What do you do before vacation..to make it easier when returning home..

[Toy Story Fan]

Good to know I'm not the only one that cleans their house top to bottom before vacation. My friends laugh at me and tell me I'm a bit crazy. I don't like coming home to a messy house.

I also have a lasagna and garlic bread in the freezer, and I leave money for a friend who looks after our house. She picks up bread, milk, cream and whatever else the day before we get home.

The day before we leave, we stay at a hotel by the airport. If we have an early morning flight, this is so much easier as the airport is almost an hour away. We usually vacation at the beginning of December and the idea of a big snow storm scares me. I can have everything done the day before and not run around in the morning cleaning up after everybody. We stay at a hotel that includes breakfast. Easy, stress free morning.

 

[Legendofthehawk]

ha! I didn't realize there were so many people that also liked to clean and do laundry before vacation! I am one of those too. It is such a bummer to start thinking about everything that has to be done at home before your vacation has ended!

Before we leave, I also make sure to clean out the fridge. Usually I time it pretty well so that all the perishables that can spoil are gone and very little remains behind. Trash is taken out, as again, no bad surprises.

I usually set out the kids clothes for when they get back. Both night time and if they have school, school clothes for that day. That way its a little easier on them to go back. I set out fresh towels for us at the same time, because the first thing we typically want to do is shower. ;0)

This year we're doing what one of the PPs suggested. I am going to make some meals ahead to freeze. Usually by the time we're home, we're all so sick of fast food we can scream. It can be hard to muster the energy to either cook a meal or stop at the store for fresh ingredients by that time... as depending on where, we've been in the car for 10+ hours non stop. We're all tired. So having something that warms up in the microwave/stove top is awesome.

I was planning on ordering Amazon Pantry, so we can have things delivered the next day that we need.

 

[Brittni__duh]

I'm also one who cleans the house and does laundry. I also make sure my bedding is freshly laundered and my bed is made. I love coming home from vacation and climbing into a bed with clean sheets when I'm exhausted from travelling. I also make sure we have a little bit of non-perishable food lying around but we run through our perishable food before we leave. I also like to make sure the car we're leaving at home has a full or almost full tank of gas.

 

[kj2mom]

Most important.......

Go onto your banks websites and let them all know that your traveling and the dates.. They all have this and it'll help with using the cards away from home.

Thank you for posting this! I do many of the things noted but last year when I was filling up the rental on the way back to the airport, after our week long vacation, my card was declined. I was mortified, I seriously needed less than a gallon of gas and was declined. I just paid cash for it and went on my way. When we were sitting at our gate waiting for our flight I finally checked my email (I tried to stay away during the trip) and I had emails from my bank saying they suspected fraud and to reply to prove it wasn't (which I didn't do because I didn't see the emails until too late). So, I am heading to Disney tomorrow and had totally forgotten. I just checked my bank online and sure enough I could enter the dates and location online. Super easy! Thanks again!