Printables for Road Trips

My daughter — who is almost nine and has an opinion about everything — thinks that the license plate game is too difficult, because there is no way you could see all 50 states’ license plates, no matter how long you were in the car.

She maybe has a point, but clearing the table isn’t really the point. It’s more about observing and seeing what you can see.

But I think she’s really going to want some regular bingo-style cards with state names on them so we can play real license plate bingo.

I actually couldn’t find any online so I’ll have to make them myself.

If you’re more of a traditionalist when it comes to “license plate bingo,” you’ll find a graphic version along with other road trip printables at Laura’s Crafty Life.

Or add to the challenge by giving kids a United States map and having them color in the states whose license plates they see. This version is from Everyday Wanderer.

Another version of the license plate scavenger hunt and other scavenger hunts you can play in the car can be found at the Resourceful Mama.

How do you play the license plate game with your kids?

Several countries have a day set aside to honor and recognize their inventors, but Nov. 9 is a special one that’s known as Tag der Erfinder in German. It’s celebrated in Germany, Austria and Switzerland and it falls on Nov. 9 because that’s the birthday of Hedy Lamarr.

Hedy Lamarr is widely known as an actress but there’s a lot more to her story. You can get a little of it geared to little kids in the Little People, Big Dreams book Hedy Lamarr (32 pages, hardcover, published 2023 by Frances Lincoln Childrens Books, suggested retail price $15.99).

The book explores her birth in Austria and how she spent time when she was young coming up with inventions. She became an actress, married an arms dealer, made her escape to America and became an actress again.

But she also helped develop a frequency-hopping signal device for airplanes that was used by the Americans and their allies during World War II. That technology became the basis for wireless technology such as wifi and GPS.

While Inventor’s Day is a great time to learn about Hedy Lamarr, you can take this opportunity to check out books and do little studies on lots of different inventors. If there’s an inventor or an invention your child is particularly interested in, that’s a great place to start. It’s fun to think about all the things we use every day that didn’t always exist; someone had to invent them!

For a start here at Craft Gossip you can learn more about Garrett Morgan, who invented traffic lights; Maria Oroso, who developed a clay oven that could cook food without electricity; and more female inventors and scientists.

And for more general inventors’ fun, check out this inventors word search from Fun Findery (and another from Let’s Do Puzzles) or take a quiz on inventors and their inventions from Flanders Family Home Life.

Have you read?

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