Meet Jennifer!!!

Hi everyone! I hope you have all enjoyed getting to see a tone of different blogs this week! Today the amazing Jennifer from When In Doubt, Add More Salt. She has a great post ready for you today and you are going to love her!

The Two Ms--Traveling With A Toddler

A special thanks to Tiffany for sharing her nugget of blog world with me today. We just "met" through the Flaunt a Friend linkup and I'm excited that we did! Prayers and happy thoughts (and wishes for no police on the roads) as you make this big move! 

I'm Jenn (who calls herself Cajun Cowgirl) riding the trails between TX and LA with my Cowboy (the husband) and The Sheriff (the toddler).  I've been blogging my way through babyhood turned toddlerhood, hot summers, Pinterest pin attempts, and a love/hate relationship with March Madness brackets. That's me, up there, conquering the world. Or just the local playground. Same difference. 

And there's the hubs. Occasionally he busts out of his Cowboy gear to unleash his inner gladiator. I'm kidding really because we aren't necessarily trail riding, shit-kicker wearing, bull-riding, cattle-roping family either but simply a trio of Cajuns blazing our own crawfish eating trails in The Lone Star State.

Together we welcomed our Cajun Shrimp who is a little less Shrimp these days but definitely a fiery little Cajun. I had to choose this picture because it is a simple reminder that yes, he can be still. Really, he can. 

And he's the inspiration behind this post, you see, because Cowboy and I are quite used to long car rides. We met in college (and said college was 5-6 hours from each of our homes); then we dated long distance before I graduated and thus spent several hours and mix CDs later on the road. 

Throw a baby into the pot, and I started sweating a bit because our families still live in LA and of course want to see  both of us The Sheriff. 

As it turns out, Baby Sheriff was great on road trips. He slept most of the time and woke to eat and then was happy going back down. Everyone wins.

Toddler Sheriff is a different story. He's great in the car, really great, but there are a couple of precautionary measures I like to take to keep him happy, and we'll call these The Two Ms.

M1-- Mom Arm

This whole time I thought "Mom Arm" was that seemingly involuntary swing of an arm out towards the passenger seat when having to brake quickly or deal with other drivers on the road. Turns out, it's so much more.

Mom Arm allows you to hand snack after snack, toy after toy, diversion after diversion, to keep backseat passengers happy.
Mom Arm allows you to, safely I must say, manage to reach back to recover said snack, toy, diversion when clumsy hands dropped it. This Mom Arm may not work in an SUV.
Mom Arm allows you to keep one hand on the wheel and use the other to entertain backseat passengers with made up dances and motions to attention-keeping songs. More on that below.

But for Mom Arm to work most effectively, one must prepare.

Step 1. Hit your local dollar store or dollar section at your favorite megastore (a la Target). These are the perfect places for car toys that you can keep in a bag in the front and hand back one at a time for easy entertainment. If you have the time and budget, perhaps even spring for more expensive toys/books that are thematically relevant to your kiddo at the time. (On our last trip, new helicopter books and noise-making transportation themed books were hits!)

Step 2. Food, food, and food! Grab a small ice chest that you can keep in the front seat and stock a reusable grocery bag or two with special snacks, drinks, and even lunches that your backseat passengers love. Do your homework and pack them ready to serve.
And if worrying about servings of vegetables/fruits is the norm, throw the norm out of the window. It's a road trip day. Let the snacking commence! But you can keep it healthy, of course. I have to pass along Laura's post because she gives excellent ideas!

Step 3. "New" toys. No, I'm not asking you to shell out any more money. A few weeks before your trip, simply hide a couple of favorite toys that you can break out as oldies but goodies they'll be excited to be reunited with on the road.

With these items in place, Mom Arm can most effectively keep the car content, thus allowing you as the driver or even front seat passenger to maintain some sense of sanity.

(These suggestions are based on taking a road trip solo with the wee bit we are raising around these parts and of course can be modified with two adults in the front seats.)

M2-- Music

You like singing in the car right? Come on. Don't lie. We are all the next American Idol when cruising the roads. Get your little people in on it.

We love traveling with a CD or two of our favorite kiddo sing-alongs, but this last trip (especially because it was without Cowboy), I made our own road trip CD of songs that we've sung with The Sheriff since he was a baby. We've got everything from Dave Matthews "You and Me" to Cee Lo's "Forget You" to W's current favorite, Coldplay's "Paradise" known to him as Daddy's song.

You won't lose your grits jamming to the "Itsy Bitsy Spider" over and over again, and you'll be bonding with the wee bits over something you love!

And there's more! Remember Mom Arm? If all else fails, learn a few "movement songs" that you've sung with your passengers before or maybe something new to introduce. Find one of our favorites here!
(Did I adapt the song for anything under the sun to keep us distracted in traffic last week on our trip? I'll let you be the judge of that! But I still hear "W has one copter, one copter, one copter" in my head!)

Be sure to bring lots of water. (Don't worry about potty breaks. With little ones you are stopping often anyway!) You'll need it to keep your voice as you find yourself perhaps even making up new songs with hand motions for Mom Arm for sure, to keep everyone happy.

And if all else fails, there is an M3.

M3 is of course movies! If you've got a portable DVD player or even laptop, by all means use it! If you've got an ancient one like mine, be sure the timing is just right. I'm not sure if our batteries are long enough for an entire movie, but what we do have has worked like a charm!

Our family for sure has lots of road trips in its future, so in the meantime, I'll keep my Mom Arm strong and continue to jam with the little guy to our favorite songs.

See, I told you she was great! I have to admit that I am happy to be able to read these ahead of time, because they are giving me ideas for the drive!  Show Jennifer some love and hop over to her blog and check out the many reasons I love to follow this girl!

You are welcome here any time Jennifer!