What I Keep in My Car to Survive Life With Kids

I spend a ridiculous amount of time in my car. Between school, church, football, dance, appointments, practices, errands, and all the random in-between time where it makes absolutely no sense to go home before the next thing, we basically live in there.

With four kids, I have learned that being prepared makes life a whole lot easier. Have I also learned how to keep a beautifully organized vehicle where everything has its own labeled container and nothing ever rolls out when I open the door?

No.

Absolutely not.

Things do possibly fall out of my car in the car line. And do I possibly just shove them back in and keep moving because there are 47 cars behind me?

Yes.

I am only human. I am trying to survive and thrive over here, and sometimes certain things just have to be pushed back.

Way back.

Preferably under the seat.

But there are a few things I intentionally keep in the car because we really do use them all the time.

1. Library Books

We almost always have library books in the car. They are easy to grab when we are sitting at a practice, waiting on an appointment, early for something, or when somebody needs something to do besides ask me how much longer every 45 seconds.

Do library books sometimes disappear under a seat and live there longer than they should?

Possibly.

Again, between me and the library.

2. The Wonder Binder

Obviously.

Honestly, one of the reasons I made the Wonder Binder was because of how much time Judy Rae spends waiting on the boys.

Football practice. Appointments. Church things. Restaurants. Whatever we have going on that day. There are a lot of times when she is just along for the ride, and three-year-olds are not exactly known for being thrilled about sitting quietly while everybody else does their thing.

I keep her binder in the car with what she needs so I can just grab it. She can trace, match, count, draw, or do whatever page she feels like doing without me having to prepare something while we are already running out the door.

That part is important.

If I have to remember 14 separate pieces before we leave, it is not coming with us.

3. Notebooks, Pencils, Erasers, and a Pencil Sharpener

Nothing special. Just plain notebooks and pencils.

They draw. They write. They play games. They make lists. They write notes to each other. They use six pieces of paper to create something that could have been accomplished with half of one.

You know. Kid stuff.

And after enough times handing somebody a pencil only to hear, “IT’S NOT SHARP,” I finally got smart and put a pencil sharpener in there too.

Also erasers because apparently simply scratching something out and moving on is unacceptable.

4. Magnets

I keep magnets because they are easy, they do not take up much space, and little kids will do a surprising amount with them.

Letters, numbers, whatever we have.

Judy Rae can match them, name them, sort them, make words, or just move them around and be happy.

I am a huge fan of anything that entertains a child without requiring me to give a 12-minute explanation first.

5. Little LEGO Sets in Pencil Boxes

This might be one of my favorite car tricks.

Take a small LEGO set or a handful of random LEGOs and put them in a plastic pencil box.

That’s it.

They can build at practices, restaurants, appointments, church, wherever.

Now, does the pencil box prevent every LEGO from ending up in the floorboard?

Of course not.

Let’s not ask it to perform miracles.

But it helps.

6. UNO

We almost always have UNO in the car.

The boys can actually play, and Judy Rae can sort the cards by color, match numbers, make piles, or create some completely different game with rules that change every 30 seconds.

It is small, easy to throw in a bag, and everybody can do something with it.

Winner.

7. Snacks. And Suckers.

I feel like snacks should probably be numbers 7 through 12.

I keep all the snacks.

Granola bars. Crackers. Fruit snacks. Whatever will survive in my car without turning into something questionable.

Because my children can finish a full meal, get into the car, and seven minutes later inform me that they are absolutely starving.

But the real secret weapon?

Suckers.

Listen. It is really hard to yell at your sibling when you are busy sucking on straight sugar.

There. I said it.

Is this groundbreaking parenting research?

No.

Is there a time when handing everybody a sucker has changed the entire mood of my vehicle?

Yes.

Choose your battles, people.

8. A Change of Clothes for Everybody

And I mean everybody.

Including me.

I have four children. I have seen too much.

Mud. Water. Drinks. Carsickness. Bathroom accidents. Food. Mystery substances. Things that should never have resulted in somebody being completely soaked somehow resulting in somebody being completely soaked.

Everybody has extra clothes.

Underwear. Socks. The whole thing.

And I finally learned to keep something for myself because apparently moms are not magically protected from all of the above.

9. A Sweater and a Blanket

It can be 98 degrees outside.

We will walk into a restaurant and within two minutes somebody will say, “Mama, I’m freezing.”

Without fail.

So there is a sweater.

There is also a blanket because blankets somehow solve approximately 75% of childhood emergencies.

Cold? Blanket.

Tired? Blanket.

Sitting at practice? Blanket.

Want to make a fort for absolutely no reason while we are waiting? Apparently also blanket.

10. Baby Dolls, Barbies, and Polly Pockets

These rotate because I do try to maintain at least a tiny bit of control over how much of our house migrates into my car.

Some weeks it is a baby doll. Sometimes Barbies. Sometimes Polly Pockets.

And sometimes I look in the back seat and realize apparently the entire playroom came with us anyway.

It happens.

11. Bandaids and Baby Wipes

These are non-negotiable.

Sometimes a baby wipe and a bandaid solve the world’s problems.

That’s it.

That’s the treatment plan.

There may not even be blood. There may barely be a mark. But you wipe it off with a baby wipe, slap a bandaid on it, and somehow life is okay again.

Magic.

And honestly, baby wipes deserve their own award because kids are sticky.

Sometimes there is a very clear reason they are sticky.

Sometimes there is absolutely no reason they should be sticky.

And yet…they are.

Hands. Faces. Legs. Car seats. Cup holders. Random mystery spots.

Baby wipes.

Always baby wipes.

12. Tylenol

For them.

And for me.

Because headaches make for grumpy people, and nobody needs that when we still have three more places to be.

This is one of those things I would rather have and not need than suddenly be 30 minutes from home wishing I had it.

13. A Spare Fork and Straw

This sounds ridiculous until the drive-through forgets one.

Or someone loses theirs.

Or the straw somehow disappears between the window and the back seat even though we have been in the car for approximately nine seconds.

So yes.

I keep a spare fork.

And a straw.

Because sometimes the difference between a peaceful drive and a full-blown meltdown is whether somebody can actually eat the food we just bought.

14. Trash

I know technically this is not something I intentionally keep in my car.

But if we are being truthful, it absolutely belongs on the list.

Snack wrappers. Receipts. Water bottles. School papers. Church papers. Broken crayons. A random sock. Things nobody claims even though clearly one of the four children sitting behind me put it there.

And yes, sometimes I open the door and something falls out.

I see you, fellow car-line moms.

Just push it back in.

Way back.

We will deal with it later.

Probably.

The truth is, I do not keep all of this stuff in the car because I think my kids need to be entertained every second. They don’t. Sometimes they need to sit. Sometimes they need to look out the window. Sometimes they need to figure out how to be bored without acting like they have been personally wronged.

But we spend a lot of time going places together, and there are also plenty of times when one kid has somewhere to be and everybody else is just along for the ride.

So I like having options.

My car is not perfectly organized. It is definitely not spotless. There are probably crushed Goldfish in places I will not discover until I trade the thing in one day.

But there are also books to read, things to build, paper to draw on, clothes when somebody needs them, enough snacks to survive a small emergency, baby wipes for every unexplained sticky situation, and suckers for when everybody needs to stop talking for a minute.

And honestly, that is about as organized as this season of life is going to get.