Travel Series: Kids Busy Boxes

Hello!

I finally made the Kids Busy Boxes for our upcoming trip to Europe. We have been traveling with our kids since V was born, but this is the first time we are traveling to Europe as a family of five. That means, we are stuck with three wild kiddos on an eight our flight to Amsterdam from Chicago, then layover of about 5 hours there, and then another one hour and a half until our destination Belgrade, Serbia. That makes it at least 14 1/2 hours trying not to lose our shit with all three. For all the previous trips I have done something fun, brought additional toys, and snacks of course. But, I have never done this! I have never made busy boxes for them! So, I am super excited to see their reaction and really hope they will love them and keep busy. I will have to update you later on that.

I have been putting them off and just got these finished the other night, and realize that taking photos at 11:00pm may not be the best idea so, I am sorry about the quality of the photos but I wanted to show them to you. I could barely finish these in time to share with you all before our trip.

My friend shared this idea with me as she made them for their road trip from Chicago to Maine, and I loved it! She got the idea originally from @dr.organicmommy, as she does these for her kiddos and they are amazing.

You can tailor these to your kids age, what they personally like and what you think will keep them busy. The best thing about these is they are custom made by you for your kids.

Everything you see here is from Amazon, except the boxes are from Walmart, and a few other things I happen to find at Target dollar spot. I will link everything at the end. Follow me on the Liketoknow.it app for all the details.

plain metal lunch boxes

I got the lego bases, cut them with regular scissors and used gorilla glue to glue them on the cover of the box. These boxes are small, plain metal lunch boxes.

lego bases

You can even get the peel and stick lego bases but I got these instead. And, I got the Classic Lego set which comes with four packs. I am using these legos for all three, even though Lego Duplo would be better for Anastasija I know that when her brothers are playing with lego classic she wants to also. I put the legos in a small ziplock bag for them.

add stickers and magnets

Not only are these boxes great for travel, but they will keep them busy when we are at the hotel. It will be something for them to do.

I then added a set of stickers for each one as they can peel and stick them on the inside cover of the boxes. I already added some for them.

matching cards are always a good idea

I split the matching cards between the boys so they won’t have the same ones, and they can play together or alone. Also, I tucked in crayons on the side and will add a coloring book and some paper.

nesting dolls for lady

I added the nesting dolls for Anastasija. I have no idea if she will love playing with them but I decided to put them in there for her.

I found a few more things at the Target dollar spot with all the back to school stuff and added them to the boxes. These boxes are on the smaller side, but they fit so much stuff. And, if you ask me I think the kids love all sorts of random things they can explore and play with it. I could not find a small coloring book so what I am doing is printing out their face cartoon characters and putting them in the boxes to color. For example, Anastasija loves Daniel Tiger so I am putting that for her and for the boys I am doing Super Mario.

the finished boxes

Here is a look at the final boxes, and with everything I found at Target too. Ps I did find some Kindergarten books for Vasilije that I will put in our suitcase for him to have when we are just having some down time and he feels bored.

One of the things I try to do is keep the trip to minimal expectations and tailor it to the kids needs. I know it’s hard on them trying to stay still for such a long period of time, and I cannot blame them for wanting to run around and maybe even get upset. I think it’s all okay. I am going in with an open mindset, and just plain simple “let’s see how it all unfolds” type of a mind. As always, my number one tip when traveling with kids is to have zero expectations. The more upset you get, the more upset they continue to be. Stay calm, and be cool.

I hope they love the boxes, and stay occupied. I will definitely do an update after the flight to let you all know how it went. The flight from here to Amsterdam is about 7.5 hours, and then we have a five hour layover, and another 1.5 hours to Belgrade, Serbia.

Thanks so much for stopping by and reading. If you try to make these boxes, tag me @motherhood_charm on Instagram as I would love to see your way of making them. I am so excited for our trip (less than four days away) and cannot wait to show you around my country.

Ps. I am thinking to share our packing tips and tricks next. Let me know if you’d be interested.

Xoxo,

Vesna