September 29, 2015
How to Pack Light when Traveling with a Baby

Last spring, Theo and I made a five day trip to San Francisco. It was a really intense trip for a college friend's memorial service and to meet a childhood friend's newborn baby. We were all over the Bay Area, from the hot sun to fog, plus I had to bring my laptop so I could work every morning. It's never been my forte, but I totally nailed packing light! All the essentials - and what to leave at home - straight ahead.


I took four pieces. My Longchamp travel bag, my purse, our Fjällräven backpack and our Maclaren stroller. Instead of packing a blanket, I let a cardigan or scarf double as a blanket during the trip. While we were in motion, I hooked the Longchamp bag over the handles of the stroller and stood the backpack in the carry basket underneath. The carry basket is only designed to carry 5 pounds, but if the backpack stands vertically on the frame beneath the basket, it's very secure. My purse went over my shoulder. After doing that over some of San Francisco's famous hills, I felt very fit!
Here is what I packed in each bag:

In the backpack, I had our laptop and battery cords. I also had a ziploc with some of Theo's favorite baby food and snacks, two bibs, Wet Ones for wiping off tray tables, restaurant tables and highchairs, a couple feeding spoons, our favorite head to toe baby wipes and a few teething toys. Naturally, there were also diapers, the world's best spill proof sippy cup for Mr. T and my beloved bkr bottle for myself. Finally, I always bring along an expandable reusable bag in case we run out of space due to shopping. ;) At a sidewalk sale in Zurich, I got a really chic Oilily one that I absolutely love. It zips into a flat square, but has leather handles and feels like a real tote bag. During travel, we kept this backpack accessible along with my purse underneath the seat in front of us and put the Longchamp in the overhead bin.

In my purse, I brought a book to read while Theo slept on me, sunglasses, my zippered pouch with lip glosses, hand lotions, eye drops, and Epi-Pen (very important!), my wallet, more Wet Ones, a pack of travel wipes and my phone. Whenever traveling, I always take a purse that has a hook to clip my keys onto. Keys are so easy to lose when you're not actually using them!

Finally, in the Longchamp, we had to cram five days' worth of clothing for two people in two very different climates. Driving into San Francisco from the East Bay is always a shocker. "Welcome to winter!," the fog seems to call out. I brought one pair of jeans, one pair of chinos, a dress, a couple cardigans and scarves (which doubled as baby blankets when they weren't being worn) and tops for each day. Obviously a baby isn't going to wear clothes more than once, but luckily his clothes folded up nicely and didn't hog much room. It's kind of dorky, but I always plan out my outfits on the back of an envelope or other scratch paper. That way, I pack enough, but don't overpack. It's foolproof!

It all worked out great. Every morning, Theo and I got up and hiked our way toward my friend Kate's neighborhood. Here we are going up...

And down the other side! Thankfully, a friend of Kate and her husband Ryan allowed us to house sit. It was the most beautiful Victorian and we had it all to ourselves. Embarrassingly, I was super afraid to be there alone at night. I found myself wishing we could just crash on my friend's couch instead! Silly.

I found a cozy little cafe to work from and Theo slept outside. The seemingly unattended stroller caused many an alarmed head jerk.


I adore San Francisco! After working for the morning, Theo and I would head up to Kate's house and we'd hang out for a while and then all go out to lunch together.

Getting out of the house with two babies and two strollers was ridiculous! City living. Sheesh!

One day, we had lunch at Tacolicious. Have you been? It was so fantastic. So delicious and pretty and dreamy! Theo napped under my scarf for the beginning of the meal.

Then he joined right in on the action and had some beans and rice and pulled pork for himself. As you can see, he also sampled the table. Good thing for those Wet Ones wipes!

With a baby Theo's age (8 1/2 months here) it's just so much easier to let them eat off of the table. But I do feel good knowing I've disinfected it first!


He slept most of the plane ride back to Minnesota all snuggled up with my sweatshirt and scarf. It helps babies sleep when they have something that smells like their mama to cuddle up with.

When he woke up, the flight attendant stole him and took him on tour. Theo absolutely loved it! Really, he was smiling and laughing at everyone - and trying to grab their hats off their heads!

The only thing I forgot, that I will definitely remember on our trip to Zurich, was the Ergo baby carrier. It makes collapsing the stroller and putting it in a gate check bag so much easier when you don't have a crawling baby to chase after. Other than that, it was a really easy trip and I wasn't overburdened by a bunch of stuff to haul around. That's always the worst and ruins a trip for me! I'll always pack light from now on.
How do you pack for travel? Have you learned to pack light? Or do you bring it all?



How do you help your children achieve independence in food prep? Or do you? I constantly have to remind myself that she's capable of so much more than we realize!

