Ready Made Busy Bags {From Flying Sprout}

Yay welcome to my first product review for 2017!

Busy bags can be a life saver when you're out and about or travelling - and I love to make my own (sometimes rather haphazardly thrown together). But if you'd like someone else to do that for you (who also has a teaching background I might add) then look no further than Bianca from Flying Sprout.

So Miss M got busy testing them out - and I got to thinking about how they could be easily adapted to suit children of various ages and abilities with a few simple alterations.

*Kindly gifted for the purpose of this review
*Not sponsored

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Road Trip with A Toddler {One Year Later}

One year ago (almost to the day) we went on a road trip to Mount Gambier (South Australia) to spend time with family. This year we went again because my very clever brick laying brother built himself a house and got himself engaged to a great girl - so we decided to go while it's (relatively) easy before baby number 2 arrives.

I wrote about our previous trip last year... It was interesting to read back over these posts and compare what was different this time - most notable being our level of relaxation and not stressing about every little thing, but then again Miss M is a whole year older and there's a huge difference between one and a half and two and a half. So anyway, here's the previous posts from last year...

Road Trip with a Toddler - The Before

Road Trip with a Toddler - The After

So some main differences between then and now is that Miss M no longer naps - so we couldn't rely on her having a sleep for a chunk of the drive, and no more dummies and bottles to worry about! She packed her own backpack of toys, teddies and books (not all practical for the car, but for her to play with once we got there). Surprisingly this book is still one of her favourites, and keeps her busy for ages, so it came along again! She actually 'reads' books now to herself which is a bonus!

Minimal mess snacks were again a must - sandwiches, biscuits, muesli bars, water etc... and of course foolproof games and episodes of Ben & Holly and Peppa Pig on the iPhone. We made a deal with her that if she was playing games it was ok to hold, but for watching episodes we put it in the headrest.

A major difference this time was the toilet factor! She's been toilet trained for a couple of months now - but it was something we always had to keep in mind... No accidents luckily! My pregnant bladder needed frequent stops as well ;) Speaking of which...another struggle this trip was my 33 week belly in the way! Turning around to the back of the car or retrieving items from the floor was not easy let me tell you!

Miss M was old enough this time to teach her I spy, so that was fun, she loved it when she guessed it right (we did the colour version rather than the starting letter eg. "I spy with my little eye something the colour green" and gave her specific hints whether it was inside or outside of the car.)

On both trips (there and back) we stopped at the Morning Loaf Bakery in Keith (about 3 hours from Adelaide and 2 hours from Mt Gambier) and is one of the states best known country bakeries. We liked the kids play room so much it was the perfect place to stop both times.

Morning Loaf Bakery - Keith

We had a fantastic time in the Mount including;

• The Blue Lake
• The Valley Lakes playground
• A spot of shopping on the main street
• Chilling out at my brother's new place
• A great meal at the South Eastern Hotel (which had an awesome kids playground - we couldn't get Miss M out!)
• and Miss M's highlight of the trip - the jumping pillow at the Blue Lake Tourist Park
• plus some great quiet time back at our accommodation.

The Blue Lake

Awesome playground at the Valley Lakes

There was this moment on the trip, when all three of us were sitting around the table having ice creams. And all of a sudden it hit me - we are like a real little family! Miss M is like a little person now, a person who you have conversations with, share special moments, and she's so much easier and more compliant, it doesn't feel like hard work all - the - time. She can do what we do and enjoy those special holiday treats. We were making her childhood memories and it was happening right in front of me!

Well I think that's it for family travel for us for quite some time...I can't even imagine doing a trip with a toddler and a baby! Have you attempted it before? How did you survive?

Lauren x

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Road Trip With a Toddler | The After

Ok so I thought I would write this post as we go... Did you read 'The Before'? No? Click here so you'll be right up to date!

8:00 am

Left Adelaide on schedule. Woo hoo!

8:45 am

We started singing 'baa baa black sheep' (requested by Miss M), a couple of snacks already, played with dolly (dancing, hiding and jumping) and doggy with the bumpy ears (which made her want to drive over bumps on the road). Trying to be positive, happy, not stressed, give her attention. 45 mins into the drive and we are watching episodes of Peppa Pig (but not giving in to every demand - "Yes you can watch peppa but no you cannot hold the phone.")

9:30 am

Note to self, make sure the magnadoodle pen is attached to the board. Impossible to find without stopping the car and getting out once dropped!!

But - favourite item so far are these 'view tainers' (raided them from Hubby's boys room - he tells me they were from Bunnings, followed by "I can feel a blog post coming on". Yes James I'm blogging about our road trip!) We spent ages posting Pom poms and pop sticks.

10:00 am 

First stop - sausage rolls for everyone. Patted some friendly dogs, successfully back in the car at 10:30. Driver swap.

11am

Sleep! Yay! Only half an hour but better than nothing. Grizzly for a bit but not as bad as I thought (made me imagine how it would feel waking up, not in my own bed, being tightly strapped in with no escape). Next stop at a playground at 12noon, followed by a bottle.

