Toddler Road Trip

What is crazier than having three children under the age of four in the house…taking those three toddlers on a cross-country road trip. Yes, we are insane. We were warned, we were encouraged to take other vacations, we were told to wait a few years. Did we listen? Well of course not. We were determined to take our little tribe from Oklahoma to California. Mickey Mouse was on the list and we had our autograph books ready!

We were warned about the altitude change messing with the baby’s ears. We were prepared with snacks and drinks. We even had a video player installed in our vehicle so that in between the echoing “are we there yets” we could have a few words of adult conversation. Your spelling bee proficiency increases greatly when you have small children. Better start practicing your spelling now…there is no spell check along the highway.

We were however unprepared for bathroom tag games. You know the ones where a child has to potty but no one else in the car has to until you are ten minutes down the road without a rest stop in sight. Oh yes, my children could have been charged with indecent watering of roadside rocks many times. We knew they would ask a billion times over the three-day trip if we were there yet. We were not prepared for the random yells of the baby who decided to practice his yodeling after everyone else was asleep in the car. 

For all those yet unskilled traveling parents out there here is a list that may be of some use:

1.    Do not hang around to take pictures of your children playing on rocks for an hour. Get in the car and drive as fast you can towards the destination. Run the kids when you have to stop for gas and potty breaks.

2.   Avoid telling your children you will stop for any scenic breaks. Let it be a surprise because they will never forget the dinosaurs you promised to show them not being there when you stop. The giant plastic teepee and peeling painted Indians will not be a sufficient diversion.

3.   Carry snacks that you do not mind picking out of your seats, clothes, hair, luggage, or baby’s diaper on a frequent occasion. Never and I repeat never give toddlers cheesy things in the car…it will look as if a powder keg of manufactured orange imitation cheese has exploded in your car and all over every child. Orange is not a pleasant color unless you happen to enjoy resembling an Umpa Lumpa.

4.   If you must stop for a roadside potty break, it is imperative that you teach little boys the art of aiming. That and not to shoot into the breeze…

5.   If you are going to a person’s house that does not have small children visitors very often warn them ahead of time to put anything valuable at chest level or preferably higher. If there are multiple little children keep in mind that they will stack themselves up like Legos in order to reach the most valuable breakable possible.

6.   Carry extra diapers, clothes, and Benadryl. Do I condone giving children medicine when it is not needed? No. However, I absolutely agree with the pediatrician and pharmacist who highly recommended “preventative measures” that included the use of Benadryl or motion sickness meds…all drowsy versions of course.

7.   Take lots of pictures. They will be valuable later once you recover and have re-dyed your hair to cover the grays or bought that wig to replace the hair you pulled out while on “vacation”.

The most important lesson I learned from our first major family vacation was to enjoy every minute. Climb the rocks with your kids, splash in the waves at the beach, go ahead and force the little tykes to get a picture with an oversized cartoon character despite their cowering body language. The kids loved the adventure and I must be insane since we are going to repeat the voyage again in a few months.