Here are a few links for you:
Amazing satellite images of humans' impact on the earth.
Pasta shapes do matter!
Brain-twisting images.
Coco's Halloween costume. (And Theo's!)
Renting in another ten years.
Another reason you wish you were Norwegian.
Do you eat your veggies?
Outside the frame.
Empowering mothers.
Perfect fall booties.
I hope your weekend is amazing. See you back here Monday! xo
Photo via veryeatalian.

Has your life ever been a complete and total wreck? Before last year, I thought I knew what it felt like to be overwhelmed, or maxed out. But as it turns out, I did not! Up until then, I had been busy, I had been stretched a bit thin, I had bitten off a bit more than I could chew, but I had never been overwhelmed or maxed out. People throw around those terms casually. I used to do it myself! Looking back, I realize that I had never known my own limits until last year happened. I was going along, juggling everything life threw at me with relative ease. I was feeling pretty good, adding balls bit by bit and then, suddenly there was one, or two, or five balls too many and I could not do it. I literally could not keep all the balls in the air. They started falling, to the ground, bouncing around, rolling out of my reach, and that was it. I was overwhelmed. I was maxed out. And it was all I could do to just keep the really critical, important "balls" in the air. Have you ever experienced that? I'm still gathering all the balls that got away.
This morning, I woke up early enough to call Switzerland and took care of some loose ends that had been bothering me and keeping me awake at night since we left. It feels so good.
Next, I have decided to start planning and searching for a really cute fall/winter capsule wardrobe. Have you ever made a capsule wardrobe? This fall, I want to wear lots of red and warm, cozy textures. I am in love with the tights and scarf in this photo. I also want to start wearing more boots and skinny jeans and some day I'll acquire a classic trench.
We also got our Y membership all set up last week! It's the best thing ever to drop the kids at the Childwatch, work out while listening to a podcast or music and then take a long, hot shower all by myself before picking them up again and heading home.
All of these steps are more progress in the right direction. Goodbye, loose ends! Hello, organized and happy fall. I know spring is the time of year we are supposed to feel inspired and get our ducks in a row, but fall always does it for me. Perpetual teacher, I guess, or maybe it's because I was born in the fall? Whatever the reason, I'm so happy to be feeling inspired and come out of the fog.
Photo via Manger
Photo via Manger

When Coco and I left Zurich to move to Minnesota, it was all so rushed. We really did leave without saying goodbye and it's been killing me ever since.
Somehow, we managed to get through last year, and then we made the move to Spokane, and slowly, the dust has been settling. Not too long ago, toward the end of the summer, I saw a friend post about the Zurich Writers Workshop on Facebook and I really wanted to go.
Of course, it's a terrible time to go! J and I are both still unemployed and looking for work, and despite the airline miles we had from our time in Zurich, I was worried that traveling would affect my unemployment. So I gave the Unemployment Office in Minnesota a call, and it turns out that traveling to attend a workshop and network with editors and publishers is completely allowed and won't affect my unemployment at all. Well, there you go. Nothing is holding me back.
Theo and I are going to Zurich. We're really going. I'll be attending the Zurich Writers Workshop and networking during our stay. I'll get to see my beloved friends, Theo is going to meet his baby friends whose mothers and I shared our pregnancies. I'm going to visit our old neighborhood, stroll through its streets as I once did with Coco, shop at our old grocery store, mail J and Coco a postcard or two from our old post office, walk by the lake, breathe it all in, arrange to visit our old apartment and give it a big hug. I'm going to do all this in the hopes of saying goodbye, of letting it go, of moving on.
One way or another, if we are to move forward in this life, I must do this. I hope that being there, I will realize that I am back where I belong being in Spokane. I hope that I will remember all of the reasons I believed Zurich was never a long-term possibility in the first place. Because I sure can't now. Is our life there all gone? Is it still there? Is there any hope of touching it or claiming it once again? There is only one way to know. Away we go.

Zurich Airport photo via Airviation. Tiefenbrunnen photo via Martin Strobach.
Do you let your kids get dirty? Do they spend time outside collecting nuts and leaves and chasing squirrels? This past week, the Oxford Junior Dictionary opted to remove dozens of nature words like 'acorn' and 'minnow' from their latest edition and add tech words like 'broadband' and 'chatroom' in their place. This is worrisome.
Montessori honestly didn't say much about children being outside and getting dirty or being in nature. On the one hand, she didn't have to, and on the other hand, it was completely irrelevant.

What's happening where you are this weekend? Around here, I'm meeting an old friend from grade school for lunch on Saturday (thanks, Facebook!) and we are taking Coco to see a children's opera of Hansel & Gretel on Sunday. She's obsessed!
And here are some links for you to peruse:
Adorable for those little sniffles and coughs..
Libraries with ukuleles?
I like this.
Air cleaning house plants.
For a sense of purpose.
Man buns. HA!
IKEA designers on Instagram.
Completely odorless and tasteless! Life changing.
I hope your weekend is wonderful! See you back here Monday. xo
Photo of forest floor via Agua Marina
One thing that made the cut is this Mom's One Line A Day memory journal.
Fall is here. Knowing it would make its entrance one night as we slept, we did our best to enjoy every last summer evening on our patio. The very last one, we had artichokes and my friend Stephanie's famous burgers. The full step by step after the jump.

