Wednesday, February 10, 2016

PACKING TIPS & TRICKS

Hello everyone and welcome back to my blog. My last post I covered what I was bringing on our trip to Thailand. Today I wanted to go over a few tips and tricks I use while packing.
These tips not only save space but they also make it a little easier to keep everything organized!

1. Rolling your clothes rather than folding. Not only is this great for saving space but its also great for wrinkles! Rolling your clothes will leave less wrinkles in your clothing so when you arrive to your destination there is no need to iron anything!

 2. To go along the same lines as my first tip, I find rolling my clothes by outfit helps with keeping things organized and also saves space! I do this by lying the largest piece of clothing down first and then lying the other articles of clothing on top and simply folding and roll it all together into a little ball! 

3. This tip is great for people who are going to be backpacking. I like to roll all of my clothes and then put them into packing cubs. Instead of using packing cubs I used plastic bags! Saves you money and also keeps your clothing dry if your bag gets wet. I like to organize my bags by tops, bottoms and bathing suits. This way when I reach into my bag and I need a pair of shorts I can easily see which bag I need to grab. The bags are also great for creating a somewhat dupe for a vacuum seal bag. Just roll and fold the bag as tight as possible! This saves you a ton of room!





4. Another small tip I usually use when traveling anywhere, even on a weekend vacation, is bringing a pillow case or extra bag for dirty laundry. I am a clean freak so I need everything to be organized and tidy and I find this helps me a ton! I love knowing all my dirty items are in one bag!

5. A little tip while packing is to make sure that you have an extra outfit or two in your carry on bag or if you're traveling with someone else, put an outfit in their bag or carry on in case your luggage gets lost!

I hope those 5 little tips and tricks helped while you pack for your next getaway! I will definitely be updating these tips and tricks as I continue to travel because I'm sure I will think of a few more!
Thanks for reading,
Alicia xoxo

Wednesday, February 3, 2016

PACKING FOR THAILAND - BACKPACKING EDITION

Hello Bloggers! Welcome back to my travel blog.
I get asked all the time from my colleagues how I decided what I was going to bring while backpacking. I thought I would share with all of you what I am bringing and how I decided on each piece!
Here's a quick snap shot of what I'm bringing!


Above is a quick snap shot of the items I am bringing. I thought I would also mention that the backpack I am bring is 30 Lt. I wanted a backpack that was big enough to fit everything but also small enough that I could bring it around with me on a daily basis. 

Here's a closer look into the tops & dresses I decided to bring with me! 

 

I decided to bring with me 2 different dresses I knew I wanted dresses that were easy to wear and comfortable with a breathable material.
The pink dress in the top left corner is from American Eagle. This dress is great because its a bright colour and the fabric is easy to wear and great for hot weather! It also has a build in bra which is great! This dress is great for day to day and also great if we decide to go out at night since you can totally dress it up!
The other dress I brought is also from American Eagle and again is very breathable and light weight. It will be easy to dry and its very easy to pack since its so light weight. I brought this dress as more of a cover up for the beach. 
I also decided to bring a cute romper, the one I'm bringing is from Boat House and has a cute open back. Again its easy to pack because the material is light weight and it will be easy to dry after I need to wash it or if it gets wet at the beach. A romper is a great idea because essentially its shorts and a top all in one! 
The three tops in the bottom left corner are from LuLu Lemon. I decided to bring these because they have a build in bra which is awesome and are also made from awesome fabric that is breathable and easy to wear! These shirts will be great for everyday use since they look good with jean shorts, a skirt and leggings. We plan on doing a lot of hiking and exploring so these tops will be perfect! Plus they are very flattering! 
The tops in the bottom right hand corner are two tops I can wear lounging around everyday or even if we need to run errands etc! The tye dye black top is from American Eagle and is a crop top, great for the hot weather and look good with the pair of high wasted shorts I am bringing. Again has a built in bra making it one less thing I have to worry about! The grey top with the skeleton bones on the front is from Sabo Skirt. This shirt will be great for sleeping, traveling and lounging. The material is light weight and easy to wear! Perfect for a lazy day but still looking cute!  

Here's a more in depth look at the bottoms & swimsuits I am bringing! 

