Luggage & Travel Day

Another practical post to start off the week. Today, I’ll be sharing the luggage we chose and reporting on our travel day.

blair family at airport

Our luggage search was fairly extensive. First we window-shopped, just to get a sense of what was out there and what might work for our family. We started at TJ Maxx, which is my favorite spot to find great individual pieces at bargain prices. Next, we checked out the Army Navy Surplus store to see their enormous, sturdy duffel bags. I even approached Lands’ End about a possible luggage sponsorship because I love their totes and figured their luggage would be excellent as well — but during discussions, we figured out they didn’t have quite the sizes we needed for this particular voyage. So we kept searching.

suitcases lined up blair family

What I found out in my research: luggage can be really expensive, but there are true bargains to be found. We eventually happened upon the brand fūl (pronounced ‘fuel’) during a Costco trip. It gets great reviews and is very reasonably priced. We ended up buying 7 duffel bags (they were $40 in store), and then bought 7 carryon/backpacks online. That’s 3 pieces for $90. Not bad! Especially considering most of the carryons we looked at were around $200 each.

laminated luggage tagslaminated luggage taglaminated luggage tags

For luggage tags, I bought a set of 25 blank ones at Staples. You just slip inside a business card size piece of paper and run them through a laminator. Since I bought them at Staples, Staples did the laminating for free. For each backpack and carryon, I made tags with initials. GSB for me. BB for Betty. OSGB for Oscar. For each duffel bag and additional checked piece, I made tags that were numbered, B-01 through B – 10. We ended up checking 7 duffel bags, 1 guitar, 1 trombone, and 1 desktop computer (in original packaging).

Through the airport, we kept June in her stroller and hung the carseat from the stroller handle. The carseat came onto the airplane and the stroller was checked at the gate.

trombone case with luggage tagOscar looking at luggage tag

For carryons, everyone but Baby June used a roller bag plus backpack. We love these! The detachable backpack was really convenient. Even 4-year-old Betty could roll her bag through the airport with the backpack attached. Then, on the airplane, the roller suitcases went above the seats and the backpacks went below.

We think these backpack/rollerbags will be great if we manage to do any traveling around Europe while we’re here — we won’t have to check any luggage

ful carryon with backpackduffel bags at airport

I have no connections at fūl and this is not a sponsored post, but I am way impressed with our luggage. The duffels are really amazing. Tons of helpful compartments — even a wet/dry section. At $40, I felt like they were a great deal. The only disadvantage: these pieces are heavy. If you’re looking for feather-weight luggage, keep searching.

maude with roller suitcaseBlair kids at airport

Here we are trooping through the airport on the way to security.

blair kids at airport securityblairs at airport security

Security was pretty straightforward. Only one bag needed to be searched. Olive had her scriptures in her roller bag and the book is so thick and dense they couldn’t tell what it was. : )

Ben and Gabby at airport

Security went so quickly we had plenty of time before the plane arrived. We ate breakfast and took pictures.

baby with cracker on airplanekids with earphones on airplane Blair Family

The first leg of the trip was from Denver to Montreal. The weather was crazy cold that day, but the plane left on time. The flight was about 3 and 1/2 hours. June was well-rested and easy to entertain. Everyone else enjoyed the individual screen time.

kids at montreal airportkids at Montreal airportbaby in stroller at Montreal airportRalph filming at airport

At the Montreal airport we had a longish layover — about 2 or 3 hours. We ate dinner, practiced a little French and Ralph worked on the short movie he was making about our trip. You can see his movie, Denver to Normandy, here.

girl sleeping on airplane Maude Blairkids sleeping on airplane Olive Betty Blairbaby sleeping on airplane June BlairBoys sleeping on airplane Ralph, Oscar Blair

During the 7 hour flight from Montreal to Paris, the kids mostly slept. Poor Baby June had the hardest time during takeoff. She didn’t want to nurse or use her pacifier and her ears started hurting. The worst part, we couldn’t get up to walk and soothe her — which is the main way she calms down. She basically screamed for 15 or 20 minutes until we could walk her around the cabin. Then she slept and stayed asleep the rest of the way. Hooray!

In Paris, we took our time gathering all our belongings. We made a point of being the last people off of the airplane so we weren’t rushed and weren’t a bother to the other passengers. We collected our checked pieces and took two separate mini-van taxis to our hotel. Our rooms weren’t ready yet, so we left our luggage with the bellhops and went to check out Jordan and Paul’s new apartment. (In case I didn’t mention it, my sister Jordan moved to Paris the day before we moved.)

When our hotel was ready, we crashed there for the day (Wednesday) and rented a minivan to use for our first couple of weeks. We left all of our checked baggage items with the hotel storage — all we needed in our rooms was our carryons. We slept-in the next morning (Thursday) and then drove to Argentan around noon, making sure to take a touristy drive around Paris on our way out of town.

