©	Travel Tickets © Or, How to avoid,  "Are We There Yet?" by Laurel Smith, Momsminivan.com

Use some colored construction paper to cut out some "tickets" for your trip. Give your child a pre-counted baggie full of tickets. Every half hour (or every 30 miles) they can turn in one ticket to you. When their tickets are gone, the trip has ended!   This really helps young children get an idea of how much time is left on the journey.   Make sure you give them a couple of extra tickets in case you mis-calculate your journey, or if you have unexpected delays.

If you're not up for creating your own tickets, here is a pre-made sheet of travel tickets created by Momsminivan that you can print!  Just click the images below to open the printable pages.

©
Click the picture above to
print a full size color image 
(Or, use colored paper to save ink and print this image in black & white)

In addition to Travel Tickets, you might also like to print some Reward Tickets.  Give your child tickets to use on the trip if they have had good backseat behavior.  They can turn them in to you at a gas stops or rest stops for some wacky flavored gum or other road trip treat - but only if they have earned the right to use it! 

Here is a printable page with enough tickets for your whole family:

©
Click the picture above to
print a full size color image
(Or, use colored paper and print this image in black & white)

Here's how one parent used Travel Tickets as a  on a recent trip:

"I just wanted to say a HUGE thank you. We just went on a trip with our sons age 5 and 7. We had 15 hours of driving to do in 2 days to get to our destination. We don't have a DVD player in the car. Your travel tickets made all the difference it made the trip manageable. It became a series of 30 minutes, instead of never ending hours and hours.

Instead of giving them the tickets to start with, I gave them one ticket every 30 minutes. They kept the tickets and had a choice to exchange them when they were ready.

• 2 tickets could be exchanged for a book ( a got a bunch of second hand ones at a thrift store) 
• 3 tickets could be exchanged for a wrapped up present ( dollar store toys and crafts) 
• 4 tickets could be exchanged for 30 minutes of playtime on a nintendo DS

So, something was always happening! They never asked when we getting there, they just asked when the next ticket time was and that was never very far. Really, it made a huge difference, 30 minutes is not a long time, it's manageable.

I also held a few sales where I sold for example 20 minutes of DS time and a book for 4 tickets etc..

Thank you very much, you made our trip much more pleasant. We really appreciate it! " 

( --Thank you to Reader Josee for sharing her experience with us!)

Don't miss all the other Printable Car Games at Momsminivan.com
 
 

--Laurel (Road Trip Mom)

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        ¸.·´  .·´¨¨)) 
      ((¸¸.·´  ..·´   Road Trip Mom -:¦:- 
     -:¦:-    ((¸¸.·´* 
 

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Laurel Smith is a former schoolteacher and mother of three who has logged thousands of road trip miles both as a kid and a mom.  Visit her website for more than 101 travel games and activities for kids at MomsMinivan.com
 

This article and associated images are copyright ©Momsminivan.com. Do NOT publish on another website or in print without permission in whole or in part or altered. They are for individual and small group use only. Thank you! Have a great trip.