Preparing for my 3- week out of town trip was one thing for my business and another for me personally. I had never been out of town more than a week up until this point (and we are talking ever) so this was exciting and a bit of a challenge for me. I was excited to be going on this adventure with my family, considering my twins are going into their Senior Year of High School this year and yet apprehensive (the nervous Nelly in me). Would our flights be cancelled would they lose our luggage (always a HUGE fear for me), would we get sick abroad, would our family back home be OK and so many other unsubstantiated worries that had no reason to be in my head. So, I took control over what I could, and I let the rest go (I know easier said than done). What did I do? 

1.      I started packing a month early. I packed, then unpacked (removed things I “really” didn’t need, then packed again and then you guessed it unpacked again because I had been reading all over Facebook groups that people in Europe had only been wearing darker colors and if you wore bright colors (it broke my heart no Lilly Pulitzer for me) that you would stick out and look like a tourist. So, after I had packed all my darker colors I had to unpack because they were now wearing color again!!! So, I packed mostly pinks and a few darker colors (just in case) and dang it I threw in some Lilly Pulitzer! 

2.      I sat down with my family, and we made a thorough list of all the places we wanted to visit and those we chose to skip. This made a huge difference in what we did and how we planned our trip. We really did not do any research online as to what others were saying because again, we wanted to try and make this tip ours. I suggest making a list of the things you (1) want to see for sure (2) things you want to see if you have time (3) things that are not really on your list. Once you have this complete you can then have a clear and concise itinerary for your trip (be sure to add in some down time as I wish we would have)

3.      After you have made all of your plans, gather all of your documents (think planes, trains and automobiles) and organize them by dates, so you never lose anything. Then assign them to one person who is traveling with you (if you are traveling with your family) that way kids do not have to worry about losing their tickets or passports or other important documents. I would also suggest aside from keeping them as paper documents to also keep them as digital documents just in case something does get lost.

These 3 steps gave me peace of mind as we left for our trip.