Packing Life Skill Download
I’m a skilled packer, ask anyone that knows me well. It’s a bit of a family joke that I can pack pretty much anything in a carry on.
Packing in advance has a lot of advantages, including knowing what laundry you need to do before you leave. Learning how to pack is a skill, one not everyone has. In an age when we have to pay $50+ per checked bag and carry-ons are highly regulated, it’s important to learn how to pack and develop the spacial awareness of your luggage to make packing easier over time.
I decided this year, when my AuDHD daughter is 9, would be a good year to start teaching her how to pack. We go on an annual trip to Montana to visit my in-laws and it’s fairly predictable so I thought it was a simple place to start. I gave her the following list of items she needed to put into laundry basket I gave her. This is not the full list of everything she needed for this trip, I kept her participation very basic. I even wrote it down and made a checklist because I know with her ADHD, she does so much better with visual reminders.
6 outfits
6 bras
6 pairs of underwear
7 pull-ups
6 pairs of socks
5 sets of pjs
Swim suits
Sleeping bonnet
Eye mask
Sandals
I thought I kept things fairly simple and easy for her to throw together. She dresses herself every morning and knows the difference between a school outfit, a church outfit and a weekend outfit. I also asked her to write down what stuffed animals she was bringing on the trip.
Clearly I had no idea what I was thinking because she brought me the following:
1 t-shirt
1 skirt
1 pair of leggings
rainbow sequined dress
9 pairs of underwear
4 bras
7 pull-ups
2 pairs of socks
10 random mismatched socks (which was a feat because I match her socks up so she had to undo them all)
2 pairs of dirty pjs
4 night gowns
5 sets of pjs
2 swim suits
sleeping bonnet
eye mask
sandals
backpack
For those of us keeping track, that’s 11 sets of pjs!!!! I don’t know how we ended up with only one outfit but 11 sets of pjs but clearly we needed to readjust how we were approaching this. I realized there are a lot of steps and mental work that go into packing that, while I have accommodated for on my own, my daughter was going to need to learn. So of course, I started planning a life skill download in my head!
I reprinted my daughter’s packing checklist I gave her and checked off the things she had already brought me. Then we sat down and talked about packing for a trip. I came up with the following questions:
Where are you going?
How long will you there?
What activities will you be doing?
What will the weather be like?
These questions would help determine the outfits we needed and how many she will need. We then talked about what makes an outfit. An outfit, on a very basic level, consists of a top/dress and bottoms. They can be more complex but we were sticking to basics here. I had my daughter get her clothing choice boards so we can pick out what outfits she wanted and we wrote them all down.
I then added to that reprinted packing list the missing items I still needed my daughter to get from her room. I sent her back upstairs with her new list, which included her very detailed outfit list.
I thought this time we would be successful. I thought I had set her up for success this time and held her hand through it. Well this is what she brought me the second time:
4 pairs of undone socks again (including a pair of fuzzy winter socks)
1 bra (needs laundry done so she has another one and enough for the rest of the week)
1 sweatshirt
4 full outfits
1 dress from one of the remaining 2 outfits
1 pair of sweatpants (supposed to be leggings)
1 skirt (supposed to be shorts)
a second sleeping bonnet
So we still had some stuff missing. Insert face palm here. This was her very first try at this though so I stayed patient. I pulled out the things we did need, gave her back the things we didn’t need and wrote her a new list of the missing items. I sent her back upstairs to get those last few things.
She finally was able to bring the last few things to me and we had everything from the original list.
Like I said, this process really made me realize there are a lot of steps that go into packing, so I created a Packing Life Skill download. I really feel like this can make packing a little bit more manageable for anyone, but definitley for neurodivergent people.
