10 hour car trip with two toddlers = Success!

My family went out of town this past week for a combination of a family reunion, beach trip vacation. I feel like I have a million post to write about since then and I am not sure where to start so I am going to start with what is freshest in my mind… the car trip!

We drove from our home to Jacksonville, Florida. MapQuest timed the trip at 9 hours and 40 minutes.

Now remember we were traveling with two babies/toddlers (they are 13 months so they are still babies to me!), so we were unsure what the best approach to the road trip should be.

We have traveled several times with the babies since they were born, evening doing a 5 hour trip when they were just 10 weeks old. 5 hours is the longest trip we have made with them.

So of course a 10 hour car trip is a totally different ball game.

I think the best tip I can give is not to think or care how long it takes to get there!  Know that it will take as long as it takes to get there safely and happily!  Be prepared to stop whenever you need to, but try to make the most at each stop…. food, gas, potty, diaper change all in one.

So on the way down, we decided to leave at bed time! This worked way better than we could have hoped for! We left at 6:45pm (twins normal bed time 7-7:30), and planned to drive until we got tired. We planned to stay at a hotel off 95, I preplanned and had several picked out in South Carolina and Georgia since we wanted to get at least that far. The car ride was so smooth we arrived in Jacksonville at 4:30am. We did stopped twice, the first was a 45 minute stop, for bathroom breaks, food, and gas, the second when we were almost there and it was just long enough to fill up the car with gas and for both Mike and I to take turns and run in to use the bathroom.

So leaving at bed time was great because the twins slept the whole way and needed nothing from us. They did wake up both times we stopped and seemed pretty confused but both went back to sleep no problem.

As long as you feel safe driving at night I think traveling at night with babies/toddler is a win!

Okay, but traveling, driving at night is HARD, YES! So we did not come back at night. We got up yesterday morning and I did our normal routine with the twins, while Mike packed the car, and then we left a nap time. This worked prefect. The twins woke from their nap about 1 ½ hours in to the road trip. I was able to keep them happy for another 1 ½ half by passing back snack cups and ready to drink milk sippy cups to them.

Then about to 3 hours into the trip they started to get really fussy. So we knew it was time to stop. We stopped at Cracker Barrel to eat, let the twins get out of the car walk around the store, etc, and to do diaper changes! We were there for about 1 hour. We got back in the car and drove. The twins were happy for about 1 hour and then it was regular nap time and they feel asleep for about 2 hours! So about 3 hours later they were awake and I kept them happy again by passing back a snack cup and some milk. About 30 minutes after that we decided to stop for dinner. We stopped at Moe’s for again about 1 hour to eat and potty and get gas. When we got back in the car it was about 6:30 so shortly after that it was regular bed time and the twins went to sleep for the night.

We got home at 9:45pm. It took us 10 hours and 45 minutes, with two stops, and two toddlers. I think that is pretty dang good!

Our babies were super troopers.

Here are my must haves for a car trip…

1. Music duh … this helped keep the twins entertained, went it was sleep time we put on classic music and it worked like a charm.

2. Snack cups and lots of them, they dropped them a number of times and while going down the road I wasn’t always able to get them so I had extra!

I prefer this nuby snack cup as the lid stays on well. 

3. Ready to drink milk, no need to worry about a cooler.

4. Sippy cups lots of them, same reason as above 

Here is a  family beach picture :)

and a few others !










This thing is a must have on the beach for babies/toddlers! Everyone keeps asking me where we got it from... well we got it last year at a beach store in the OBX, we went in September while I was still on maternity leave so it was post regular beach season, the beach store had everything in the store for 50% off so we scored it for just $12.50. They do have some that look similar on Amazon, search beach canopy or click this link. 












Look at that hair... what a mess!







Happy as can be!