it will help to have someone back there to entertain him. You need to drive on their schedule.... it isn't heaven but it isn't to hard and the sooner they get acclimated to driving the better they are able to handle those long drives. Even without a tv or dvd player. My girls are now 13 and 9 and are the best travellers....when we go to WDW next year we will get a dvd player not because they can't handle the trip but because they can

 

[estherhead]

I think it is more about the parent's personality. Having kids on a car trip is noisy, in my experience, whether it is talking, laughing, or crying, little voices turn into HUGE voices in a small space for hours and hours. So if you are th kind of parent that can relax all the rules and go with the flow, and if you have a DVD player,or some such entertainment device, and if you do some of the driving at night, this is completely doable.

I've found that it is normally ME who is complaining by hour 14. I'm tired of turning around to pick up dropped toys and hand out drinks. My butt hurts. And I'm irritated by listening to the Mulan voices without seeing the picture. Ny voice hurts from reading storybooks. It just forces you to be mommy & daddy for 25 hours straight. The kids are THRILLED to have you completely at their disposal for that long.

At least that is our story. Perhaps others have different situations.

 

[ntburns22]

When my DD was 6 weeks old we drove about 8 hours. We made alot of stops, but I think it was more for us. She did great! I think it all depends on the child.

 

[java]

The big thing is it is unpredictable. It can go smoothly or complete disasterous. We drove NJ to Miami(about 19 hours)with 3 kids one of them a 5 month old. We took 2 days to get there and actually didn't do so bad. But we HAD to go. It was my brother's wedding. I don't know if I would have chosen to go....but...we are driving to Disney with our new 4 month old this Friday. So I guess Miami was not so bad.

 

[letsgoagainsoon]

We drove to WDW from PA last fall when DS was 9 months. He did fine with stops about every 4-5 hours. We also had my nephew with us who was four. It's about a 20 hour ride. We stayed over a night too on the way, which helped. I would invest in a DVD player, games and books!!

We will be on our way in one week and one day!!! Driving again!

 

[Lisa loves Pooh]

We have driven from Melbourne to DC. We headstarted to St. Augusine where my mom lives which is 2.5 hours. The trip to DC took about 15 hours from there with a 3yo and 1yo. Did that RT twice---and had a DVD player for 1 of 4 legs and it didn't make one bit of difference. And I did this solo with the girls. We stopped on the return trip at a hotel both times with interior check-in and corridors.

We managed. The key was to use rest stops for more than just potty time (run around and play for a bit)....books on tape, leap pads, et cetera. The baby just slept mostly.

We contemplated driving to Las Cruces--but the schedule will not support it and we found good airfare in December. I would have only done it as a minimum 3 day trip with 2 hotels stops each way. long duration is a push.

 

[the kabuki]

Please don't take this the wrong way, but IMHO just thinking of taking a 25 hour drive with 3 kids those ages just gives me the willies!!!
I can't even begin to imagine doing it, but that's just me.

 

[Coodie5]

We'll be doing the drive from Chicago to WDW with a 1yo and almost 4yo. We take lots of road trips. As long as we bring plenty of dvd's and snacks we're fine. I've also found that the Crayola Color wonder markers are great to bring with. They keep all of us occupied and they don't make a mess if one is accidently dropped. We drove to Las Vegas when ds was 8 months. The only bad part was having to stop for diaper changes. DH likes to keep driving until it's absoultly necessary to stop.

 

[lillygator]

we drove from here (Sarasota) to Key West when DD was 9 months old....she was great - I was anxious to get out of the car!!

personally I hate riding or driving even regardless of who I had with me...but some people prefer it...

 

[devotedchristian]

Don't try to drive 25 hours with kids that young. If I were you, I'd break those hours up into at least 2 days with overnight stays in a couple of hotels.

You should map out your route, go to Expedia.com and find some decent hotels along the way...there AND back.

 

[YesI'mObsessed]

I can't imagine a car ride that long with mine. I don't care how many books, dvd's, or stops you make. We thought about driving, only about 14 hours for us. But after our trip I know I was crazy thinking we could have handled the drive. It's one thing to get there, but just imagine getting home! We were so zonked after our only 5 day trip to the World, I could never have survived a ride back! Never.

Just mho.

 

[MOMOFMNM]

We'll be doing the drive from Chicago to WDW with a 1yo and almost 4yo. We take lots of road trips. As long as we bring plenty of dvd's and snacks we're fine. I've also found that the Crayola Color wonder markers are great to bring with. They keep all of us occupied and they don't make a mess if one is accidently dropped. We drove to Las Vegas when ds was 8 months. The only bad part was having to stop for diaper changes. DH likes to keep driving until it's absoultly necessary to stop.

GOOD LUCK!! have a great drive...we use to drive from Iowa and stop in TN to see family and drive some more...that was awesome as a kid, we had a suburban and my bro and I would camp in the back...there were no DVD's or VCR's in cars back then, heck we didn't even have Gameboy yet!!! My kids are so spoiled with dvd, video now, gameboy, cd walkmens and none are over 9 yo!!! The car ride is quiet though Good luck with the drive from Chicago, we would attempt it but during the fall there is not enough time to drive from Iowa...next summer we might attempt it and save 1000 bucks!