Travel toy dos and don'ts

[Rachel (mumsnet)]

We're helping out on a newspaper article which is doing a round up of the best travel toys. It would be great if you could send over some suggestions of which toys have or haven't worked for you. We're looking at how well the occupy the kids, portability, value for money etc. Someone has mentioned Tantrex, RummyKub and Globetrotting. Have you bought these? Would you consider them to be good for car/plane journeys. Many thanks in advance for your help.

don't buy anthing woth pieces in it, or you will spent the total journy weged in between the seats picking the bloody things up.

Best toys for my two (6 and 9) game boys.

Best value for money....a pack of coloured pipe cleaners for them to make things out of!

Puzzle books....but not if they are prone to vomiting.

Book tapes/cds. harry potter has been a godsend, and we all enjoy it.

from experience i would say

etch a sketch - you can get a travel version i think too (we have gone through loads of the chad valley one you get in woolies, its less that £5 so great value for money)

sticker books
a basic clipboard and pencils
a car dvd player
cds of music/stories

also - v important - buy one for each child (etch a sketch, clipboard, stickers or similar whatever) to avoid the unavoidable arguments

and get the dvd player that can be postioned in between the car seats, ie in the middle, and keep a hold of the remote, DONT let the children have it or they will argue over it

Thanks for your suggestions - keep em coming.

Rachel

best ever - a portable DVD player - is perfect for trips between UK and Australia and the US - along with appropriate DVD selection - for my son, it was the Wiggles (who, quite frankly, should all be knighted for their efforts in keeping small hurricanes firmly in seats and quiet for more than 30 minutes at a time)

etch a sketch - small travel version

crayons and paper - good for so many things - my 2 yr old was kept quiet for hours just taking the paper wrapping off all the crayons !!!!!

oh yeah - the "donts"

• any time of texter or pen type drawing implement that can not be washed off seat fabric or skin

• any type of toy with small parts (will just spend hours picking up small parts and will inevitably lose most of them)

• anything too heavy (such as small metal cars) which when thrown forward through economy class convert into tiny missiles which cause bodily harm

I can recommend a Leapster - ds1 and ds2 (4 and 2.5 years) both have one. There are different games available on cartridges which are interchangeable between the Leapster and later Leapster l-max. Games are age related. DS2's current favourite is a Thomas the Tank Engine game. It make for a quiet car journey!

We are fond of the "looking out of the window and telling everyone what is outside game" which works for our 3 year old on long car journeys. It's free and helps prevent travel sickness. Perhaps it works better in NZ because we don't have motorways, so you get to see animals and windmills and level crossings and stuff.

Also action song tapes, use a teddy bear for any big actions, and use your own hands for the hand play songs. Keeping some of his body moving seems to make up for having to keep so much of it still.

I like the travel etch a sketch a lot for when we actually get there.

never, ever, ever let you dh pack their toys. I made this mistake once.

Everything that he packed made a noise!

Hard to believe that man has an IQ of 152