Airplane Busy Bag for a 7 Year Old

One of my favorite parts about traveling when I was a child was the bag full of surprises my mom packed for me! Whether it was a flight to Texas or Virginia (from California) for a family reunion, a road trip business trip with mom a few hours away or a trip to Disneyland - my mom always had goodies, non tablet or DVD goodies, for us.
My friend's stepson was visiting for a few weeks this summer and I decided to make him a Busy Bag for his direct, 2 hour flight from Tennessee to Missouri so he wasn't hungry or bored. Older kids are easier than toddlers and babies when it comes to traveling; they don't need things like diapers, wipes, baby formula or baby food. But even though they are easily entertained by their fidget spinners (seriously, what is that all about?!) I took it upon myself to create an inexpensive, yet entertaining Older Kid Busy Bag.

The bag itself is from Wal-Mart, they had a few backpacks on the sales rack at $2.50 - just perfect for this! Then we went to the clearance section (always need to!) and we found a Spider Man puzzle and then my oldest picked out a Hot Wheel car for him. And they had some school supplies already out and on sale, so we picked up some color crayons.
Next we went to the Dollar Store to find some snacks and toys. We got a magnet doodle thing, a coloring book, Silly Putty, one of those dollar grab n pack character coloring packs in Sponge-Bob, then some of his favorite snacks and the lollipops are from my pantry.
The whole thing cost me less than $20 and I made the kid's airplane ride better. Simple, inexpensive and effective 👍