When Theo was born, I realized (suddenly) that I think in kilograms and centimeters. The nurse weighed him, once she had managed to pry him from my arms, and exclaimed, "9 pounds, 9 and a half ounces!" to the cries of delight and surprise from the doctors and other nurses. Meanwhile, I smiled a half-smile and asked, "What's that in grams?!" and then, upon hearing the whopping number 4,350, burst into shocked laughter like the rest of the room.
This does not apply to adults, mind you, just babies and children. When we took Coco to Enchanted Forest, she was not allowed to ride the log ride because she isn't yet 40 inches tall. To me, 40 inches sounds really tall for a 3-year-old, so I was thinking she's doing all right at 37. But then, I converted it to centimeters and nearly fell over. Coco is only 94 centimeters?! Most 18-month-olds are taller than that. Oh dear.
So I continue to shop at H&M where the sizes are listed in centimeters, and I continue to convert Theo's height and weight each time I take him to the doctor. That little chunker at 12 months weighed more than Coco at 26 months. He was so happy to get off that scale! I will never understand Celsius and I had to convert my own weight into pounds at every prenatal check, but for babies and children, I seem stuck on metric. Just another repat problem! ;)
Have you been to Insel Ufenau? What did you think?

And here are some fun links for your weekend:
A 9/11 rainbow.
Making these for Coco's lunch next week.
Celebrities with no makeup.
Tiny bathroom help.
This guy on the ukulele is just insane.
Have you tried overnight oats?
Cities by starlight.
We got held up taking Coco to school last week!
36 hours in Portland.
This cracked me up!
One double tour, please. I'm swooning!
10 podcasts to change your life.
Can you believe it's been 14 years since September 11? It feels like yesterday. I hope you have a wonderful weekend! See you back here Monday. xo
Over the next few weeks, I'm planning to share with you our soul-crushingly beautiful and perfect Italian road trip from the Easter Holidays in 2014. Coco was older, and hooked on Peppa Pig and the iPad, so unlike our first road trip experience with her, it was completely wonderful. First up, The Blue Grotto.
You know those experiences you've heard so much about that you're sure it will never live up to the expectations? The Blue Grotto is one of those - and it surpassed the expectations!

The Blue Grotto is on Capri. Once you arrive on the island, there are little ticket windows on the docks for excursions, including The Blue Grotto. You have to buy tickets several times, and by the end of it, you've spent so much money it makes you groan. But, The Blue Grotto is so brilliant, you won't remember! I am happy to say that I cannot recall the price of the tickets today. :) You buy your first tickets, and a few minutes later, you're on a speed boat zooming through the sea.
Then begins the waiting. You sit and bob around on the speed boat for a very long time once you get there. There are loads of other boats around, as well as a zig-zagging stair case coming down the cliff, loaded with people waiting who came via bus or taxi over land. Getting to the Blue Grotto is the first hurdle, and every step of the way, you're reminded that you might not actually get to go into the Grotto. No refunds. Happily, a few minutes after this photo, I remembered I had an umbrella in my bag. That sunlight was intense, even in April.
Finally, our boat was called forward. The little gondola-like rowboats pull up alongside of the speed boats and the gondoliers help everyone in. Each party gets their own rowboat. Next, you pay again. I can't even imagine how much cash those guys had in that little boat!
Then you're off! Everyone in the boat has to lie down to go through the tiny entry to the Grotto. The gondolier times it with the waves, and when the wave is down, with a big thrust, he points the boat into the hole and swiftly grabs a chain that's running along the top of the tunnel-like hole to yank the boat through before the next wave, which would crash all our heads into the rock! Impossible to photograph.
Once inside, the glowing blue of the water absolutely takes your breath away! It was more arresting than anything I'd ever seen before. J's first words were, "Take a picture of that!"
The tour is quick, just a few minutes long. But once all of the boats are inside for that particular tour, the gondoliers burst into song and it echoes and reverberates inside the cave. All the while, the glowing, blue water is gently splashing and moving beneath you. It's absolutely magical. I totally cried!
It's super dark in there, except for the glow of the water. Coco was amazed, if not a little scared and held on tightly to J.
You go out the same way you came in, except on the way out, you're beyond exhilarated and experiencing the most joyous of natural highs!
It was totally worth the wads of cash and long wait. If we ever go back, we will definitely do it again! Have you been to The Blue Grotto? Did you absolutely love it?
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