We drove to visit family over Christmas, where we were met with warm southern weather, delicious food, lots of grandparent-love for the kids, and a fun game of SUV-Tetris as we endeavored to pack all the outworkings of that grandparent-love into the car for our trip home. Nathan's parents were not the only ones who said, "Now that you've bought a big house, we can buy you big presents!" but they were definitely the ones who took the idea and ran the farthest with it. Until we move into the new place, we'll just be nice and cozy over here with our six-foot teddy bear and life-size tractor-trailer set.

After we drove 12 hours to Boston last month, a friend asked how we manage such long car trips with all the kids. My answer was something like, "Oh, we all just get really tired of each other, get over it, and then repeat that sequence a hundred times..." As helpful as I'm sure that was, I've thought of a few other ways we've managed to make road trips with the kids tolerable over the years.
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EATING ON THE ROAD

Our favorite way to do meals on a trip is to use the Yelp app to find a local restaurant near our route. On our way home, we knew we'd be hitting Chattanooga right around noon, so we went about ten minutes out of our way to go downtown for lunch. We usually look for a place with high ratings and reviews that highlight great food and fast service. Urban Stack did not disappoint -- I will have dreams about the gouda creamed corn.


After lunch, we walked a couple of blocks to a coffee shop our server had recommended (Mean Mug). We really enjoyed being stared at by all the single hipsters as we traipsed in with our five children and ordered two coffees and one cookie cut into fourths.

THE RESTROOM SITUATION

Children prefer to wait until you have JUST passed an exit or rest stop to exclaim "I HAVE TO GO POTTY SO BAD!" Keeping the toddler potty (I'm sorry, I hate the word "potty," but it's a necessary evil at this point in my life) in the car on a long trip is much preferable to the "have the toddler stand on the running board and hang their butt out over the knee-high grass next to the highway" method. (PRO TIP: Keep a lot of wipes in your car, for this and other emergencies.)

BACKSEAT ALTERCATIONS

Everyone deals with it (and if you don't, I don't want to hear it). The kids are fighting in the backseat. For major offenses, we pull over, as parents have done since the invention of cars (or at least seatbelts). For minor offenses, we make them do this:

DRIVER'S PRIVILEGES

Our rule is: The driver gets to put in headphones and listen to music, podcasts, or an audiobook, while the passenger takes care of the kids. This generally works pretty well for us, as I really love to drive, and Nathan really loves to pretend he's fallen asleep and can't hear the children when they ask for things.
//Safety note: While it's tempting (so, so tempting in this family), we never wear noise-canceling headphones while driving. You never know when someone will be honking to alert us to an item we've left on top of the car or on the back bumper (yet again).//

ENTERTAINING KIDS IN THE CAR

When I was growing up, we'd play "the billboard game" on car rides -- find a word on a billboard that begins with each subsequent letter of the alphabet. Unfortunately, these days I'm not that interested in directing my kids' attention to roadside advertisements (think 1-800-DIVORCE and GIRLS GIRLS GIRLS), and anyway, half of them can't read. We do have a DVD player, which can be a lifesaver, but I try to limit us to one movie per leg of a road trip.

Enter: audiobooks. We check them out of the library before we leave town or buy them using my Audible account. Some of our favorites are: The Wind in the Willows, the Ramona Quimby collection, The Chronicles of Narnia (Focus on the Family Radio Theatre version), and The Wild Robot. When I think about all the amazing books they could hear without me getting a dry/sore throat from so much reading aloud, I almost wish we took more car trips! (Almost.)


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I hope this is helpful, or inspires you to hit the road with your family, or reinforces in your mind that you will never take a long road trip with kids, if you can't handle being trapped in a vehicle on an interstate in bumper-to-bumper traffic with a person who has pooped their pants. It might happen. But it'll make a great story later.