120 thoughts on “Luggage & Travel Day”

  1. Congratulations on your safe arrival! I am so looking forward to the posts on discovering France. Ireland sounds like a great trip — what a beautiful country with such warm people! I think there is a ferry from Calais…

    I am also curious–how much stuff did you pack for each child? I am impressed with how you all stayed luggage light!

  2. One of my favorite posts ever, and I’ve been reading Design Mom since your first post! Love the luggage tags and especially how you numbered all the checked baggage so you made sure you had them all: genius!

    First question: did you buy an airline seat for baby June or did you just hope you’d have an extra seat to accommodate her car seat?

    Also, how did packing the kids go? Did the kids help choose what went in the backpack (for use during flight) vs carry-on vs checked baggage?

    Thanks! So happy you all made it to France safe and sound.

  3. If ever in need of duffles in the future check out LL Bean..they have been doing them for years and have fantastics customer service!!! Glad all of you are safe adn looking forward to your french adventures.

  4. seriously.. seriously! you are inspirational. one day, one day, i will pick up my family and move, i swear i will. even if it’s in the states. you are so lucky to be going on such a fun journey with your family.

  5. I’m glad your trip went so silky-smoothly for you, but then, you’ve got the planning down, girl! I only have two wild Indians — er, precious children — and when we travel with my sons, everyone in the WHOLE AIRPORT knows my kids’ names…

    I’m looking forward to following your family’s French adventures, and hopefully you’ll share some cool family-friendly, off-the-beaten-path things to do that I can incorporate into a future trip. I hope your family gets over whatever is ailing all of you soon.

  6. Looks like a lovely trip so far! We are all very jealous here. My kids and I (we have six, but older than yours) are following your website and enjoying it very much. My three youngest do K-12 and so have been very interested in this whole thing. Their father is a college professor and they think now he should do something overseas for a year! I don’t want too right now because I have my first grandchild on the way…..Yeah!

  7. I am so impressed with your organization! your family looks so cute pulling their roller bags! and great job finding quality luggage! I hope it lasts for a long, long time!

  8. Stephanie Smirnov

    You are amazing. And to think I stress over travelling with a single eight-year old. The pictures of the kids sleeping are too precious.

  9. I am loving living vicariously through your little family–such fun! Glad you are taking so many photos–it’s sad poor baby June won’t remember this adventure, no?

  10. Jennifer Segalini

    I am so excited for you and the family – how exciting! I so look forward to following the Blair Family Adventures in Paris.

  11. Oh my goodness, congrats on making it through that trip – so sorry to hear about the stomach flu though :( And poor little June on takeoff, how awful! Glad she was able to sleep after that. I’ll be taking my little one on his first plane ride to California in a few weeks, and I’ve been really nervous about it – but you are such an inspiration, if you can make it to France with SIX children surely I can manage one little baby! Ha!

    Rest up!! xo Laura

  12. What an exciting day!!! Glad you are all there safely. I enjoyed looking at all of the pictures! How lucky that baby June stayed asleep after that 15-20 minutes! That’s impressive for a long flight like that!

  13. Special treat to sit down at the computer and see you marvelous, beautiful, wonderful Blairs taking this fantastic trip. LOVED Ralph’s video! Eager to see the tree house and more pictures of you all! Hope you’re getting enough sleep.

    Grateful it wasn’t a long flu! Know that we’re with you all the way — love, prayers, and WOW!!!!

  14. Impressive! I’m glad you guys found luggage you love. If you or the kids want to personalize them, a great way I always loved to do while traveling is to pick up patches from places I visit and sew them on. It makes the bags easier to spot and differentiate however you travel. Bon voyage!

  15. You rock – you manage to make trekking through an airport with all your kids look stylish and fun! Really, we have four kids . . . and we travel a good deal, so it is so fun to see your family on such a great adventure!

  16. oh, i am really loving this. you and your sister’s family – you’re giving me hope and inspiration that one really can design one’s own life. our family is at a bit of a crossroads…and i think family adventure is in order. why not? i’m trying to build a local network to start over in my career but i could really go anywhere. my one blog follower would read me, still (my dad!). my husband is the one at the crossroads…a highly competent man in search of his next step. i told him tonight about your family’s adventure and the way i’m looking at our life now is: “i wonder what God has in store for us next?” we’re not passive; we’re do-ers, but the future is uncertain and it’s a bit unsettling. still, we’re both bright and willing to do what it takes and what i wouldn’t give to take a chance on a foreign stay elsewhere. we’d hoped for a foreign assignment back in the day when he was in a corporate role in a multi-national firm, but life and opportunity sent us to the beach, here. i’ve loved it a lot but honestly, we have to make some changes, and your ‘sea change’ truly encourages me.

    can’t wait to see what happens next…my own wheels are turning in my mind…

    bon soir!

    jeannie

  17. The pics of the kids sleeping are too cute!

    A word of caution – you will not be allowed to bring those combo bags on a plane in Europe. They are much stricter wrt handluggage allowance. One piece per passenger, 8kg max, and those pieces with the backpacks on them are definitely too large for cabin. Planes on continental EU flights will be smaller than across the Atlantic, and they won’t let you bring 8 huge bags like than into the cabin. It would also be really unfair to everybody else on the plane.

