First - let me start off by saying that if you’re a Boyink.com visitor because I usually talk about web stuff - especially ExpressionEngine - then my apologies.  This post won’t (directly anyway) relate.

But between twitter and the new blog on Train-ee.com I’m actually a bit unsure what to use the Boyink.com blog for anymore.

So today it’s on taking long road trips with kids…

As many of you know we recently attended SXSW which is in Austin, Texas.  Last fall while we parents were secretly considering booking the trip my kids starting voicing the desire to somehow get to Texas for a different reason—to see their Grandparents (my folks) who winter in the Mission, TX area.  I’ll save you a trip to Google maps - Mission is just about as far south as you can go in Texas, and is just a few miles from the Border of Mexico.

At the same time as these two different trips were being discussed and considered, it was also the Christmas season.  In years past I’ve been able to do some sort of special “daddy gift” for my kids - which is usually something home-made and comes just from me.  I’ve written them stories, built toys, and the year before created blogs for them that reside on our family extranet.  This year I had nothing.  No good ideas and not as much time to work on it as usual.

So we had the grand idea to combine the two trips—get down to my folks for some Grandparent time, and fit in the SXSW visit as well.  This way some of the trip costs could be written off as a business expense, the kids would get their wish, and the trip could be my special gift to them by announcing it via a wrapped present on Christmas morning.

In reviewing every possible way of making this trip it really became clear that the cheapest way to do it would be to drive.  Well, fine - except for we live in West Michigan - a round trip of approximately 3200 miles.  Or, at my rough estimate of an average of 60 MPH, roughly 53 hours of driving. 

With two kids.

Yes, visions of Chevy Chase and the Vacation movie came immediately to mind - not helped by the fact that our daily driver is this 1996 Buick Roadmaster station wagon complete with fake woodgrain sides.  We’ve affectionately dubbed it “Edna” in honor of the Great Aunt in the movie:

What spurred me to finally sit down and write this blog post today was seeing this post and comic:  When We Were Kids on StuffThatHappens.com.

See - one of my big concerns (or pet peeve) these days is how often we plug our kids into something with a screen so that they can be entertained - and we as parents can “get a break”.  People think some sort of DVD player is a “must for long trips”.  Don’t get me wrong - we’ve used “movies as baby-sitters” too—it’s just that I think there’s a point where being in front of a screen too much just isn’t healthy.  We’ve taken steps to reduce it in our home life - mostly by getting rid of cable TV, doing movies more as a family event, not having a game console of any sort, and limiting the time that the kids are on the computer.

Families have been taking long road trips for years without the aid of screens in our vehicles - so I don’t agree that “it’s a must”.  I think it’s just the easy way out.  Without the electronic babysitter the onus falls back on parents to help fill that time and keep kids attention on something besides “how long until we’re there?” And that takes work, no doubt.

So for us and our trip the first decision after “let’s drive it” was “with no DVD’s, video games or iPods”.  I wanted the driving hours to be time together as a family - and not just an empty void to fill.  I wanted the kids to actually see things on the way - to get an idea of how other areas of the country were different and how other people live, and just how big the world is outside of our home.

I should throw in here - for those of you who don’t know - we’re also homeschoolers.  One nice part about homeschooling is that trips like this aren’t occasions to pull the kids out of school so much as they are about taking school on the road.  Homeschooling also tends to also change your focus - from looking at how to most easily get through potentially boring periods of time to how you can turn that time into teachable moments, or how to fill it with creative activity.

We had some time before the trip - so were able to do some research and brainstorming for how to fill that time.  MsBoyink checked out books on road games, and we reserved some books and new music on CD from the library.  We found websites like MomsMiniVan.com that had all kinds of simple (non-electronic) ideas for road games and toys. 

I remembered trips I had taken as a young boy and that my folks had daily “road trip gifts” wrapped up for us - so each day would start with a new gift to open and play with.  One of them (and here I’m dating myself) was this Super Add O Matic grocery store mechanical calculator.  We had hours of fun with these - choosing different things to count and having contests to see who could count the most.  I missed a couple of these on eBay so bought some simple lap counters instead. 

So - how did it go?  Really, really well. 

The lap counters were a hit - we listened to the kids clicking those things for hours.  It’s amazing how something as simple as counting can keep you engaged and actively scanning the landscape or road going by rather than focusing on how long you’ve been traveling.  The stories on CD worked well - except for having to turn them off when important route changes were coming up. 

Another hit was some balloon animal kids MsBoyink had found - consisting of a small air pump and balloons.  I was happy to see these got played with much longer than the handheld electronic “Deal or No Deal” game we bought. 

We discovered a mutual love for the Beach Boys and even attempted some harmony singing together.  On the way home we came across a Christian station on the radio - and we a bit of church on the road.  Listening to the kids young voices singing along with the praise songs they knew while driving through the countryside in Arkansas on a sunny day will always be a special memory of mine.

Now - I had the kids blog what they liked about the trip, and neither of them listed the drive time.  No surprise there - but they also didn’t list it in the 3 things they didn’t like about the trip.  It wasn’t all sunny, filled with music and laughter.  But for me, when I hear the phrase “quality family time” I never count just the “happy time” as quality.  Working through the missed highway interchanges, the need for a bathroom break soon, the squabbles about what music to listen to, the waiting for the food to warm up on the camp stove—those moments aren’t ones to throw away either as they are moments to learn about how to deal with stress, how to interact with others during stressful moments, and learning ways to avoid that stress in the future.

I had great fun telling people at SXSW that we drove - and seeing their reactions.  While other folks might avoid long family road trips, for me it was something I both looked forward to and enjoyed doing.  And would do again. 

But not too soon.