What we packed for the trip

I get asked constantly how we decided what to pack for our 4-month assignment. So, I thought I would make a post. We wanted our apartment to feel homey when we came home after a long day. At the same time, we knew it would be small, less than 300 SQ, so we had to be very mindful when we were packing. I started with the clothes and shoes I couldn’t live without, once that was packed, I had extra room so I added some various clothing items. I used a big suitcase and my small rolling suitcase. For the 3-day trip to NYC, I put those clothes in my backpack.  

We packed the remaining items in 4 baby blue storage bins from Ikea. For the bathroom items I started with medications, contacts, and our skin care regimen. After that I added all the shampoo and body wash I had. I’m sure glad I did that because everything is more expensive here. In that bin I also added a few cleaning items, sponges for dishes, and the dog’s medications.  

In the next bin I added our study books for nursing, our bible, a few books we might want to read, and our tablets. I also added a binder with all our important documents. This is probably one of the most important items we packed. We added clear plastic protectors and put our documents in them. We brought our Nursing licenses, our certification cards, our social security cards, birth certificates, marriage license, our shot records, the dogs vaccination records, our check book, and our passports since we were so close to Canada.  

The next bin was for kitchen items. One thing Don can’t live without is coarse salt for dry brining chicken and along with that gallon storage bags for freezing meat. We brought a few of our containers for our lunch. We put our coffee cups, coffee pitcher, coffee, spices, water bottles, and some of Dons favorite sauces in the top of the bin. In the fourth bin we put dog food.  

For the trip up to NYC we rented a dodge caravan. In the seats behind us be put each dog bed in a seat and buckled them in with seatbelts that attach to their harnesses. The rest of the seats were put down for more room. We put in the suitcases and stacked the blue bins. we had to lean the dog kennels on the back seat. We added in packs of toilet paper where there was space. We kept out backpacks in the most assessable position as well as a bowl for dog water and gallon bag of dog food. In our lunch box we put our road trip snacks. I put my pillow and blanket in the front seat and we were ready to hit the road!  

We could have gone without some of the stuff we packed, but we just didn’t want to spend double for things here in NYC. That’s all I can remember that we packed. I’m sure I forgot to list things.