It’s that time again, Holiday travel with kids. The time to make it to all those Thanksgiving dinners, Holiday parties, Christmas gift exchanges, family gatherings, and whatever else the calendar holds. When kids entered the picture, Holiday travel became quite the adventure. If I am going to be completely honest, it became such an adventure that I almost decided to throw in the towel and stay home for every Holiday forever. Traveling with kids meant adding hours to every drive, never sleeping through the night, no one eating anything put in front of them, and very tired and crabby kids. Have I convinced you to stay home yet? But really, traveling with kids is not for the faint of heart. While all these things are very true, you can survive Holiday travel with kids. You don’t have to give up on every family event forever. You might want to, but because it’s likely frowned upon here are some practical tips.

Tips for Holiday travel with kids:

Prepare for stops. If you go into your trip, especially if you’re driving, keeping in mind that you will have to stop a few times, then you won’t get frustrated along the way. You can either plan to stop in certain areas, or go with the flow on when your kids need to stop for a bathroom break. We personally like to go off their cues. We do our best to drive until one of our kids need to stop, and then time food around that as well. If one of the kids need to stop at 11:30, then we get an early lunch, if they make it past noon and we don’t need to stop until closer than 1, then we go with it! We find it goes much smoother if we just go with the kids cues.

If you’re flying, and your flight is more than two hours, don’t shy away from layovers. Layovers may be just what you need to give your little ones time to stretch their feet, run around, get a bite to eat, and whatever else you need to help the next few hours go smoothly. We all enjoy being able to stretch our feet.

Pack a lot of snacks. When I say a lot of snacks…I mean a lot of snacks. This is the one time I fully support you feeding your children a ridiculous amount of food to keep them happy. Make sure to pack plenty of choices, and at least one of each choice for as many kids as you have. If you plan that they won’t want the same thing, they’ll want the same thing every time. If you plan that they will want the same thing, they likely won’t. Just be prepared and you’ll feel like a million bucks.

Not to mention, my kids don’t always eat well when traveling. Sometimes I need their favorites on hand to make sure they do eat at least something. It will make you feel better, and help them be less crabby. No one likes a hangry kid.

Provide entertainment. We are not opposed to entertaining the kids when we have a long drive ahead. Games, movies, tablets, they are all fair game when it comes to traveling with kids. Look up a few game ideas for road trips and bring a few favorite movies along. With younger children, grab a basket of toys and change the toys offered out throughout the drive to keep it new and interesting.

Let loose a little. Give yourself grace for all those rules, and remember it’s okay to bend them just a little. You don’t want to go too crazy where you basically have to re-parent at the end of the Holiday season, but you need to loosen the reigns enough not to make yourself go crazy when traveling. My kids don’t sleep well when we travel, so traveling means we get one big slumber party! That doesn’t happen all the time, but that’s what makes it special! We also tend to be a little more lenient on what they eat when traveling. Our kids don’t eat as well when they aren’t home so usually we are just happy if they are eating something!

Pack the necessities…you know your entire house. But really. I give you full permission to over pack with kids because if it’s going to make your life easier, you do it. We bring sound machines, favorite blankets, pillows, and lovies. We even pack some of the kid’s favorite snacks and quick food to make sure we can get them to eat SOMETHING while we are travelling.

Traveling with kids can be challenging. Kids aren’t always used to being away from the place they call home, so you do what you need to do to make it fun for everyone. It won’t always be this way, but when they’re young it’s okay for it to be challenging. If you prepare in advance, holiday travel with kids won’t be too stressful. Just remember to give yourself a lot of grace, and them! It’s a vacation after all, we could all use a break!

What are your tips for Holiday travel with kids?