I love to travel. I know some people who love to travel, but I LOVE to travel. I love to dream about a trip. I love to plan a trip. The day before we leave is my least favorite day of the process…It’s always a little stressful. I love to hop in the car and pull out of the drive way and get on the road.

I am also a map nerd!

Around 2003 or 2004, Brent and I made a travel goal for our family. We wanted our kids to see all 50 states before they graduated from high school. We were not sure how to make that happen, but the idea was put into place.

In January of 2004, Elizabeth was 5 and Jonathan was 3. By this point, they had been to New Mexico and California (to see family) and a road trip to Florida to visit Disney (picking up Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama on the way). Elizabeth had also been to Colorado and Arizona before Jonathan was born.

Everyone was so excited in this picture!

So…we began our 50 states journey. In July 2004, we were planning on attending a family reunion in Sedona, Arizona. We decided to take the “scenic route” from southeast Texas to Sedona by way of Mount Rushmore. Just think about that for a minute. That is a looonnnggg way out of the way. But we did it…and learned many things (good and bad) along the way. 10 days….11 states….4,620 miles. (New states: Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska, Iowa, South Dakota, Wyoming, Colorado, Utah and Arizona).

On July 26, 2015, we stepped off a cruise ship in Ketchikan, Alaska…State number 50 for Brent, Elizabeth, Jonathan and me. Alaska was number 43 for Timothy. This was the summer before Elizabeth’s senior year of high school.

Ketchikan, Alaska and the partial completion of a goal! 🙂

This month, we are travelling north to complete Timothy’s 50 states….Iowa, Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan.

Friends and family have been asking me for years to explain how I plan vacations. Now is the time! Who is with me??

Creating travel goals is the most important step to make when you are ready to plan amazing vacations for your family.  What are you wanting to accomplish in your travels in this season of your life?

I really don’t remember the first time Sweetums and I talked about visiting all 50 states with our children.  I can’t remember a time, since we’ve been married, that I didn’t think about it.

Maybe visiting all the states seems like a crazy goal to you…maybe it’s something you could care less about.  Maybe vacation to you is staying in one place for a week.  But…what do you care about when it comes to travel?  Could it be you want to…

• Spend time relaxing on as many different tropical beaches as possible
• Ski every slope in the lower 48
• Visit every National Park
• Visit every church your congregation supports
• Shop in as many quilt stores as you can find
• Visit every Harley Davidson dealership in the world
• Stay at every Disney Resort
• Participate in as many medical missions across the world as you can
• Visit every country from where your ancestors came
• Visit every state park in Texas
• Visit every major league ballpark
• Ride America’s top 20 roller coasters
• Shop at every outlet mall in the South
• Eat your way across America’s major cities
• Visit every Civil War/American Revolutionary War battleground

The list is endless.  But, you need to stop and think about what you would like to accomplish in your life in your travels.

Next, these goals will probably need to change over your lifetime.  When you stop to look at your life stage or “season” right now, where are you?

• College
• Single
• Married and DINKS (Double Income No Kids)
• Married with young children
• Married with older children
• Empty Nesters
• Retired
• Widow/Widower
• Single Again
• Tight financial resources
• Comfortable financially
• An abundance of resources

As you move in and out of each of these life stages, you can re-evaluate your travel goals.

Sometimes the movement from one life stage to another is gradual and expected, but sometimes it is abrupt.  Even when you are forced into a new season of life you didn’t ask for, you can make the most of it in your travels.

Take for example, my Aunt J.  Almost 4 years ago, my Uncle D passed away unexpectedly.  Aunt J never asked to be in this situation.  She did make and act on a new travel goal, though.  She went on a Medical Mission trip with her daughter to Kenya.  It was an incredible experience for her!

Don’t let life pass you by without a plan.  Be intentional!  Don’t wake up one day and wonder where your life went and why you never made meaningful memories with those you love and care about.

What are your travel goals?  It’s not too late to make some today!  🙂

One thing that drives me crazy on a trip is forgetting something.  I know, when you travel domestically, that there is a Target or Walmart almost everywhere where you can purchase forgotten items, but I don’t want to spend money on something I already have at home.

We have traveled many times but I just came up with this very simple, but extremely effective, chart system for our vacation we took this June.  I don’t know why it took me so long.

I wanted a way to remember everything I needed to pack for each of us, so I created this chart in my vacation notes….

As you can see from the list, I have a row for every category needed for each of us.  As I packed, I had everyone’s suitcase in my room.  When I was certain each item was packed in the suitcase, I would check it off.  After everything for a particular person was packed, I circled their name.  My older kids, who can pack their own suitcases, could compare what they packed with my master list.  I was confident when we left that we all had what we needed.  That is a great feeling!

Emily liked the concept so much that she made her own check list when she and JoeJack went to church camp….

I like her addition of a smiley face when the packing was complete!  🙂

I did make an excel spreadsheet that I will customize for future use.  Here is the file if you want to use it too.  Packing List  The first sheet is the packing list for clothing and shoes.  The second is for other items you don’t want to forget.  You could also include toiletries, and actually, I will add that next time too!  🙂

How do you make sure you remember everything you need for your trips?