  18. Sorry, your family got the stomach flu. It seems to be making it’s way around again. I totally agree with you on the duffel bags. When we went to Europe in 2008 we used duffel bags because space is so limited in cars in Europe that we felt we could always squeeze a bag by someone’s feet or under a bench, but would be hard to do with a suitcase. I love how cute your whole family looked for their new adventure. Were the tickets cheaper going through Canada? Glad you all arrived safely. How fun to have your sister in France at the same time. Can’t wait to read more about your adventures.

  19. Poor June with the ears:( I remember my first plane trip – they made me suck on chunks of chocolate, maybe just to forget all about the pain, and I was a lot older… Glad she slept well later, though. Your kids look too cute!! I am sooo excited about the tree house!

  20. OMG, I think I have to lay off from your site till I’m done with pregnancy (which is jus a month more…hurray!). So “hormotional” all the time and those pictures of your kids sleeping made my cry :(

  21. Is that really, truly all you are taking to France for your stay there? Did you ship anything? Will there be a post on how to pack a family so lightly? How did you negotiate with the children to leave behind favorite things?

  22. hooray! thanks for the update, and glad you hear you all made it there safely and in good form. why do i feel like i am on an adventure too?

  23. Hi there,

    I am shocked that you would try to get a luggage sponsorship from Lands End. This is your trip/you decided to make it and have eight kids, thus it is YOUR responsibility to open up your wallet and pay for your needs! Shame on you for trying to get a freebie, like that!

    1. Hi Kate. You know I detest offending my readers, so I’m sorry if getting sponsors seems shameful to you. But working with sponsors and advertisers is how most full-time bloggers make a living.

  24. This post made me cry. I love you and your family.

    I am so proud of you guys. This move is such a big deal and your family is handling it with such joy and excitement.

    Thank you for sharing. It’s so inspiring.

  25. REALLY appreciate your level of detail about how you packed and traveled. While I’ve taken my 5-year-old to France (by myself) and Spain (with hubs), now we have 2 children and we are moving to Germany at the end of the year. I’m already plotting how to downsize our “stuff” into storage (and oddly highly excited to find out how little of our own “stuff” we actually need, or how little we miss the stuff we leave behind during our 2-3 years in Europe..by the time we return to the US, I may be ready to yard sale all of it and go minimalist!)

    Looking forward to the rest of your journey. (If you don’t already read or follow it, you might be interested in Kristin Espinesse’s “French Word A Day” blog, and you’d probably like Kristin.)

    Enjoy every moment!

    1. Shannon,
      My husband and I are moving to Germany at the end of the year with our daughter, too. We’re also trying to figure out how to downsize, store things, etc. Are you a military family?

  26. Amazing! I’m so loving your organization skills during of all this. That’s just how I would be and I only have 2 kids. We hope to bring the kids overseas for a vacation while they’re still little so I’m eager to learn from your journey!

  27. Oh, I am so envious…to live in France. Sigh*
    I am visiting Paris for the first time in a little over a month, I am over the moon excited. Keep the lovely posts coming…

  28. There is something about this that made me tear up — I just love the expressions on all your kids faces. They look so ready and happy.

    This is so lovely to read about and follow along — you Blairs are so inspiring!

  29. We’ve been looking for some new luggage for the fam lately (0urs is falling apart & matches everyone else’s black suitcases). I read this last night & then happened to see some in Costco today so I picked some up. Thanks for the tip!

  30. Wow. Was just browsing your posts and can’t believe you moved to France for a year! It’s amazing how you were able to do it in such short notice and you pulled it off extremely well :) What an exciting adventure for you and your family!

    My husband is French and I moved there with him after we got married. We lived right inside Paris for 2 years and then finally moved back when he got his permanent residence card for Canada. We go back to the South of France to see family every 2 years. We have family in Normandy as well. It’s a beautiful quiet countryside there.

    Also you chose a good time to bring baby June on a long flight. Sleeping through most of the flight is a blessing. When we took our 18 month old on our 12 hr flight to France last June, he only slept 2 hours. Maybe even less.

    By the way, thanks for the carryon/backpack tip. I’ll definitely have to check that out at Costco! ;)

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