Whats in the Luggage?

One short flight from Denver to San Fran

One LONG layover

One LONG flight to Korea

One year

Five people

Five checked bags

Five Carry on bags

One small apartment

The question is----what do we pack?

Here is some background on me personally.  I like stuff, I collect stuff, I hide stuff, I buy stuff cause it is on sale (even if I might not use  it), I take other peoples stuff, I am sentimental about stuff.  We don't have money so when I find a great deal on something (like a coat that will fit my daughter in 5 years) I buy it and store it.....it is 'poor mentality'. You don't know if you will have the money later so you better get it now....

My house was a nightmare to pack.  I am not a candidate for 'Hoarders'  well my scary room was, but I have stuff and packing it all took forever.

We have a house that is 2000 square feet, a shop about the same size, 3 silos-medium sized, and a 3 car garage (which store our stuff for our acre of land).  Somehow in the last (almost) 8 years I have filled it with stuff (not to mention the 100 years worth of family stuff that was still in the house, the shop, the silos, and some in the garage)

WHICH makes packing for one year really hard.

Plus we are

1. Hikers

2. Homeschooling

3. Have small children

4. Will be there for all kinds of weather

5.  Have a small apartment

6. AND I am really hoping we can find a way to Pack Lucas's Banjo into our Checked Luggage

(the neck and base come apart--it could work!)

7. Crafters/art people

8.  Religious people 

Hiking: We are taking our backpacking packs as our carry ones (I am taking Wheeler's baby backpack carrier).  We have packing into those pretty down--we can use every inch, and since we aren't taking sleeping bags we will pack stuff for the plane instead of sleeping bags.

Homeschoolers:  I am finding good pinterest links to free homeschooling stuff, and scanning into our computer homeshooling books (we will convert them to CD's and just take those to print out over there). We are trying to loose a lot of the weight of the books 

Small Kids:  The girl where given a small box to fill with their favorite toys.  Wheeler has some in there too.  They each are taking a favorite stuff animal and blanket.  We won't have a lot of space in the apartment so toys will have to be small.

Weather:  We are packing our poncho's, will will buy umbrella's there, and Clothing is pretty easy---we are arriving just in time for Monsoon season.  The tempature is similar to where we live, but we are surrounded by water and humidity in 60-80% in summer--so it will feel hot and sticky to us!  

We are going to be buying winter clothes in Korea (except Lucas since his arms are so long).  Lucas will have to pack clothes for every season since he is so tall.  So clothing will be kept to minimal and more/warmer layers will be bought as the weather turns colder.

Small apartment=creative space savers.   I have been reading blogs on living in small spaces.

This is our apartment looking towards the front door-loving the pink walls!

See the kitchen to the left?

Not sure what is to the right---I am thinking it is the 2nd bedroom

They don't use walls or doors much that I can tell

This is from the front door--looking into the bedroom

The door on the left is the bathroom

We have a bathtub!  Most apartments have a shower attached above the sink in the bathroom with

a drain in the floor--when you shower everything gets wet!  You set your TP outside the bathroom door so it does't get ruined when you shower

The Kitchen--a full fridge=awesome, not all apartments have that

Notice no oven (only stove top) and no dishwasher.

Banjo=I want to pack it because when else will Lucas have this much time to play it?

Plus they are not common in Korea so we can't just buy one.

Crafter/Art People= lucky for us Korea has lots of art supplies and craft things.  Lucas will pack a sketch pad and some pencils for the plane ride, but we will buy things there---we will have to find a place to store it. They have airbrush supplies there, mostly for painting nails--who knows  maybe Lucas will start a new business.  I also packed away all his Oil Paint stuff, so looks like we will invent in some of that over there.  I have my face-paint stuff in our luggage ready to go.

Religious people:  Being LDS, we attend church services for about 3 hours on Sunday, which can be really boring in English at times, let alone in a language we don't know.  I will be bringing some church books to study while I 'attend' church. 

I feel most sorry for Pepper because I feel she might take longer to learn the language and be bored to tears every Sunday--I might "home church" them for primary.  We will see. 

I WISH this was our luggage

I have packed 'everything' (with in reason) that I would like to take, which leaves us one checked bag for all our clothes and shoes---ha ha ha!  Looks like I need to rethink what to take.

Plus our carry on's are full of things to do on the long flights--gotta rethink that too!

I have read a TON of blogs on what to pack, and what not to pack, but I still feel ill prepared! 

I will maybe do one of those cool pictures that shows exactly what we are packing--

But don't plan on it!  :) 

If  YOU had to pack a year into a suitcase and a carry on 

(and a purse/diaper bag) 

what would you pack?