_edited.png)
Planning is vital for a stress-free and positive outcome when it comes to family travel. Whether you're looking for child-friendly travel hacks or tips for a family-friendly destination, it's essential to create an activity kit, maintain your routine and stay flexible with your planning. Pack your home away from home with all the essentials, research local cultures and activities, and create a positive outlook for the entire family. With some extra preparation, you can ensure your family vacation succeeds!
Pre-Planning for Stress-Free Family Travel – Tips to Prep Before You Go
Pre-planning can be a game-changer in reducing stress during family travel. To ensure a smoother and more successful vacation, take some time to research your destination and plan accordingly. Packing items that will make your family feel at home away from home, such as favorite snacks, blankets, and books, can make a big difference.
We always do a little research before we go on our trip about the local culture to find child-friendly activities and family-friendly destinations. When we arrive, we finalize our plans and remember to include every family member in the final planning process. We focus on activities everyone enjoys to keep us energized and excited throughout the trip. With pre-planning and the right attitude, you can make your family vacation a stress-free and enjoyable experience!
Manage Expectations and Encourage Positive Outlooks about the Trip
Traveling with the family, especially kids, can be an exciting and rewarding experience, but it can also be a source of stress and anxiety for some. To ensure a stress-free family travel experience, managing your expectations is essential. First, try to maintain your family's routine as much as possible, even while away from home; this includes eating, napping, and, most importantly, your bedtime routine. They do not all have to look identical to what your family is used to, but simple things like putting on pajamas before we read at night help our girls know it is time to wind down.
Lastly, encourage a positive outlook about the trip by managing your expectations. We know there will be hiccups, big feelings (tantrums), and stress. We enter our trips knowing these things will happen and preparing ourselves to face those with compassion and patience. We find it easier to handle these things as they come up because we are not feeling blindsided.
Create an Activity Kit - Keep kids busy during travel and outings with activity kits.
We always pack activities to keep the girls occupied during our trip. On this last trip, we made kits by using backpacks. We found it was much easier to grab them as we left our hotels and headed to an activity or restaurant to eat dinner. We packed things that they like to do at home to bring the feeling of familiarity to them. The things included for our 6-year-old girls' sketchbooks, coloring pages, markers, colored pencils, wix sticks, books for reading, the family "would you rather" card game, and tablets with our favorite apps (EpicKids!, AmazonKids, ABCMouse, and Kahn Academy Kids). Ultimately these activity kits are built for your kids to stay occupied during downtime. Pack what you think will keep your kids busy for these moments.
Family travel can be a great way to create lasting memories, but it can also be stressful if not properly planned. By following the tips outlined in this blog, you can ensure a stress-free family travel experience that will leave you and your family with a positive outlook and lasting memories. Pre-planning, creating a comfort kit, embracing flexibility, maintaining a routine, and connecting with local culture are all critical components of a successful family vacation. With some preparation and the right attitude, you can ensure that your family vacation is a home away from home.