Each time we prepare to travel internationally, we enter into battle planning mode with our bags. Many of you are familiar with the costly mistakes we have made in the past which have resulted in hassles, delays, and financial penalties. The worst was when we tried to leave Botswana in 2012 and discovered that Andrew's passport had expired by 3 days. That oversight lead to a week of expensive delays and a mistake in baggage claim that cost us nearly 1000 Dollars. The fact is, there are a lot of things that can go wrong with international travel, especially to African countries with a whole family while your trying to max out all your baggage allowances. The combination of meticulous planning, weighing, and measuring of bags with lots of grace from the Lord has resulted in most of our travel being long and boring, but otherwise uneventful. Without both the planning and the grace, costly mistakes ensue. With 5 people traveling, we are allowed 10 check bags at 50 lbs each, 5 carry on bags of 17 lbs each, and 5 personal items. Every time we return to Africa, we are loaded down with presents from friends and family, but mostly grandparents. This year, Gma wanted to send us home with a farm sink and tap because our new home in Africa doesn't have a complete kitchen. Yes you read that right, we packed everything AND the kitchen sink! The trouble is that the sink measured 1.5 inches over the baggage limit by itself and with the original box it was 12 inches over the limit. So, we ditched the original box and wrapped the sink in cardboard sheets with packing tape. Luckily, it looked the same size as our other trunks so the guy at the airport didn't even measure it. Score one for good packing skills and we saved 200$. Some of our check bags are duffles. You can fit a ton in a duffle but then it's easy to go over the size and weight limits. Enter the space bags that suck all the air out and reduce blankets and clothes down to small, but solid as a brick packages. The trick is always to distribute the weight between the bags. Fill a bag with clothes and your right at 50 lbs, fill it with stuffed animals and blanket's and your not even close to your weight, and fill it with medicine and discipleship materials and you'll be way over weight. By the time we were done, I packed, weighed, and repacked each bag at least 4 times over the course of 3 days, but all ten bags were exactly 49.5 lbs. The half pound is just in case my scale or the airport's scale is off by a bit cuz then I could get charged 200 dollars per bag. We also keep an empty bag with us during check in so that if bags are overweight, we can pull one or two items out and leave them with Gma at the airport. Making sure the lowest priority items are at the top of the bag is an important part of our strategy. It's always stressful in the days before we leave and Sarah and I don't really relax until we are through security and waiting to board the plane. Fortunately, it all went to plan, we got off the ground without a hitch, and it was all worth it when we unpacked in Botswana like it was Christmas all over again.
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