advice for travelling with 6 kids and hubbie!

macymoo

Kids:DS's, books, POTTY !!! Wipes, Leappad, Calpol, story Cd's / Tapes, spare clothes

Adults: Redbull, Chocolate, standup comedy Cd (hopefully you get to listen to it if kids sleep)

Overthetop

re feed cheaply if you are not going to pack food look up tesco shops before you go(they used to have a map with stores nearest motorways) then you can eat in tescos cafe's. Even if taking packed food this is a good way to cut down on petrol costs.

lindens

I presume you have a people carrier of some kind. I would not sit in the front, sit one of the older ones in the front and you sit in the middle as it were so you can reach everyone easily.
The french stick idea is a good one, and the frozen drinks. also lots of stops so they can have a bit of a run around. What about audio books too?

suzywoozy_3

We do supermarket cafes or Weatherspoons pubs as these are much cheaper - also if we are going near them we have been known to stop at an Ikea just to use the fairly cheap cafe. We also sometimes stop at a supermarket for a box of ice creams - much cheaper than a service station and the kids think it's a great treat. We take a list of them with us so we know where we can stop.

We bought a DVD player when we started regularly travelling between Scotland and London - it was amazing, no more fights. We also do story tapes and quiz questions and word games (shopping basket, the Ministers Cat etc)

We found first thing in the morning was the best time to travel - about 5am - the kids were too dozy to fight until Carlisle where we stopped for breakfast at Asda I think, then we did DVDs etc for the rest of the journey. When we tried to do overnight ours just stayed awake getting more and more and more whingey, it was dreadful!

edjaned

SmellyOldSock wrote: »

Many thanks for all your replys. Loving the idea of 2 cars!:T don't think hubbie will go for it though!

Have got lots of snacks etc prepared and bottled water, they all travel well but you never know. Am looking at leaving early Saturday morning about 5ish, we can't get into the caravan till 4pm, but can use the site.

best wishes
Charlotte

i too travel at night my kids are 12,11,5,3 and 8 months so i know how stressful the car journey can be lol

not got any advice 4 the journey just wanted to say that when we go on our hols i take the slow cooker put the food on in the morning then when we get back its cooked so we can get out earlier,most of these holiday places have awful cookers that take hours and are not big enough 4 a big family

meanmarie

Would endorse the lots of different food, very few treats, frozen drinks and early morning travelling, frequent stops for leg stretching and other reasons...OH God Im glad those days are over!

Enjoy the holiday

Marie

OddjobKIA

we have 4kids

9---6---2---1


when ever possible we drive long distance a night...


I will get an hour or 2 sleep in the day then we leave at 9pm ish kids sleep dont need to stop or eat...and roads are emptyer also we get to chat....

Skint_Catt

http://www.offmotorway.com/

Possibly a useful website to find facilities at regular intervals.

Give each of the older kids one of the younger ones to look after.

debbym

Overthetop wrote: »

re feed cheaply if you are not going to pack food look up tesco shops before you go(they used to have a map with stores nearest motorways) then you can eat in tescos cafe's. Even if taking packed food this is a good way to cut down on petrol costs.

I agree with SOOZ about travelling at night

I personally would not eat at a Tescos cafe - Morrisons are about the same price but stuff is made fresh.

The other thing to remember is that if you give the kids something like a DVD to watch or book to read they can be very sick even if they are normally OK as we found on a trip to Scotland to our cost...DD was fine on the motorway with a DVD, but as soon as the road got a little twisty, lunch re-appeared spectacularly (luckly missing the laptop playing the DVD!)

Also getting up for leaving the house at 5am will have everyone really tired so think carefully about who sits with who on the sibling front. DD no longer sits next to DS1 as he pulls her hair when he is bored just for the reaction!:mad:

Don't plan to be anywhere at a set time - if you get trapped in traffic it will only add to the stress.

Taking frozen drinks will act like icepacks and keep everything else cool - you could also do the same with something like Frubes.

Apart from that good luck! I do it with 3 kids and DH that's more than enough for me:D