Stock Up For Your Family Holiday Road Trip With These Top Dollar General Finds All For Under $30

The open road during the winter season—a perfect time to escape the hustle and bustle, crank up the yuletide tunes, and embrace the adventure of a holiday road trip. This year, we’re driving 10 hours to meet halfway with our family on the Oregon coast. Wish us luck???

At this point, I consider ourselves professional road trippers, so we have all kinds of things to do on a road trip to save our sanity. What do we know to be true? No holiday road trip is complete without a few essential items to make your journey comfortable, fun, and, most importantly, festive.

This year, we stopped by Dollar General as our one-stop shop for a selection of budget-friendly and cheerful items to elevate our holiday getaway on wheels. I challenged myself not to spend more than $30, which, truth be told, is not hard to do since Dollar General offers fantastic deals. In addition to what I bought; I also included some extra options that could be right for your family. At the end, I go over everything that I personally bought and the cost breakdown to stay within our $30 budget.

Let’s dive into our family holiday road trip packing list to keep your car merry and bright all season long!

The Ultimate Family Holiday Travel Packing List

1. Festive Snacks for the Road

No road trip is complete without snacks. Food is the answer to everything. But during the holiday season, why settle for the usual? The holidays are a fun time to revel in peppermint everything. Dollar General offers a variety of fun, festive snacks, from Clover Valley Fudge Mint Cookies to national brand favorites like mint Oreos that are perfect for munching while you’re cruising.

Our Top Picks

• Good & Smart Whole Cashews: These are perfect for a healthy, protein-packed snack. We do our best to offer something more nourishing, and these cashews are a great fit. They’re an excellent option for keeping your energy up on the road, and they’re less than two dollars. What more can I say?
• Clover Valley Mountain Trail Mix: If your family needs a little hint of sweet, try this protein trail mix packed with nuts, seeds, raisins, and chocolates.
• Nature’s Bakery Fig Bars: A sweet option that won’t overload your child with a sugar high.
• Fruit: It’s always hard to get fresh snacks while on the road but our Dollar General offers a great selection of produce, and we were able to stock up on fresh fruit options like apples, bananas, and grapes.
• Peppermint Bark: A sweet and seasonal treat that will help get everyone into the season.
• Chocolate Mint Marshmallows: We are all about hot chocolate season, so we go all in on any excuse to make it even more fun. So yes, we made sure to get the chocolate mint marshmallows.

Check out our complete road trip food list for more snack inspiration.

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2. Entertainment

Next up on the hierarchy of things you need on a holiday road trip is going to be entertainment for the ride. While old standbys you might already have at home can work, sometimes I find that getting a few new things they haven’t played with can help your kids stay entertained for longer.

Top Picks:

• Coloring Books: Dollar General has a great collection of coloring books, from branded Disney character books to more advanced artsy coloring books like this Bendon Coffee Coloring Book. All of the books were under $3. You can also stock up on crayons and colored pencils.
• Word Search and Puzzle Books: If your kids aren’t the coloring book type, they might enjoy a booklet of fun games like search and find, mazes, or word search. We chose the Harry Potter Search and Find Adventure for our son.
• No Mess Water Books: Melissa & Doug’s Water Reveal Books are fantastic for road trips with toddlers who aren’t quite ready for puzzle books.
• Earbuds: We found earbuds for under $5! I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to buy expensive earbuds for my accident-prone child. These are a must-have for kids playing video games or listening to kids’ podcasts. They’re perfect if you don’t want to listen to Pokémon the entire ride!

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3. Holiday Toys

Since we’re traveling by car, we wanted to pick up a few small stocking stuffers and toys for our family.

Top Picks:

• LEGOs: Is there a more perfect toy for kids than LEGOs? They’re creative, they stimulate their engineer brains, and they can do it independently! We seriously contemplated buying the LEGO camera set they have at the store, but it was $20 and just out of our budget this time.
• Hot Wheels: The perfect stocking stuffer you can easily hide in your luggage.
• Hasbro Mini Games: We are a board game family, and these mini games are perfect for travel. You can bring them to the grandparents’ house or a rental home over the holidays. We opted for Guess Who, but they also had Connect 4, Hungry Hungry Hippos, and Monopoly.

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3. Stay Cozy and Comfortable

Let’s face it: riding in a car for a long time isn’t exactly the height of comfort. One way to make it better is to bring in cozy elements. With the winter chill, we like to bring things that make our family feel snuggly and warm.

Top Picks:

• Holiday-Themed Travel Blankets: A soft, warm blanket with festive designs like snowflakes or Christmas trees to keep you toasty during long drives.
• Fuzzy Socks + Slippers: Keep your feet warm and stylish with holiday-themed fuzzy socks or slippers.
• Squishmallows: Is your child as obsessed with squishmallows as ours? Dollar General has a fun collection of squishmallows for under $5. I like that it can double up as a pillow in the car and is also a fun toy for cuddling.

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5. Essential Road Trip Supplies

Lastly, don’t forget those practical road trip essentials. Dollar General is a treasure trove of items that can make your journey more organized and hassle-free.

Top Picks:

• Phone Chargers: Extra USB cords and portable chargers are essential for keeping your devices powered throughout the trip.
• Window Scraper: Don’t be like us and try to use a kitchen spatula to get ice off your car. Be ready for winter conditions with an ice scraper for your window.
• Wiper Fluid: If your family holiday road trip involves driving in snowy conditions, you’ll need plenty of wiper fluid to keep your windshield clear and visible.
• Travel Organizer: Keep all your small essentials neatly packed with a travel organizer.
• Zarbees: Travel, winter, and the hustle and bustle of the holidays can often mean sick kids. We picked up some Zarbees cough syrup to prepare for the cold season on the road.
• First Aid Kit: Be prepared for minor bumps and scrapes with an affordable first aid kit.

READ NEXT: Check out our complete list of road trip essentials.

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Our Holiday Road Trip Picks from Dollar General

Here’s a quick breakdown of everything we were able to buy for our holiday road trip with a budget of $30.

Forty-five cents over budget is not too shabby! Although, now we do want to go back and get the LEGO Camera Set.

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Who’s ready to hit the road? With these simple and festive picks from Dollar General, I hope your holiday road trip will be a little more festive and a lot less “Are we there yet?” So, stock up, pack the car, and let the holiday road trip adventures begin.

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