Lessons learned at my mother's knee

When preparing for a trip, always make sure your laundry is at least a month behind schedule. That way, in order to pack, you must do 42 loads of laundry and stay up until at least 1am in order to accomplish said goal. Further, you will then be able to enhance your trip preparation by being too tired to think of everything so you'll have to take part of the next day off from work in order to accomplish what you could have done while you were watching HGTV and waiting for the dryer to finish another load. While you are home from work, you can do two loads of dishes, put away 42 loads of laundry (not that there's any hope of that -- who has that sort of closet space?), and with any luck think of everything that you've forgotten to pack but can't live without on a five day trip to the mountains. And, best of all, you know that 5 minutes down the road, you will absolutely think of at least one more thing that you can't live without. Repeat that last step 3 times -- for each additional member of the family -- and you have a fair approximation of what my night last night was like and what my day today looks like.

And, then we have the 6 hour drive across California!

Are you jealous yet?

Happy Thanksgiving everyone. We'll be home on Sunday!