A Long, Pleasant Drive

Today we drove 2 hours to get to my great-niece's 4th birthday party. We've only been to their town once before, prior to Boy Wonder being born. Since it seems kind of far away for a couple hour birthday party, we've not been looking forward to the drive, but we have been looking forward to seeing my niece's new house. As it ended up the drive went fairly quickly, the kids were good, and we were really glad we went.

Thanks to a sale before Christmas, I am now the proud and happy owner of a handheld navigational device which we took as a backup to the written instructions emailed to us by my niece. Because the instructions contain such tips as, "You will pass a llama ranch and later a buffalo ranch" we knew we were going out in the middle of nowhere and there was no cell phone service if we got lost. The Christmas gift proved an excellent assurance that we were on the right track! We arrived before the party-start time, and we all had a great time visiting with family while we were there.

Long car trips can be a challenge and I have to say I don't know what we did before our portable DVD player, Leapster, and GameBoy. Boy Wonder has loved his Leapster since his 4th Birthday when he received it and was so absorbed that he did not even notice the guests left until 10 minutes after everyone was gone. Now Our Little Princess is the main Leapster player, using her brother's for a long time until she got her own pink version for Christmas. She was thrilled! The Leapster games are great - the kids feel like they are just playing a game, but educational components are built into game play so we can feel good about the hours they spend staring at the screen! I can't say that Boy Wonder's GameBoy is nearly as educational, but it too does build certain skills, such as logic, planning, and of course, hand-eye coordination. The Leapster though is something we always feel good about. I'd highly recommend one for passing the time on long car trips!