The Hubs and I recently took a long road trip (11 hours each way) with our baby. I'd like to share some helpful tips of what worked for us-
We brought the grandparents along for the ride. This won't always be the case but it helped Lo to have new faces every couple of hours. This would work with just 2 people instead of 4...just rotate every stop.
Speaking of stopping- plan on doing that a lot. When you add up all of the reasons for stopping, there are many! We tried to work around baby's schedule. Since our 4 month old eats about every 2 and a half hours we found that we could hold off on other pit stops until she needed to eat again. We made a long stop about half way through the drive. We would find a place to sit down and have lunch. We brought Lo's stroller that reclines all the way so she was able to stretch out and play while we ate. A typical stop went like this-someone takes baby out, lets her stretch, feed, burp, diaper change and then walk around for a few minutes/play time. Usually one of us would stay at the car with baby while the others gassed up the car, went to the bathroom, got snacks, etc. Then we would switch.
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| Punky and Papi shopping at Cracker Barrel. |
In between all of those stops were play time and nap time. Our 4 month old likes white noise and darkness so we brought her travel white noise machine and a blanket to put over her seat to make it a little darker. We were also sure to bring her favorite blanket and pacifiers to make it more comfortable for her.
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| Lo's cave of darkness. |
Another life saver was her "command center". I brought a little square caddy that had dividers in it that we put on the floorboard in front of her seat. In one section there were bottles already filled, formula and one with bibs and burp clothes. In another section we had toys and in the other there were lots of pacifiers. It was very convenient!
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| Taking a stroll at a pit stop with her Daddy. |
And even though she didn't seem interested in toys before we left home we quickly found that she in fact, did like to play with them after hours of sitting in the car. We brought a slew of new toys and a couple familiar ones and switched them out.
When she got really grumpy and we did have internet connection we would occasionally play a little clip of Curious George or Sesame Street from the PBS Kids app and she loved that.
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| Punky and Sophie the Giraffe |
Make sure to dress your little one comfortably. We just stuck to a plain white onesie. We were also sure to bring LOTS of bibs since we have a teether on our hands. I switched them out every stop that we made so she stayed nice and dry.
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| Our comfy little traveler at a gas station taking in the sights. |
Other things to pack for your stay with a baby-
*Travel crib
*Diapers and wipes
*Hand sanitizer
*Extra blankets, bibs and pacifiers
*Extra outfits (they're bound to dirty up a few)
*Clothes that can be layered. We went from almost 100 degrees at home to about 70 degree weather.
*Gas drops, infant pain reliever (just in case!)
*Lots of deodorizing bags for all of those diapers- there are no diaper genie's on vacation.
*Travel sized baby wash, powder, diaper rash cream.
*Several different modes of transporting your baby- slings, front packs, wraps, stroller. I brought a few different carriers and stowed them in the underneath compartment of the stroller.
I definitely over packed but I would rather be prepared than be scrambling to a nearby store to try to get what I need.
