We LOVE our iPhones when we’re traveling! They are super handy and we have tons of apps that we love and use often. Here are our top five iPhone apps for road trips:

1. Roadside America

This is by far our favorite app! We have discovered SO MANY really awesome things thanks to this app and it is totally worth the $5.99/year membership price. Some of our favorite things we’ve found from Roadside America: the castle in Kentucky, Hillbilly Hot Dogs, the Minister’s treehouse, and the Peabody ducks. If you’re looking for quirky, different, and just plain fun, this is the app for you!

2. Trip Advisor

This is a great app for checking out reviews of hotels and restaurants BEFORE you eat/sleep there!

3. Priceline Negotiator

In a pinch, I like to use this app to find last minute hotel deals by bidding super cheap!

4. Yelp

This app is similar to Trip Advisor, but we mostly use it to find great restaurants nearby. Often times, there is more information listed on Yelp than on Trip Advisor and there are usually more restaurants listed as well.

5. Camp and Tent

Fair warning… we haven’t used this app yet! But, it comes highly recommended and I think it will come in handy for our trip in July. We’ll be looking for somewhere to camp on the few nights of our trip that we aren’t staying with friends. This app locates all campgrounds near you or your destination and provides information and reviews.

Don’t forget it’s Family Road Trip Week! We’ll be blogging every day this week with road trippin’ tips and fun stuff!

If you’re planning your own road trip in the near future, you’ll want to check out our Road Trippin’ {mini} Adventure Guide! And if you’re ready for the real deal, our Adventure in a Box: Road Trippin’ kit is just what you need! It will be on sale all week for $109 (regular price $129)!

So I came up with a solution for both! I bought a couple boxes of giant Hefty bags. And I put a complete day’s worth of kids’ outfits into each bag (one outfit for Max, one outfit for Ava, & one outfit for Lia all in the same bag). There’s also a bag with jammies and their bathroom stuff. So, when we stop for the night, all we have to do is grab the jammie bag and an outfit bag. That’s all we need for each night’s stop and it helps keep our suitcase nice and organized!

Don’t forget it’s Family Road Trip Week! We’ll be blogging every day this week with road trippin’ tips and fun stuff!

If you’re planning your own road trip in the near future, you’ll want to check out our Road Trippin’ {mini} Adventure Guide! And if you’re ready for the real deal, our Adventure in a Box: Road Trippin’ kit is just what you need! It will be on sale all week for $109 (regular price $129)!

And don’t forget… it’s Family Road Trip Week! We’ll be blogging every day this week with road trippin’ tips and fun stuff!

If you’re planning your own road trip in the near future, you’ll want to check out our Road Trippin’ {mini} Adventure Guide! And if you’re ready for the real deal, our Adventure in a Box: Road Trippin’ kit is just what you need! It will be on sale all week for $109 (regular price $129)!

Car activities for the kids

Coloring case

Bubble wrap bingo game

Kids’ travel kit

Website for planning fun things to do

We’re SO excited to be heading out on our first road trip of 2012 on Wednesday!! We decided to celebrate by deeming this ‘Family Road Trip Week’! We’ll be blogging every day this week with road trippin’ tips and fun stuff!

If you’re planning your own road trip in the near future, you’ll want to check out our Road Trippin’ {mini} Adventure Guide! And if you’re ready for the real deal, our Adventure in a Box: Road Trippin’ kit is just what you need! It will be on sale all week for $109 (regular price $129)!

So, to get the week kicked off, here are our top five tips for awesome family road trips!

1. Lower your expectations.

We all know that kids will be kids and we seem fine with that fact of life when we’re home, but when we travel, we totally forget it. So, before you head out on the road, adjust your expectations. It’s much easier to handle screaming, fighting kids in the car when you expect that it will happen. At the same time, let go of the idea that a road trip should be getting from Point A to Point B as fast as possible. Remember, the journey is just as important (if not more so!) than the destination.

2. Choose to actively seek out adventure.

We often refer to our trusty Roadside America iPhone app and reach out to friends via Twitter and Facebook to get recommendations of awesome places to visit and dine. Also, watch out for roadside signs and take a chance on something that looks really lame. You never know…it could turn out to be loads of fun!

3. Take pictures.

It’s no secret that we’re professional photographers, so it should come as no surprise that we strongly recommend documenting your trip in pictures. We also think you should take videos and write in a journal or on your blog. Your road trip is going to be full of so many memorable experiences, you’ll want to document them all so you can relive them over and over again!

4. Make a road trip playlist.

If you have an iPod, just create the playlist in iTunes and then put it on your iPod. You can also burn a few CD’s. We recommend upbeat, fun, happy music to get everyone in a good mood. Songs that everyone can sing along to are a great choice too! Either way, don’t leave your road trippin’ tunes up to whatever radio station you can tune into at the moment… come prepared!

5. Actively seek out cheesy gift shops and random quarter machines.

You never know what amazingness you’ll find. When we were in the Southwest, we picked up a giant sombrero and used it as a photo prop. When we were in Colorado, we bought stick-on mustaches from a quarter machine. Look for adventure and fun, and you’re sure to find it!

1. Consistency is key! The quickest (and best) way for kids to learn something new is to practice it often. All you need is about ten minutes once or twice a day. And if you’re having a hard time staying motivated (or remembering!) to do it every day, try using a sticker chart.

2. Make it fun! We like to play letter games, use the alphabet puzzle, and read her favorite letter book.

3. Get older siblings (or grandparents) involved. Max and Ava love helping Lia with her letters. I love it because it helps promote a close sibling bond and it also gives the older kids a little ego boost. And of course Lia just loves it when her brother and sister dote on her!

4. It’s okay to use “rewards”. We try to avoid junk food (especially the kind with oodles of artificial colors!) around here, but I’m not the least bit ashamed to say that I went out and bought a pack of mini M&M’s to use as encouragement. Every time Lia gets the correct letter sound, she gets an M&M. Since they are mini, even 22 isn’t a huge serving.

Do you have a tip to share about teaching letters or letter sounds? I’d love to hear it! (P.S. All Amazon links are affiliate links.)