Tuesday, April 22, 2014

ROAD TRIP!!!

Spring break for us was a road trip down to NC to visit my brother and then on to SC for a dear friend's wedding. Z-man is a great traveler. We travel to NY to visit his family almost every month on the train. At this point, we are train riding professionals. But car rides, not so much.
Over 1000 miles total. This is no small feat for a turning-two-next-week-year-old. Or for a motion-sick-mama. Or for Z's dad who had to put up with both of us and drive.
I tweaked a tradition the bride shared from her childhood. Her family has four kids and trekked often from NJ to SC. That's a road trip. Her parents packed each one a shoebox with games and goodies that they got halfway through the ride. Well the Mother-of-the-Bride is among those mamas I admire most, so I knew it was worth a try. 
A dollar store trip, left over valentine tissue paper, and a new favorite word "present" and the trip was relatively painless (minus traffic). Every time Z-man would get frustrated, bored, or a little grumpy, I passed a present his way. I tried to limit the presents to one an hour. It was so successful on the way down that we made a dollar store run before the trip back.

Among the best and most entertaining gifts were a slinky, pipe cleaners and pony beads (and I now have a fabulous new blue bracelet), books, a glow stick (reserved for when it started to get dark), a small car, and window clings. I have some left overs from the way back that I'm saving to use on our next trip!


*I'm so proud of this thrifty idea that I have to share it. When some of the presents failed me, I resorted to Dinosaur train, hung up by a sweat headband. Who needs a fancy mount for the ipad? Not this mama!

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