(This person shall remain nameless, but full disclosure: I happen to be married to him.)
Or he wont notice that one of our kids toys is with the takeout containers we need to trash.
We can do better than this!
And I will show you how.
Ideally, the magic begins long before you gotta begin packing upbut you might start any time.
When you arrive: Designate your spaces
I amnotgoing to tell you to avoid using drawers.
You should absolutely use the drawers, if your hotel has them.
Specifically, you should take yourpacking cubesout of your suitcase.
leave them full of clothes, and put each cube directly into a drawer.
The key is that you must claim the spaces youll use.
Consider certain areas of the hotel room your spaces, in that they will be home toyouritems.
(That drawer you just plopped your packing cube into?
Then designate other areas as being for items that are disposable or that belong to the hotel.
Here are some examples of how you might do this during a trip.
you could tailor them to your needs.
The nightstand is mine.
The TV stand is the hotels.
Ill also put the TV remote on the TV stand when I dont need it within reach.
The area under the table, where the garbage bin is, belongs to the hotel.
Ill put garbage and recycling there.
I willnotkick off my shoes and leave them under the table.
My bathroom space is the counter.
The shower is not one of my spaces.
(The hotel soap can stay.)
The bed belongs to the hotel.
Obviously if you have multiple people staying in the same room, you caneachhave your own space.
For example, you take the table and your roommate takes the desk.
You take the top drawer and they take the second drawer.
You take the left side of the bathroom counter and they take the right side.
This is also good practice for when youre finally packing upbut more about that in a minute.
And I love a good hanging toiletry bagI havethis one from Travelon.
I’ll use my deodorant, then pop it right back into its little pocket.
Its also time to start converting some of your spaces back to hotel spaces.
Lets say you hung some clothes in the closet.
This is also a good time to separate things that belong to different people.
Nope, nothing in the drawers.
OK, lets see what I can pack from the bathroom.
On a solo trip where you have one or two bags, this is a fast and easy process.
Its more complicated if you have more people and more luggage.
All the clothing together.
All the toys together.
All the food together.
If its empty, great, youre done with that space.
(If yours doesnt, designate a suitable space.)
You may be tempted toalsoput garbage near the entryway, but confirm its completely, visually separate.
When a bag is packed, dont take it out to the car just yet.
Put the bag in your staging area.
It goes without saying that youll continue your scan of hotel spaces.
You may also reclaim some hotel spaces as staging areas.
Judiciously, of course.
Your jacket, for example.
Pajamas, toothbrush, passport?
If you have a cooler, leave it open in front of the fridge as a reminder.
My kid is a lot more likely to find that doll under the bed than I am.
