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My family is about to leave for a 6 week-long round the world trip starting this Friday! Since we’re traveling so much, I’m trying to keep my packing list extremely minimal. Nothing is worse than trying to lug around 20 different things across an airport, city or public transportation. One of my biggest tips is to stay at a vacation home. They have everything you need! I always book an Airbnb or a home through Tripping.com (a vacation rental search engine). It just makes life easier when you have all the things you need! Here are some essentials I plan on bringing with me.
1. GB Pockit Stroller – This stroller is amazing! It opens and closes easily and it is super compact. We ended up buying ours in Paris because carrying our 14 lb baby around the city was getting exhausting. This stroller’s weight (11 lbs) and compact-ness make it great for using in public transport. It’s a bit price-y at $200, but if you travel a lot, then it is totally worth having. It just makes your life easier.
2. Food – For our long flight, I plan on bringing some food pouches. They’re easy to transport and feeding baby with them is easy in a cramped airplane seat! Elara is also teething, so we like to bring teething crackers to keep her busy on the flight. We found out on our last flight that it gave us about 30 minutes of quiet and relief for baby. Once we get to our destination I like to hit up the local grocery store and buy food there, but I keep a few powdered food packets in my bag just in case. They are shelf stable and all you need is a little breast milk, water or formula to make a quick meal. These packets have been a life saver for me multiple times!
3. Tommee Tippee Bibs – The reason why I love these bibs is because their made of silicone and are washable. Cloth bibs are great, but they get messy and I hate having crusty bibs sitting in my diaper bag. I just rinse and dry these bibs after I feed her. Plus, I only need one bib for the trip – saving a little space in my luggage!
4. Travel-Pack of Baby Laundry Detergent – I usually book vacation homes or AirBnbs with a washer and dryer. We all know that baby’s make messes and doing laundry is a fact of life. Most of the places we stayed at in the past didn’t have baby detergent so I like to keep a small travel pack with me. This is also helps cut down on how many clothes we need to bring with us – saving us from over-packing!
5. Sophie or any other teething toy – As I mentioned earlier, baby is teething like crazy, so Sophie is a must. Sophie has saved us many times, especially on planes. It’s small and doesn’t take up too much room and keeps my teething baby monster’s tantrums at bay.
6. Bright Starts Clack and Slide Activity Ball– This toy ball is Elara’s favorite toy at the moment. It has tons of moving parts and a small mirror which keeps her entertained for a while. We’ll be doing a road trip from Cape Town to Port Elizabeth and a small toy for her to play with in the car seat is essential. We used it during a road trip to Tahoe last weekend and it worked like a charm!
P.S I wasn’t paid for any of these suggestions, they are seriously things I take with me when I travel! However, if you buy any of the products using my links, I will get a small payment from Amazon which helps Milk & Cardamom keep running!
