How My Family Survived an 18 Hour Car Ride with a Teething Six Month Old

December 20, 2017

315 Shares

We wanted to take a family vacation to my in-law’s condo in Florida (we live in Illinois) for 10 days but our son would be 6 months old and we were nervous about such a long car ride. Until the night before we weren’t even sure if we were going to go. We went back and forth many times deciding if this was the right move for our family. Finally, we decided to go and if worst came to worst we would get as far as we could and spend the night and turn back if it was too much on Liam. So here are my top five tips for a stress-free road trip with a baby.

Tip #1 leave in the middle of the night!

I read so many articles about how to make life easier for a long car ride with a 6-month-old. The absolute best decision we made was to leave at 2:00 am. Our son is not a good sleeper and always wakes up between 1:00 am and 3:00 am so we decided when he woke up between those times we would change his diaper and put him back to sleep in his car seat. (Of course on the return trip he slept through his 1-3am wake up so we as gently as possible lifted him into his car seat. He woke up but it didn’t take much to get him back to sleep). Leaving at this time allowed him to get ample rest from 6:30 pm-2:00 am and sleep the first 4-5 hours of our 18 hour day. We wanted to get as much of the driving done as possible before 4:00 pm because Liam gets pretty fussy around that time until he falls asleep between 6:30 and 7:30 pm.

Tip #2 Distractions Distractions Distractions

Liam has just started liking toys (especially if they have music) so I bought him a couple new toys that played music, had lights or vibrated. The Fisher-Price Snugapuppy was a huge hit when it was naptime in the car! Liam loves to rub soft things on his face to get to sleep (I wish he could sleep with this thing all night!) and the ears of this puppy were perfect for soothing himself. It also played soft lullaby music and the vibrations made it feel like mom was holding him. I highly recommend getting this puppy for soothing babies when you can’t pick them up. I also bought him the Oball Grasp & Teethe Teether. It was perfect for his little fingers to hold on to it and it had different textures to soothe his teeth.

Then, I downloaded to my tablet Trolls, and a couple of Furchester Hotel episodes. (Side note I TV is definitely a last resort for our family but it was a life saver for this drive). Finally, I had a bunch of sensory balls for him to chew on and play with and his favorite monkey stuffed animal I would keep them all in a bag next to his car seat and if he got crabby I would pull out a toy he hadn’t played with in a while and it would keep him distracted for a while then I would offer him a new toy when he got bored. When no toys would distract him I would play some music from one of the downloaded movies/shows.

Tip #3 scheduled breaks!

Taking breaks every 2-3 hours was the most important thing. It isn’t good for a growing baby to be locked in a car seat for hours on end so we scheduled a 30-90 minute break every 2-3 hours. We would break longer if we were stopping to eat and shorter if it was just a stretching break. I tried to find interesting stops along the way that we could explore with him. No matter where we stopped it was a seat free stop for Liam. So, no high chairs, stroller or seats of any kind. It made eating a little difficult but allowed Liam to jump around, stand, move and stretch. I am pretty good at eating so Liam can’t reach my food and I can still hold him. Holding Liam while we ate in exchange for a happy baby was the easiest decision of the trip!

Tip #4 Go with the flow

If Liam was sleeping and we had reached the 3-hour mark we wouldn’t wake him up for a stretch break. But, when he woke up we would take a longer break and let him really stretch and move. Driving as much as possible while Liam was sleeping was key to such a stress-free car ride. But, we also needed to be mindful of his little growing body. We were always sure he didn’t spend too much time strapped into his seat. So if he was fussy and we had only been driving 30 minutes we would still take a break. We decided up front even if it added several hours to our journey we would stop anytime we felt he needed it. Making that agreement upfront help the stress level stay low for me and my husband as well.

Tip #5 Food!

This will be really different for every baby. Some babies are exclusively breastfed so you will need to add a little extra time for breaks to eat. Others are formula fed so you can eat on the go. My son is a mixture of both he was bottle fed with either expressed breastmilk or formula. I had already started weaning him at this point so I could go the entire trip without out pumping or a feeding. (For moms that need to pump during such a long car ride they sell battery packs for pumps to make pumping in the car possible! I wish I knew this when I had to drive to a conference and stopped to pump in public restrooms… not fun) No matter how you feed your little one food breaks are obviously extremely important. We had just started him on pureed food so new foods were another distraction for Liam that worked wonders. We fed him Beechnut baby food and he loves them.

Due to our detailed preparation, the long car ride was so stress-free and Liam had so much fun we are beyond happy we went. Watch him breath.