Getting Ready

Yesterday while my kids were destroying my house and my kithen sink filled up with more dishes, I packed. What a tedious job. When are the airlines going to get with the program like the post office: "if it fits, it ships". Weight limits on carry-ons??? Seriously, that stinks. My carry on has NEVER been weighed... but once. And man, oh man could we have been in trouble.

On our trip to Ethiopia last summer, we stayed in Amsterdam for two days. When we left Amsterdam, they weighed Ryan's carry-on. Since my amazing husband is also way strong, he had the bulk of the weight in his carry-on. So, we took some out of his and moved it into mine. That one time, it could have mattered. So now, I pay close attention to the weight restriction.

A limit of 17 lbs for a carry-on stinks! It's horrible. I so could have packed ALL my clothes into my carry-on if it weren't for the 17 lb limit. Now instead of a neatly, tightly packed carryon that doesn't allow for crap to move, I have a 3/4 full carry-on where stuff is going to move around. So annoying to this slightly OCD person. And worse than that, it meant that I had to put some additional stuff into my checked luggage which means less room for donations.

Oh well, I guess I should get over it. The thing that really bugs me is if they're not going to check, then I would prefer to just fill my carry-on and let it be over by 3 lbs and be less stressed about it. Have you ever seen the commercial where someone is checking in for a flight and has layers and layers of clothes because of the weight limit of the bags. That's so going to be me on Tuesday. I'm going to have my sweatshirt on and every pocket filled with snacks, make-up, etc. Ug, so retarded... the rule that is.

Anyway, we're all packed. Mostly. Yesterday I packed myself and the kids. This morning I dropped the kids' stuff off at my mom's. Bethany had to pack every dolly she could find in her room! Ryan, well, he's packing right now. He carried the suitcases down the stairs for the 4th time lately. I had determined that we weren't using our luggage cause it was just too heavy. The big suitcase weighs 17 pounds. So, we've packed in smaller canvas luggage. I wanted to do the rubbermaids but Ryan didn't want to carry those suckers around at the airport. Down to our last bag to pack, we might have to move to the big suitcase and give up weight for cubic inches of space. I have about 15 pairs of crocs left to get packed. They don't weigh much at all but they take up space. And Ryan has 150 blade/needle/surgery things (sorry can't remember the techy term) and they weigh nothing but take up space too. So, we'll see what we get accomplished.

By the way, Ryan just came down and weighed his carry-on. It holds our camera equipment, and the laptop. It weighed 18.5 pounds. I told him to just go with it. Pray with us that our checked luggage makes it through customs (lots of vet meds that are worth moola) and that our carry-ons don't get weighed :)

Ciao.