I’ve said it before (many times)….my kids get car sick. On any given trip, at least one will throw up. My oldest has grown out of most of it, but he still occasionally blows chunks. The two year old? It’s a regular occurrence for her.

I’ve found that one hour seems to be the magic puke-free length of time. It’s really not enough to get us very far, especially since we live in the sticks, but it’s doable for a day-long outing or weekend. And if it’s going to be longer than an hour? We crush up half a dramamine for each of them and we have a nice, quiet drive while everyone sleeps (it’s almost like Heaven on earth, really).

But for a mini road trip, with Memorial Day looming last week, and no plans (save for a family gathering on Monday), I decided that we should do something fun (with everyone awake). What are the kids always begging to do? Stay at a hotel. We’d use our Groupon to the Oz Museum in Wamego and make a weekend of it.

The fun thing about taking a mini road trip 45 minutes away is that you can be totally relaxed about when to leave and what you do, and still have tons of time to have fun. (I did take the Solar’s advice and pack everything the night before so there was way less stress the morning of.)

We started out at the Kansas Children’s Discovery Center in Topeka (which the kids LOVED). There was so much to do there, but it wasn’t overwhelming.

Our next stop was the hotel. (Yes, we did stay at a hotel 45 minutes from our house, and it was fabulous) We stayed in a huge room with almost no one else there (it seemed). After the kids bounced on the beds, had a snack and played with their pool noodles for a while, Little Erv took a nap while I took the big three swimming.

After the first swim, we came back to the room and ordered Godfathers pizza (one gluten free, two regular), hung out for a while, then we all six went swimming again (still no one else in the pool!).

The next morning, we ate breakfast, swam again, and loaded up. Check out was at 11am, so we decided to hang around Topeka and eat lunch after riding the park train and playing for a while (restaurant choices are limited in the Midwest when you need gluten free, and as far as we know, Wamego has none…or at least, no major chains that offer it).

After lunch, we headed to the Oz Museum (or, as the kids called it “the Dorothy place”). They haven’t seen the movie, but they’ve talked at length about it to my mom. The girls and T even “rode” in the tornado tube.

The museum didn’t take as long as I thought it might (we were only there an hour, at most), so we tried to find something more to do. The “Bison Experience” was no where to be found (except on the city map), so we headed back towards Topeka. We thought we’d able to make a stop at the Topeka zoo, but realized we’d only have an hour there. So, T and I decided to make a pit stop at Dillons for a potty break and gluten free buns (SO not worth $1 a piece, by the way) and go home to play in the sprinkler and grill hot dogs (not at the same time).

It actually turned out to be a great, relaxed summer “vacation”, and I credit the Road Trippin’ Mini Adventure Guide for a lot of great tips and out of the box ideas. I don’t think I would have considered the part planned, part totally played by ear trip without the inspiration of this road trip resource. Plus, we checked AT LEAST three things off of our Summer Bucket List in one weekend!

I was given a copy of the Mini Adventure Guide to review, but this post was NOT compensated, and all opinions, plans, dramamine-free adventures are my own. Check out The Happy Family Movement for tons of ideas for the summer, or a happy family in general.