The bottom two pictures are the bottoms I am bringing, the bottom right shows how I rolled my bottoms to make more room in my backpack! Rolling your clothes is a great tip for saving room! 
I decided to bring two pairs of leggings, one pair is a cropped pair of leggings from Joe Fresh & the other pair is a full legging from Winners. Both have great fabric that is super breathable and easy to dry & pack! I decided to go with pink colours so that it was a little more fun for the hot weather! Plus black attracts the heat and I didn't want that! Both of these bottoms go with either of my LuLu Lemon tops which is exactly what I wanted! 
I also packed a skirt with built in shorts. This "Skort" is from Bench its the blue one in the middle. Again sticking to the same fabric as before, very light weight and breathable. The skort option was great for me because I wanted something cute yet realistic. Great for traveling or everyday use! 
I also packed two pairs of shorts. One being a light weight very colourful pair of printed shorts I picked up from Stitches. These are perfect for hot weather! There cute and fashionable & they dry quickly! The other pair of shorts are high wasted white denim shorts from American Eagle. I thought it would be nice to have a pair of denim shorts for going out at night or going to the mall etc. These white ones are great for matching with any of the tops I am bringing above! 
Now for bathing suits! I decided to only bring 2 since I'm sure ill find some cute ones while in Thailand. I decided to go with a very bright bathing suite and a plain black suite that way I can mix and match both suits and get more use out of both!
 For underwear and socks I decided to pack them all in this great mesh bag I got from WhiteFox Boutique. This bag is great for a beach backpack and is great for storing all the undies and socks! I brought 7 pairs of underwear and 3 pairs of socks. I also brought 2 bras, a white and a nude. I also decided to pack 1 sports bra and one bandoue!
ALSO! Don't forget the outfit you wear on the plane counts as clothing too! Heres a quick look at the outfits I am wearing on the plane! 


My airport outfit took me the longest to figure out! I get FREEZING on air planes and knew I needed a good outfit to keep me warm but needed to keep in mind I didn't want to get too warm so knew I needed good layers! 
I decided to go with a pair of leggings, an Under Armour long sleeve to keep me warm and a nice golf sweater I had from Jasper that keeps you warm but isn't too thick for when I needed to pack it away. I also am deciding to wear a scarf, this will be perfect if I get extra cold it can double as a blanket or I can use it over my neck pillow for extra comfort! 
Im also wearing my tennis shoes because there super comfy and light weight to pack away after! 

While I was packing I made sure to pre plan my outfits. I picked versatile pieces that would make a number of different outfits. That would be my biggest piece of advice while packing your backpack. Pre plan outfits!! Saves you a lot of time! Another tip is if your heading to South East Asia like I am, I heard the shopping is AMAZING so don't over pack because you will find some amazing things while your there that you can pick up for half the cost it is here!

Thanks for reading!
Alicia xoxo 

Monday, February 1, 2016

FINDING CHEAP FLIGHTS

Hello Everyone, welcome back to my travel blog!
I wanted to share some of my tips and tricks on finding cheap flights. These tips and tricks are great for international flights and even domestic flights!
My fiance and I got our tickets from Toronto to Bangkok for $625!! That's a great price considering when we used to live in Jasper, AB our flights from Calgary or Edmonton to Toronto were roughly the same price! To fly within Canada is pretty expensive so if your not planning to travel internationally, hopefully these tricks can help you!
If you were curious as to which company we booked our tickets and which airline I will list that below:
We booked our flights with FlightNetwork and our Airline is EvaAir. We almost got our tickets from FlightHub and found it consistently had the best prices however, flight network had a sale and lowered their tickets $10 cheaper so we jumped on them and purchased!
Here are some of my tips and tricks!



TIP ONE:The best tip I could offer would be to consistently search different sites and see which sites are offering the best deals, I will list some of my favorite search engines - Flight Network, Flight Hub, CheapOAir, Travelocity, JetRadar, Kyak & Trip Advisor
My favorite site was probably Kyak - Kyak allows you to search all of the above sites in one search engine and shows you which company is offering the best deal! Its fantastic!
TIP TWO:When searching for flights make sure when you are searching your clearing your browsing history and cache, this is because the companies are tracking your browsing history and they will increase the prices of your flight if your consistently searching for the same flight. So once a day or even after a few hours of searching just delete your search history and open a new internet browser and continue searching!
TIP THREE: This one goes hand and hand with the first tip, I found this to be very helpful when I was searching for flights. I would download the apps onto my Ipad from each flight network company. This was I didn't have to clear by browsing history and it was easy to search flights everyday and see which company was offering better deals * Kyak was by far my favorite and the most useful app!
TIP FOUR:Sign up for notifications! I signed up with both FlightNetwork and Flight Hub to receive notifications when the flight I was looking for dropped in price. Sure they only email you when it goes down by a few cents but in our case the flight had dropped $10 and for us to save $20 each that's 2 nights stay in Thailand! So a penny saved is a penny earned!
TIP FIVE: Booking your flights on a Monday or Tuesday are the cheapest of the whole week! & not just cheaper by a $30 or so they are cheaper by hundreds of dollars! For example, our flight to Thailand on a Friday-Sunday was roughly $1300 and on Monday and Tuesday it was $600-700!

& those are a few tips and tricks that I found help me while searching for flights! Make sure to do your research when looking for flights! It took me about 2 months to find the flight I wanted and the price I was happy with! Remember, last minute flights are great but dont wait too last minute or else sometimes you'll end up paying more!
Hope some of these tricks help you out next time you fly!

Alicia xox