We love loading up our little short bus and heading out to explore Eastern Washington. It’s a beautiful part of the country! But, messes on a road trip always seem to happen.
On our last journey, we ended up with:
- A stinky diaper and wipes
- A drawing that Owen ripped
- A couple of crayon wrappers
- Snack wrappers
- The edges of paper ripped out of a notebook
That’s a lot of trash from a day trip!
And when that trash makes it to the bus floor, it tends to stay there awhile. By the time we get home, everyone’s tired and ready to head inside. No one wants to stop right then and clean the bus.
So, I came up with a solution, testing it on our last trip. It worked wonders! And now I always know what to pack.
A Simple Solution for Eliminating Messes on Road Trips
Quart-sized Ziploc bags are now a necessity for road trips for my family! It’s easy to get them on the bus.
To keep costs low, we typically pack everyone a lunchbox with a sandwich, some snacks, and a juice box. So I just make sure I pack one item for each lunch box in a quart-sized bag instead of a smaller one.
Now, everyone has their own personal trash bag. As they accumulate their plastic wrap and smaller bags, they can toss everything into their Ziploc bag.
If we have a poopy diaper, they fit well inside this sized bag. Even a bigger Owen diaper! And then I can seal it shut and we don’t have to smell anything!
By the time we make it home, everyone has a bag that they can toss in the dumpster before heading into the house:
Our bus looked way better, and there weren’t any huge messes to clean up. Such a nicer end to a road trip!
And as a bonus, we got our first pic of all eight kids on this trip. The pictures taken with Bryan’s camera haven’t been edited yet, but here’s a sneak peek I took with my phone:
Any Road Trips Planned?
Are you heading out on any road trips this summer? I’d love to hear about your plans! Will you be packing any quart-sized bags for the messes?
Car Games for Road Trips
If you need some new games to play, give these a try:
Communication Games for Road Trips
Observation Skill Boosting Car Games
Color Identification Car Games
Math Car Games
Such a great idea, Lisa! I’ll add my own suggestion for longer road trips (i.e., hundreds of miles, lots of meals on the road, and camping along the way). I have learned (the HARD way!) to take a kitchen-sized garbage bag and stock it with several more of the same size, a big handful of old grocery bags, and a gallon (or bigger) zip-top bag filled with more gallon, quart, and sandwich sized bags. That way, if we want to grab a few grapes out of the cooler, we can just stick a few in a small bag and not have to deal with a big bag of grapes rattling around in the car until our next stop. If we have a fast-food meal, we can shove all the wrappers in a grocery bag and toss it at the next fuel-up. And if something goes haywire with some of the luggage (when does it NOT??) or rain threatens to soak the stuff in the back of the truck, we can just slip it into a big ole bag and keep moving. Last time we drove from WA to CO, I even packed a handful of the really big black bags, just in case. We ended up using them all by the end of the trip (don’t ask)!
Great tip Carolyn, keeping all the bags packed in one won’t take up a lot of space, and you’ll always have the size you need. I’m learning you can never have too many bags packed. 😀 Have a wonderful day!