travel | soholdfast

Sorry for the absence to my legion of 5 devoted readers, but last week me and my trio of cuteness were in survival mode. Daddy was out of town. He left Sunday morning before I usually am even out of bed and didn’t come back until bedtime on Friday night. Throw into the mix that the twins go to school at Daddy’s work which is 45 minutes from our house and Mommy had a long week. There are so many people who volunteered to help, but when they are already cranky because Daddy’s gone, throwing help into the mix just turns out to be more work because it messes up their schedule.

I realized at the end of the week when Daddy got back and wanted to know how things went, that the week can be summed up in pictures.

Day 1: Happy is not doing well. Imagine her saying, “I miss my Daddy.”

Day 2: Picture my delight when not only do I get to drive for 90 minutes before I even get to work, but then have to drive 90 minutes after I’ve put in a full day. Imagine the utter delight added to it when the forecast was 100% rain. All Day.

Day 3: My bright idea to help the girls cope was to let them take turns staying in Mommy’s bed. While they loved it, it meant that Mommy couldn’t really do much until the little one of the night was asleep. On Day 3, it was Cranky and she didn’t kick it until 9:30pm, 2.5 hours past her bedtime. Mommy did not get up after this!

Day 4: It’s going downhill. Sweet Girl was on repeat on our drive to get the little ones, “But Mama, I’m so thirsty I’m going to die!” So I did what any parent in survival mode would do and sacrificed my Dr. Pepper.

Day 5: I don’t know where this milk came from or how long it’s been here, but on Day 5, it smells like death. Since I’m in survival mode, it doesn’t make the cut of things to get taken care of on Day 5 (or 6) and instead I just pop a new air freshener in the car.

Day 6: Someone snuck grape juice upstairs and then didn’t get the cap on tight before swinging the bottle around in a circle. Cleaning this while it was fresh did make the Day 6 cut.

Since the airlines knew what was good for them, they allowed Daddy’s flight to be on time and he made it just in time for bedtime on Friday. Did I mention we had 25 people coming over for Sweet Girl’s 6^th birthday party on Saturday at 11am?

How about a little fun today?Here’s my list of things which are necessary for travelling to eastern Europe:
1. Lots of public restrooms didn’t have toilet paper (or seats even)
Travel Flushable Wipes

Travel Toilet Paper

2. A good travel pillow – Another adoptive couple recommended these. I’m debating if they are worth the money since we have travel pillows already. They swear by the design though!
The Travel Pillow

3. Supplies to eat in your hotel room – at least breakfast
Space Saving Camp Pot – has a pot and bowls and sporks that nest inside each other.

A Freeze Dried Meal (there will be one night you just don’t want to find food

Hot Pot (what good is the food you bring if you can’t heat up water) – pack this with your food inside to save space

4. Luggage organization
XL Ziplocs – We split our clothes into 3 bags each – one outfit in the carry on and split the rest into the two suitcase bags. This way if a bag was lost, we’d have a change of clothes. We love these bags to do that since you can put clothes in them by outfit or day and then squash the air out of it like a space bag to save space. It also made it nice and organized to stack in the luggage and protected our clothes should a toiletry (or all the vodka on the way back bust).

5. Technology
Travel Adapter – you can use a travel adapter for most electronics. Things which don’t operate on dual voltage will also need a converter. This one is nice because the plugs slide in and out and it has 2 usb ports (so you can charge multiple items at once on the same plug)

Kindle – to read books on the plane and in your room – our tv didn’t even work, but if it did, it would have been in a language we don’t speak.

MacBook Air – to watch movies on the plane, blog, surf the internet. Luckily he has one for work that we were able to take. Couldn’t afford this otherwise.

And.. once we pick up sweet girl here’s some things we’ll take just for her!
1. Travel Potty – In case we’re somewhere and can’t find her a restroom or in case she’s scared of big potties in the hotel or airport.

2. Picture Dictionary – In her language so we can attempt to communicate basic needs (we’ll also sign with her!)

3. Reusable Sticker Book – Dreading 10 hours on a plane with a preschooler already – hoping this helps!

4. Kids Headphones – So she can watch movies and listen to music with headphones that fit her!

Additional items I forgot or were suggested:

1. Hi-Country Beef Jerky

2. A GOOD Camera

3. A small camera – for backup to the big one and so as not to freak your new child out on minute 1 with a huge camera in her face

4. Unlocked iPhone (add a Russian SIM for free local calls and cheaper long distance)

5. Chase Sapphire credit card – I’m a credit card snob and up until this point had two credit cards. I broke down and got the Chase Sapphire card because 1. it has no foreign transaction fees 2. it has decent rewards for travel

Also, please note that these links go through my friends, The Dismuke’s, Amazon Associates page. What does that mean? It means that the price will be the same for you, but they will earn a percentage of the sale from Amazon. Why didn’t we set one of these up? Well, easy, it’s illegal in North Carolina.

Hopefully I’ll keep adding to this page as I remember more!

soholdfast

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Tag Archives: travel

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