Travelling in a car with kids can be hard going so it pays to be prepared for every eventuality. Kate Middleton will be bringing home her next previous bundle shortly so webuyanycar.com challenged bloggers to come up with a list of tips to make car journeys with children easier and safer.

Pack Travel Essentials

We always make sure we have a tub and baby wipes for travel sickness and a spare change of clothes were always found in the boot. More so when they were younger and would miss the tub completely, giving us no warning before they went projectile! We dabbled with Sea Band acupressure bands and although they did seem to help with motion sickness they did not eradicate it completely.

Whilst the travel sickness tablets seemed to agitate them more. If they did not like the taste they would get themselves worked up and throw up again anyway!!! In the end we found that travelling on a light stomach was one of the best ways to avoid stopping regularly to empty a sick tub! It also helped to ditch dairy products like their morning yoghurt and cereal and swap it for a plain slice of toast.

It pays to have a good sized boot too. Then you are not all squished in with luggage and those travel essentials.

Plan Regular Stops

If your children are older than babies they will appreciate a stop to stretch their legs. Get a toilet break and have a change of scenery before being cooped up in the car for the next stage of the journey.

This is also good for the parent’s sanity as it gives us a welcome break from the “are we there yet?” question. Plus for us in particular the constant arguments in the back. Especially as our eldest does not like youngest singing! Or he is fidgeting too much and on it goes. A long list of complaints…

Alleviate Boredom

Part of this is the regular stops I mentioned previously. But also it helps to have a few simple games you can play to keep your children occupied.  Our favourites are eye spy (when they were younger we played this with colours now we can use letters and it challenges them more), guess the colour of the next car and animal, vegetable, mineral. Although we are hopeless at minerals so tend to leave out guessing them.

Consider Safety

Always use an appropriate car seat for the size of your child. It’s an essential item for your child’s safety so it pays to do your research. I would say avoid second hand car seats unless you know their history. It might seem like a big saving but its not worth the risk. Once you have chosen a car seat you are happy with, make sure you have it installed correctly. Another element of safety to think about is the car you drive. You can check the safest ones through the Euro NCAP site. We went for a car based on the high scoring on there and feel much happier when we are out on the roads because of it.

Fingers crossed your next journey might be a little less stressful!