Sounds Good on Paper

Now that we are settled, we have unpacked and taken stock of what we brought from home.

Normally, when we go anywhere we have an elaborate pack list. I have specialized lists based on the type of trip. I have a bike trip, visit family, cold weather, wine tasting, warm weather, tropical weather, and Air BNB specific pack list.

Below is my most bare-bones packing list.

And here is the list I used to pack for six months in Panama.

Yes, that is correct, there was no pack list. We were so consumed with moving everything into storage, we didn’t think about what to actually pack for this trip.

This may be the reason I brought twenty pairs of socks, but only three shirts.

We spent all our time cramming our stuff into here, no time thinking of what to bring with.

This is the crazed look of someone that has been moving for 16 hours straight.

When our move was complete, and we finally had ten minutes to pack, we tried to shove a bunch of stuff into our suitcases. When they wouldn’t close we realized, “We don’t have enough luggage.”

This is not the best thought at 10:30 p.m. the night before you fly to Panama. Thank God for the late night Target in Kent. I stayed in the car with our stuff while Jeff ran in to buy a suitcase.

Here is the text Jeff sent me from Target. I was supposed to choose from these two.

When I couldn’t choose Jeff may have had a mental breakdown.

If you ever see a grown man sitting on the floor of a Target at 11:00 pm giggling to himself and taking selfies in the luggage department, don’t judge.

We bought the black one, jammed it full and didn’t open it again until a few days ago. Here are some of the things we brought.

Our Stainless Steel French Press seemed important in Seattle. Turns out all rentals have coffee makers. And you don’t really need stainless steel to keep your coffee warm when it’s 102 degrees outside.

These were our kitchen must-haves. While the rentals have knives, none are sharp. We’ve used everything in this photo.

Guess which two items we’ve used the most.

We brought one pan.

At the last second, I packed all the food we didn’t give away or eat. The apartments all seem to have blenders so the protein powder is coming in handy. Not sure if we’ll be making enough Ethiopian food to get through the bag with the berbere spice.