Travel Prep For a Busy Toddler

Little Girl and I are preparing for a trip to see my parents this week. Airplane trips are never fun but with an active 18-month-old, I'm not exactly looking forward to hours on a plane. When we flew before she was barely crawling; no big deal. Now she's walking, talking, running, squirming...what to do for 3+ hours with a toddler on your lap?
I don't think kids are ever really too young to learn something new. From the time they are born, they start discovering things and imitating what they see. It's all a matter of what you expose them to and help them with. While I am taking some fun new toys (princess stickers, My Little Pony {her first!}, a necklace) I'm also loading up on educational coloring pages.
One of Little Girl's favorite things is coloring. She also loves saying the alphabet, not in order but she knows quite a few letters. On Pinterest, I have found many links to homeschool blogs and school websites that offer free alphabet, number, animal, etc. coloring pages. Just print them off! Let me show you what I've been doing this morning:

http://www.livingston.org/Page/384 From this site, you can print off coloring pages of famous artwork (Van Gogh, Da Vinci, Monet). Just click on the picture you want and print.

http://www.sheknows.com/kids-activity-center/coloring-pages SheKnows has loads of information about a variety of topics: decor, beauty/fashion, moms, gardens, kids....For coloring pages alone, you can choose animals, seasons/weather, food, world/maps...amazing resource. Once we start homeschooling in earnest, I'm going to be using this site often.

http://www.mrprintables.com/alphabet-coloring-pages.html Again, another amazing site for moms and teachers. I used the Alphabet Coloring Pages (which you can use upper or lower case in English or Spanish). There are also printable customizable calendars, flashcards, games, maps. Just check out the site and make sure you have plenty of blank paper ready!

Because I don't want to cart reams of paper onto the plane, I printed images on both sides of the paper. Then I used by three-hole punch and stuck everything into a folder. You can laminate or use plastic slipcovers and color with a dry-erase marker to get multiple uses out of one printout but Little Girl isn't quite ready for any kind of marker!

And we're (partly) ready to head off!! What do you do to keep kids occupied on a trip?