the dresses I carried…

I thought after my talk of packing planning and travel obsessions you might be interested to know some of what I carried with me on my recent trip.

I hope you’re interested! If not, I understand. I’ll be back with wanderings and photos and crafty stuff soon. See you then.

For those of you who care, these are the dresses I carried:

There are 2 made from slippery knit fabric, unnatural but very packable and cute. 3 are black and simple, 2 of which double as cotton underlayers when wearing other dresses. one is a floral wrap dress. Another is a blue floral. Yet another is an indigo and lime green African dress known around here as a Kate dress, which had a previous life in someone else’s luggage, but now makes my wardrobe a happy place.

The red and black koru print is a sarong which doubled as a blankie on the plane and a wrap in the airports along the way and also works very well as a skirt. There was also a dark grey acrylic knit dress with long sleeves that served me very well as a travel dress, warm enough for the snowy wet weather we left behind and comfy enough to sleep in. The final two items are cotton cardigans, very useful for cool mornings and evenings.

I am happy to say that every single item here got worn at least once – often several times. We had a couple of laundry days on our trip – easily achieved since we were staying with family.

And this is most of the rest of it. A pair of short shorts, a pair of capri shorts, 2 tees, a tank, and a swimsuit. (The swimsuit was the only thing I brought that I never got to use. It wasn’t quite warm enough on the days when we had time to go to the beach – a fact I would have ignored if we had been just a little more convenient to the beach.)

Of course I also brought underthings, in moderate quantities, knowing that we would be able to do laundry. And a couple of lightweight carry bags – a foldable backpack, a little purse. A furoshiki. I always miss my stock of bags and furoshiki when I’m traveling. I brought a top and capri pajama pants too, for lounging and to appear decent in company.

I, perhaps extravagantly, brought 4 pairs of shoes with me. Two pairs were flip flops, rotated day by day so I didn’t get sore feet. One pair were primarily for wearing on the plane – slip ons. And one pair were old sneakers specifically for hiking up my favorite volcano, Rangitoto. (yes, we did see a couple of people do it in flip flops, but they were foolish!) As much as they were bulky, they were well worth bringing. I could’ve worn the old sneakers on the plane, but I was trying to look reasonably cute, and sneakers did nothing for my grey dress and stripey sock ensemble…

So that’s about it. One large mesh cube, two small, one ultra lightweight toiletry bag, inside a Rick Steves brand backpack. Weighing in under 20 pounds (18 pounds check in on the way, 22.5 pounds on the way home) I felt good about what I chose to carry. I always second guess myself, wish that I had smaller, lighter clothes like that skinny little lululemon yoga girl I saw in Hawaii, but in the end I brought what I’m comfortable in, I looked nice every day and I was able to do the things I enjoy doing while feeling like myself (not an anorexic yoga bikini surfer chick!) Reviewing my wardrobe I might have chosen a different travel dress, something a little lighter and cottony, with maybe one less pair of shoes. But it’s never easy dressing for late winter early spring in one country, early autumn in another, and airport/airline climates in between. I think I did well.

If you will permit me I will talk about my carry on bag in a future post.

Jo:)

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