Road trippin' with a Toddler...

It's holiday season! Whether you're going for a 3+ hour trip to North Carolina or a 10+ hour trip to Ohio traveling with a toddler can seem a bit impossible. Toddlers tend to be busy and being in the car for more than a hour is usually Tristan's limit before he starts to get restless. So we were a little nervous about Tristan's first road trip to Charlotte, NC which was about a 3+ hour drive away. Surprisingly Tristan actually did well for the combined 6 hour trip. I mean like we had to stop once on the way there and on the way back to change him (this was our transitioning potty training stage) and we had successfully conquered our first road trip! But before taking this journey I did some research and found these 20 tips to be helpful. But after actually going on this trip I came up with a few of my own!

1. Leave early in the morning, like around 4 am or 5 am so that your toddler is still sleepy enough to go back to sleep once they get back in the car.

2. If you are in between potty training and diapers, I would advise you to just put diapers on for the trip. Mainly, because it holds more and you will make less stops. If you choose not to do this, you can check out nice travel potty seats here.

3. Have 2-3 of your toddlers FAVORITE snacks. Tristan loves Cheez-its, apple sauce and bananas (we did dried banana crisps for less of a mess). I would advise you to keep the snacks in an area that is easily accessible.

4. Travel with a partner, this helps if your toddler gets fussy and your partner may need to take over driving so you can sit in the back seat with the little one.

5. Create a playlist of songs that your child likes. I used Pandora to add stations to my list since thankfully Tristan isn't too picky when it comes to music. But I think the "Trolls" station had to be his favorite. But if you would like to customize your child' playlist spotify is introducing a all new app, called spotify kids.

6. Always OVER PACK diapers/pull ups and wipes. You can never pack to many wipes and diapers/pull ups.

7. Identify games that your little one might like, Tristan loves I spy and sing alongs. I found these tips to be helpful when identifying what games he would like.

8. Get a car headrest mount for your child's tablet or ipad. This will be a life saver! Because Tristan loves to touch his tablet and always ends up turning off the show he's watching or game he's playing, so this was definitely a big help!

9. Make sure you always pack a refresher bag with a clean pair of clothes, trash bags, extra pull ups/diapers and wipes. Essentially, you want this bag to be an overnight bag because accidents happen with little ones and you always want to be prepared

10. First aid kit, this was important for us because we know our toddler can be busy and often times get into things he has no business getting into. In this case, Tristan was outside playing in the driveway and tripped and scrapped both of his knees and arms. I was glad we were prepared and got him cleaned up quickly and put a few band-aids on him and he was back to playing like nothing happened.

Stay tuned for my traveling tips as the holidays are upon us! Safe travels to those traveling this holiday season and stay tuned to my Instagram for holiday travel adventures!