Travelling with kids... Nightmare or nothing to it?

We are going overseas (**cue excited dance**).  This involves an 8 hour flight and airport time (**cue nervous laughter**).  We have travelled before as a family with a memorable almost-two-year old leaving her screams as a souvenir for those on our flights.  This scarred us and we have waited for Mr 3 (almost 4) to "grow up"  a little before attempting an international flight. 

This time I have prepared some in-flight entertainment that the kids can also do at the airport and at the hotel when there is "down" time during our holiday.  We will also be bringing an ipad and using the airline's inflight entertainment. 

I'm going to show you Mr 3's "Trunki of tricks" in this post and will reveal Miss 7's "backpack of fun" soon.

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Travelling with a preschooler.

What's in Mr 3's "Trunki of Tricks"?
1. Trunki - the suitcase itself is a great fun.  Mr 3 can sit on top of it and push along with his feet. We can pull him along whilst he sits and lifts up his feet.  It fits neatly underneath the seat in front on the aeroplane so the contents can be accessed easily. Importantly, if you are in a hurry the Trunki has a long shoulder strap that adults can use to carry it.
2. Puzzles - individually packed in zip-locked bags.
3. Funny Faces colouring book by Crayola - includes stickers and colouring pages.
4. Kaleidoscope scratch art - includes wooden pencil, stencil and 2 pieces of scratch art paper.
5. Notebook, pencils and stickers
6. Books to read - chosen based on Mr 3's interests.
7. I -Spy books - very thin small books that have lots of detail to find.
8. Mr 3's folder of fun! - I found this neat zip up folder at Office Works.  It has a small pocket which I have put the tiny car erasers and cars seen below. The folder also includes dry-erase markers, a glue stick and the following activity sheets.

My homemade activity sheets were made from scrapbooking paper, stickers and some printables. I laminated all of these activity sheets.  They include:
1. Dinosaur scene with small dinosaur stickers.  Mr 3 loves to tell stories with dinosaurs and I'm hoping this will occupy him for quite a while.
2. Thomas printables and train track.  Both of these were found on the internet.
3. Car mazes with small cars. Three of the small cars are erasers found at a discount shop.  These can be driven along the mazes or Mr 3 can use the dry-erase markers to draw on them.
4. Counting page.  Mr 3 loves to count.  
5. Rainbow I-Spy. I created this page for "spying" at the airport and on the aeroplane.  Especially for the time that you sit on the runway and taxi to the runway....well this can take a long time! {Flashback to being delayed for an hour on the runway with almost-Miss-2-year-old}. You can find this printable at the Your Kids OT shop as a free printable.
6. Shapes matching page. Mr 3 can draw using the dry-erase markers to match the shapes or around the shapes. 
7. Empty faces. Mr 3 (or I) can draw some funny faces.

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Yes, I know that there is quite a lot of stuff and hopefully it won't all be used! There is still the plane ride home.  

I will be trying to post to the blog whilst we are away but apologies if it doesn't work!

These activity ideas are not restricted to travel times!  The activity worksheets could be used in a therapy context.  Do you think your preschoolers would like any of these activities? What is your "must pack" travel activity?

Enjoying Your Kids OT? Let me know in the comments below or on FB. I love hearing from you!

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