Ahh, Thanksgiving.  Its promise of turkey, stuffing, pumpkin pie, family togetherness, and lots and lots of driving.  Not all of us can be as lucky as the Wurtzes and have 81 cousins in town to share holidays with! We have about 12 hours to go to visit our family this weekend, and sometimes for the kids, that's about 11 hours too many.  What's a mom to do?  Sure, we have a TV in the car (insert a grumble about how when I was a kid, the grazing cows on the side of the road were entertainment enough!), but my kids can only watch so many movies before they (and I) get antsy.  What's a family on the road to do for long haul entertainment?  How about road games?

When it comes to travel games, there are two different categories: home-grown and store-bought. There are good options to be had in both categories. For store-bought games, Rubberneckers is a lot of fun and has provided us with hours of entertainment for cross country drives. Likewise, we love our travel bingo and it's spurred some nice educational conversations about what water towers, smokestacks, and so on are used for.

If you happen to have a copy of one of the Cranium games, especially Cranium Family Edition, just take the cards with you to save space and use them to challenge each other in the car. Spelling stuff backwards while taking turns? Not as easy as it sounds.

One last store-bought item that's a lot of fun is audiobooks. Find some of those old classics from your childhood - Where the Red Fern Grows, or The Great Brain, or Bunnicula (those were a huge hit for my girls last summer), or even classics like Alice's Adventures in Wonderland or Peter Pan. Catch up on the Goosebumps or Harry Potter books. There's a wealth of wonderful children's literature out there, and almost all of it is available on audiobook, either on CD or as an MP3 download from the iTunes store.

Coming up tomorrow: home-grown travel games!  See you then.

Posted by Dee | tagged: travel, Thanksgiving, games