Right, today I want to talk about road trips and car games. No matter if you are setting out on a two hour trek to Grandma’s house or heading cross country for summer vacation, if you have small children you are going to have to play car games.
Growing up, in Southern Indiana, our family went on a lot of road trips and played a lot of car games. Therefore when I decided to take my three little ones on an hour and half road trip to Sharjah I was confident that I had things well under control.
Any of you readers who have not heard of UAE should Google it. I love living here, most of the time, and am very proud to call it my second home. Anywho back one track….
We packed up all the essentials: Game Boys, books, cars and trucks. Just a few things after all it’s only an hour and half. Stopped to fill up and get some treats and we are on our way; me and my boys out on the open road.
Well, we are only 20 minutes into the trip when Nasser (NasCar 5yrs) starts the “are we there yet?” whine. Wow that was fast. We are not even out of the city yet (Abu Dhabi). OK that’s fine…..I have been trained for this situation……Travel songs, always a crowd pleaser, are just the ticket. I charge Khalid(k ha lid) with starting us out he’s ten and an old pro at the travel game so he can teach the other two the ropes. First: John Jacob Jinglehimer Schmitt then ole’Mac Donald, The ABCs (three times) and on and on finishing with a wonderful rendition of There’s a whole in my bucket, and everyone laughing. HHUMM all is right in the world. AAAAHHHHH….. I would like to accept this Mother of the Year Award on behalf of my wonderful children…… Yeah! Right! The peace and tranquility lasted all of two minutes then we were back to “are we there yet?” I check the time I check the mileage Um I’m doing pretty well Ok let’s play a game. One of my favorite games growing up was Count the Cows. Very easy game, you count cows. The car gets divided in two; Driver’s side against Passenger’s side and the side with the most cows at the end of the trip wins. The catch is if you pass a graveyard then you lose all your cows. Get it? Good game right? Just one thing we don’t have cows in UAE but we do have camels, cows-camels same difference and graveyards are not near the roads so they would be hard to spot…uumm gas stations are just as rare so we’ll use that. The boys love the idea and soon we are counting camels and looking out for the dreaded gas stations. This game got us almost all the way to our destination and I sure was glad to see the end of the road.
It just made me think how lucky I was to grow-up where and with whom I did. One thing that I worry about is my children growing up in a place that is so different then where I did. Yeah, the summers are hot here and there are not as many activities for them. But, we had a wonderful time on our road trip even if we did have to count camels.
Till next time,
Shamsa
Growing up, in Southern Indiana, our family went on a lot of road trips and played a lot of car games. Therefore when I decided to take my three little ones on an hour and half road trip to Sharjah I was confident that I had things well under control.
Any of you readers who have not heard of UAE should Google it. I love living here, most of the time, and am very proud to call it my second home. Anywho back one track….
We packed up all the essentials: Game Boys, books, cars and trucks. Just a few things after all it’s only an hour and half. Stopped to fill up and get some treats and we are on our way; me and my boys out on the open road.
Well, we are only 20 minutes into the trip when Nasser (NasCar 5yrs) starts the “are we there yet?” whine. Wow that was fast. We are not even out of the city yet (Abu Dhabi). OK that’s fine…..I have been trained for this situation……Travel songs, always a crowd pleaser, are just the ticket. I charge Khalid(k ha lid) with starting us out he’s ten and an old pro at the travel game so he can teach the other two the ropes. First: John Jacob Jinglehimer Schmitt then ole’Mac Donald, The ABCs (three times) and on and on finishing with a wonderful rendition of There’s a whole in my bucket, and everyone laughing. HHUMM all is right in the world. AAAAHHHHH….. I would like to accept this Mother of the Year Award on behalf of my wonderful children…… Yeah! Right! The peace and tranquility lasted all of two minutes then we were back to “are we there yet?” I check the time I check the mileage Um I’m doing pretty well Ok let’s play a game. One of my favorite games growing up was Count the Cows. Very easy game, you count cows. The car gets divided in two; Driver’s side against Passenger’s side and the side with the most cows at the end of the trip wins. The catch is if you pass a graveyard then you lose all your cows. Get it? Good game right? Just one thing we don’t have cows in UAE but we do have camels, cows-camels same difference and graveyards are not near the roads so they would be hard to spot…uumm gas stations are just as rare so we’ll use that. The boys love the idea and soon we are counting camels and looking out for the dreaded gas stations. This game got us almost all the way to our destination and I sure was glad to see the end of the road.
It just made me think how lucky I was to grow-up where and with whom I did. One thing that I worry about is my children growing up in a place that is so different then where I did. Yeah, the summers are hot here and there are not as many activities for them. But, we had a wonderful time on our road trip even if we did have to count camels.
Till next time,
Shamsa
1 comment:
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Interesting games that you played with your kids during the trip. Counting camels must be very fun! I have been to Abu Dhabi & Dubai many many yrs back. It is beautiful.
Singapore is a very small country so we never had any long trips unless driving to Malaysia.
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