The Great American Road Trip

For those of you who don't know, I'm going on a road trip this summer with all 4 kids and my mom.  It's going to be 3 weeks of adventure in June.  Tony is staying behind because he has to work. 

During those 3 weeks we will be driving from sunny So Cal to Tennessee, to Florida, and back.  Tennessee is in the trip because I'm going to the Clever Container national conference, then in Florida we will be dropping Becca off for a week for her missions trip with Teen Missions International.  The rest of us will be wandering around Florida for the week and having fun, then we will pick her up and start the drive back home.  Sounds fun, right?

Here are some of the challenges for planning this thing:

1. Traveling across the country with 4 kids.  Yeah, that's pretty much the biggest one.  We will be spending a LOT of time in the car and I'm constantly searching for things to do to keep them occupied that don't take up too much space.  We don't have a DVD player in the van, so that may keep things interesting.  It does have quite a few plugs for the kids' game boys and stuff.  Becca can get carsick sometimes, so that should make things interesting too.

2. Micah's diet.  We will be working with gluten free and casein free foods on the road.  Chex mix is my friend!  I'm looking forward to the times when we can hit farmers markets for some really fresh stuff that all of us can enjoy.

3. Budget.  Money is tighter than we originally thought it was going to be.  I'm bummed because we will be spending the week in Orlando and not going to Disney World, but we will survive.  It's going to be interesting trying to do a long road trip without eating out much.  The kids' clothes are coming from a thrift store or the sewing machine.  Hand me downs are also our friends.  We are also tent camping for the majority of the trip to make things a bit more budget friendly.

So, anyone have any suggestions?   Do you have a favorite cheap thing to do in Florida, Nashville, Oklahoma or southern Texas (those are our main stops)?  Ideas on what I should have the kids do in the car?  Favorite camping recipe that I can make GF/CF?  What do you think?