Vacations with kids should be about building memories, not searching for missing items. Avoid travel meltdowns by staying organized so you can fully enjoy your precious family trips! Here are our top 6 tested tips:
- Label Passports
This is so simple I can’t believe I haven’t done it sooner! You’re at the immigration line and you and your partner are shuffling through 6 passports because you have to open each one to figure out who’s it is. Before your trip, take a label maker and add the first name to the back of the passport! No more opening shuffle, now you can see the owner at a glace. Here’s the label maker we use around the house, though you could also take other durable stickers or tape and hand write it.
- Pack a Passport Organizer
A dedicated family passport organizer keeps these valuables visible and handy while protecting them. Choose a durable sleeve or case and tuck passports inside with your itinerary print-outs. Some even have slots for vaccination records and emergency cash. No more holding up the line at the ticket counter!
- Create Ownership
Home Alone is a great example of multiple things going wrong to result in leaving your kids home on accident. One of the most important organization tips is to create ownership so things don’t get lost in the shuffle. I recommend one parent be the designated passport owner most importantly. That way there’s never a: “I thought YOU had the passports!” situation.
- Streamline In-Transit Essentials
We’ve all left the MVP stuffy (or must have headphones) behind and had to go through lots of tears and jump through hoops to get them back. Consider keeping important items like MVP stuffy in a specific spot, like on a carabiner on a backpack and a assign an owner for making sure every time you’re packing up to leave a plane, train, or hotel that MVP is on the carabiner and they holler out “Mr. Stuffy Check!”. This is called habit stacking, and consider other checks to ensure no stuffy or passport is left behind. Depending on the age of your kiddos, it can be an older sibling in charge of this very important task. Additionally, consider applying the same rule for other must-have entertainment items like headphones and chargers in one travel pouch for easy round-up. I love these Aloha waterproof pouches, you could also have something with more little spots for things like this one, or you could even do a see through ziplock bag for easy visibility. Less loose objects to drop or forget equals less angst all around.
I also love a good travel backpack that has a home for everything. This one is particularly great for parents, so you know exactly where the wipes, sanitizer, passport holder, Kindle is at any given moment. I actually put my Lululemon everything bag inside of my backpack on a plane for quick access and making sure nothing gets left behind.
- Sort by Days with Packing Cubes
My little one like to dump out everything from backpacks and luggage when we get to a hotel, which creates a whole lot of chaos and likeliness to leave things behind. This was particularly painful when we drove the Ring Road in Iceland and stayed at a different place every night. Consider using packing cubes, or bags labeled with days to allocate outfits and items needed. Just grab and go the morning of – no decision making or scrambling! For hotels, leaving dirty clothes sorted this way also simplifies laundry.
- Create Shared Travel Calendars
Spreadsheet or calendar? Up to you, I’ve done both and I still prefer both- spreadsheet for at a glance and calendar for source of truth reservations. You can’t overcommunicate enough about the itinerary and I still found that every night and every morning my kids and husband would ask- what are we doing again?
Sadly Google deprecated the trip summaries on google.com/travel which was a feature I absolutely loved, however they are still adding travel email confirmations automatically to calendars, which is great. Tripit also offers a single view by parsing through emails, which is the closest to the deprecated feature and it’s worth a try and it’s free.
By planning ahead and staying organized, you reduce vacation chaos and give your family the gift of fully enjoying your trips away together. Try out these simple yet effective tactics for more memory-making and less meltdowns while exploring the world with your kids. The more organized, the more there is to spark their sense of adventure and wonder! What are some things that you do to stay organized on family trips?
