Keeping Kids Busy on the Road--Part 2: Magnetic Paper Dolls

As many of you know, we are preparing for our summer vacation that will commence in t-minus 9 days, 4 hours, and some minutes. :) We ARE counting down, but I don't know exactly when we will be leaving as that's kind of up in the air right now.  

I do know that it's going to be a nice long drive in the car with 3 kids and a 6 week old baby.  I just might be crazy, but I also see it as a challenge.  

The mission?  To arrive at said destination with the same 3 kids and a 6 week old baby that we left with...with all body parts in tact, having had no auto accidents, and all in the vehicle having kept their sanity for the duration of the trip.  And I might just add to that mission, that we all have a good time while doing it!!  Because really, what is the main goal of any family vacation?  

To create long lasting memories for ourselves and our children.  When its my littles (only they'll be bigs then) taking their littles on a family beach vacation, I want them to remember all the great memories that we made as a family...and hopefully they won't remember the stressful times :) 

 This activity (not a game) should be fun and on age level for my littles.  Remember, I have a 4 year old daughter and a just turned 7 year old son.  A couple months ago, I was searching for some good "new" travel activities for this year's road trip and I came across this.  I loved the template, but it was no longer available. So what does a crafty girl do?

BROWSE ETSY!  

And look what I found?

Anne Made Art

 

There's really not much to doing this.  I'm not even gonna call it a tutorial.

Materials: pizza pan from the dollar store, magnetic paper, paper doll template, inkjet printer

 

Follow the directions on the magnetic paper for printing in your inkjet printer.  Our printer had some special settings for printing on this paper so you'll want to check into that as well.  

Color using your choice of coloring tools.  If you so desire, leave it for the littles to color.  I chose to do this myself and cut them out because I wanted the activity completely ready for them to play with on vacation.

The etsy shop I showed you also has the paper dolls in BOY!  So, I decided to go ahead and purchase both girl and boy templates and I made a set in both.  One for my girl and one for my boy. :) I wanted to see how markers handled on this paper so I used them to color the boy set.  Personally, I like it better than the colored pencils/crayons I used on the girl.  I'm thinking about coloring over top of the colored pencil in marker.  We'll see. 

 

 Overall, both sets turned out beautifully!  It's pretty thin paper so you have to be careful not to cut an arm or leg off.  On the flip side, it would also be very easy to tear a part off as well, so be mindful of that.  I know things happen with little kids :) but I'm hoping this set lasts at least through this trip!

So, what are your ideas on travel activities?  Be sure to share with my readers what YOU do on road trips in the comment section :)