Your 2:6 year old has been stuck sat in the car for 7 hours in major traffic jam..........

[tryingtobemarrypoppins2]

......how are they likely to behave on finally arriving at a party with lots of new people and children???

Melt-down!!!!

Time to cool down, have a drink, calm down. But the other children will prevent total meltdown and later they'll be knackered.

Mine would probably be quite clingy for a few mins then run around like mad things for the reminder of the party.

Clingy and overstimulated, unable to cope with the relative noise and bustle.

After 5 hours in the car last week DS (2.6) ran around in circles for about half an hour (), ate his weight in peanut butter sandwiches and then was absolutely fine.

Mine would be evil grumpy for the first half hour or so. Anyone that so much as looked at him funny and he'd throw a mighty strop and scream and cry. Anyone trying to coax him out of his mood would be met with raaaar's of rage. In his own time he'd calm down and enjoy the party.

DD is older, but she'd be telling everybody about the traffic jam, and everything she saw out of the window while she was waiting, including the funny looking bird, and the cloud that looked like a banana.

This happened to us (the 7 hour traffic jam) but we arrived at a caravan on holiday rather than a party.

Dd wasn't the problem tbh. Dh and I were in a far worse state. We were bickering and crying out for wine/chips. Dd1 wanted Cbeebies and a yogurt. Also we had to wash her car seat cover. not her fault btw. We had given her a large bottle of a certain branded drink and not encouraged her to go to the loo at the services.

The traffic jam we were in was terrible. We knew it was bad when the police cleared a large gap in the traffic on the M5 and the air ambulance landed. Thankfully I understand there were no fatalities.

Depends on the day, weather, how much sleep she'd had, what she'd eaten etc etc but generally she'd be her usual self, chattering on about the world outside the car and what stupid things mama did to keep her occupied.

Oh dh and I would have been either still ripping chunks out of each other or through that frustration and laughing hysterically.

Well my DS did the whole clinging to my leg thing for about 15mins before going compleatly nuts!

He kind of went bonkers running around like a loon after the older children making a racket. When I caught him to talk about calming down he kind of blanked me, like he was out of control of his own body then carried on, before falling into a heap asleep on the floor a few hours later!

Lack of a decent meal ( think he eat 1 spoon of wetabix, a motorway chocolate muffin ("I don't want my lunch"), and half a cheese sandwich at the party) decent fluids and a routine did us no favours!

He really did lose the plot.....I was so and yes DH and I were most certainly ripping chunks out of each other too!

Oh no, we are going to a wedding in Chesire in the summer with dd who will be 3.6 dont say that

Go the day before!

Ds would want to watch a bit of TV or chill out in his cot.

Good luck with the wedding journey.