12:30 pm - 99 kms to go!

Rest of the trip went as well as could be expected. We had a 'toddler who cried poo' incident, thought she needed a change, got her out, no change needed, then refused to get back into her car seat! So I ended up sitting in the back with her for the last half an hour, reading books and putting coins in the money box. 

Arrived as predicted at 2:00 pm

Currently trying to get her to nap - not sure how we'll go...

Nope - didn't happen.

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The drive home...

Left at 10:00 am - off to a good start.

Played with dollies to start the long drive. Predicting it will be hard to maintain my positive, happy, not stressed and give her attention method on the drive home because I'm soooo tired. Looking forward to sleeping in my own bed, pitch black with A/C (I'm a fussy sleeper).

10:30 am

First stop already because I wanted to look at the 'trinketry' shops in a cute little town. James & Miss M go to the playground, and a lovely lady at a cafe heats up her bottle for her. Here's hoping a warm bottle in the car = a nice loooong sleep. Are you crossing your fingers for me?

11:30 am

Asleep! Better this time round because she had a warm bottle at the right time and took her dummy. Nice and cosy too in the car. I get to enjoy reading a magazine.

12:30 pm

One hour later - still asleep! We sacrifice our planned lunch stop (one of SA's best country bakeries mind you) and continue to the next town. Does your little one wake up as soon as the car stops or a door closes like Miss M?

1:00 pm

Awake & stop for lunch. Love all the little kid friendly rest stops we have discovered - most have play areas, pencils, chalk boards etc...

1:30 pm

My turn to drive. A few episodes of Peppa Pig kept her happy for a while, but she was quite grizzly on this next stretch. We made a quick stop for petrol around 2:30 and then I sat in the back to read books for a little while. Getting a bit over it now we think.

4:00 pm
Made it home safe and sound!

Phew! What a weekend. Was great to spend time with family.

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Do you have any road trip travel tips that you would like to add? If you're off on a holiday during the silly season, good luck! 

Lauren

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Road Trip with a Toddler | The Before

Now I must confess - we are only off on a 5-6 hour drive this weekend with our little miss...I'm sure many more families go on much longer drives and have great ideas of how to keep their little ones amused! I just thought I would share the things I'm packing to take with us in the car. Our plan is to keep her entertained as long as we can for the first stretch of driving, stop somewhere for food and a play/run around, and then hopefully she'll sleep on the next stretch. I predict the time between when she wakes up and when we arrive will be horrendous so fingers are crossed for a nice looooong sleep! I'll have to write a follow up post when we get home and let you all know how it went (and what I would do differently next time LOL).

So first things first - toys! As well as a few of my busy bags (see previous posts) - I packed a 'surprise' bag full of miscellaneous things. Some of her favourites, some new things - things I can easily pass to her from the front seat. I've also thought of packing things that I can play with her if I need to retreat to the back.

She loves the TV show 'Mister Maker' and I saw this sticker/activity book in Big W and was thinking of popping it in her stocking for Christmas - but no, decided it would be perfect for the road trip. The little mini 'magnadoodle' will also hopefully keep her happily drawing (mess free) for a while.

I also brought along one of her favourite books "Big Book of My World" - it's quite long and has so many detailed pages so when we read it in detail cover to cover it takes ages! I would never leave her unsupervised with the money box and coins - but it will keep her amused for quite a while if I sit with her in the back.

Hanging toys and books that you can clip to the headrests are great (and you probably already have these in your car). Plus the little 'linky clips' are a must have so that little hands can reach the toys.

My lovely facebook mother's group also had some helpful suggestions to offer - music to play, a good repertoire of songs to sing, stickers, plenty of books to read... and this clever little 'Aquadoodle' travel mat from Toys R Us.

Now - food! The plan is to keep it easy and relatively mess free. Jatz bikkies, Cruskits, 'Rafterty's Garden' fruit bars are winners at the moment (don't you just love how toddlers taste buds are constantly changing! One day they love sultanas the next day not at all?) We packed her bottle too in the esky and are hoping that we can get it heated up when we stop. Dummies are a must have as well to increase our chances of getting her to sleep at the usual time.

We have episodes of Peppa Pig, Mister Maker and The Wiggles on our iPhones to play for her if we get desperate. Honestly - if it means she is happy and quiet and we can drive safely that's what's most important. We just pop it in the headrest and she's good to go! Just like a built in DVD player. I love that with the latest iOS update the episodes play continually.

Also did you know about the setting called 'guided access'? If you've got specific apps for your little tikes, you just triple click the home button (once activated in settings) and it locks them in to whichever app they are in - so you don't need to worry about them making calls, deleting precious photos or getting into mischief ;) I recognise that 'screen time' and use handheld devices are one of those parenting choices that not everyone will agree on - so please be respectful of our parenting choice :)

Wish us luck!
Lauren + James + Miss M

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