By the way…..I would love to have you subscribe to my blog!  🙂

One of the most difficult tasks in actually getting ready to travel…whether for a weekend or 2 weeks…is creating a system to effectively and efficiently pack all that stuff!

More than 10 years ago, I came up with a system to do all that, especially when packing for my kids.  The only investment you need is a bunch of gallon size ziplock bags….

Here is the plan….

1.  Figure out how many days worth of clothes you need.  Then grab shirts, pants, undies and socks for your boys.  For your girls get shirts, pants, undies, socks and accessories (rubber bands, headbands, bows, barrettes, etc) for each day.

2.  I then lay out plies on my bed…one for each day.  For Skywalkah, for our vacation in June, it looked like this….

I have each outfit around the edge of the bed with a pile of socks and a pile of undies in the center.  I also have a separate pile for pjs and swimsuits.

3.  Then I grab a ziplock bag, a pile of clothes and a pair of undies and socks and slide it in the bag like this….

One hint…do not zip the bag closed.  It makes the next step easier.

4.  Once every pile of clothes is in a bag, I stand the opened bags up in a suitcase like this….

From trial and error, I have learned that standing the bags up saves more space and works better on the unpacking end than laying the bags flat.

5.  Lastly, I take swimsuits and pjs and put them in other pockets in the suitcase.  There have been times when I used a suitcase that didn’t have other pockets.  In those times I would have made a ziplock of swim attire and a ziplock of pjs.  Extra shoes can just go anywhere you have extra space.

6.  Zip up the suitcase and you are ready to go!

So…what is the benefit of packing your child’s clothes like this?  There are several….

1.  If someone else (spouse, grandparent, other family member or friend) will be getting your child dressed, they have everything they need in order to have a complete outfit that matches.

2.  The child can dress themselves without destroying everything in the suitcase.  Just tell them to grab a bag and get dressed.

3.  If you are staying at a hotel for a few days or more, you can take the bags and place them in drawers.  Then, you don’t have to worry how clean the drawers are.

4.  If you have extremely messy clothes, you have a place to put them so that the clean clothes stay clean.

5.  It also works great when you send your child to camp.  I always had an idea of what they did and didn’t wear.  Sometimes more bags came back with clothes still in them than empty.  That’s a totally different issue, though!  🙂

Emily loved this system so much that when her clothes wouldn’t fit into a gallon size bag, I “splurged” on bigger bags to encourage her organization!

In complete honesty, I started this system so that I could make sure that Emily and JoeJack matched everyday.  I needed to make sure that they looked good for photos.  (Does that surprise anyone that I would do that….yeah, probably not).  I would label the outside of the bag with a day of the week.  That way we would just grab all the “Tuesdays” and get everyone dressed.  Then when skywalkah joined us, I did the same for him.  This photo was taken in Washington DC in May, 2006.  The kids had to wear red, white and blue!  What can I say?????

In separate posts, I will discuss how I pack Sweetums and my clothes and how to organize suitcases depending on the type of trip you are taking.  🙂

Do you have a great tip for packing suitcases for your kids?

Well…I’ve finally done it.  Sweetums and I have been talking and praying about this blog/website for a long time…more than a year.  And today….I did it….I started the blog.  I pray that I will be able to provide great information for you about what has worked well for us…and what has not worked so well.  One thing I know for sure….I love to travel.  It is my absolute favorite past time.  I love to research and plan for trips.  I take planning very seriously.  I want to be a great steward of the time and money God has blessed us with so that the trips will be fun, within budget and memorable!

We want our kids to see all 50 states before they graduate from high school.  This usually surprises people!  The first question I always get asked is “So….How many states have y’all visited?”  Followed closely by, “What states are left?” Well, I have an Excel spreadsheet for that!  🙂  (For those who know me well, this will come as no surprise).  I keep track of all the states and the month and year we first visited them.  Here is our current tally along with the yet to be visited states….

Sweetums 48 (Alaska and North Dakota)

Me 46 (Alaska, Indiana, Kentucky, and North Dakota)

Emily and JoeJack 44 (Alaska, Idaho, Indiana, Kentucky, Montana, and North Dakota)

Skywalkah 31 (Alaska, Arkansas, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Utah, Wisconsin and Wyoming)

Here is my spreadsheet if you want to use it for your family too!  State Analysis

As you can tell, we traveled quite a bit before Skywalkah came along, but we have plenty of time for him to catch up!  🙂

Why?  Why even try to accomplish something like this?  We want to expose our kids to all the beauty and geographic diversity this country can provide.  God has created so many incredible places on this continent alone.  We want to build lasting memories with our children…time away from the hustle of daily life.

We are trying to live lives that are intentional.  Intentional in worship to God…intentional in day to day activities….intentional in our major family activities. Time passes so quickly.  We want to make the most of it.

How intentional is the life your family leads?