Road Trip Post Series: New Orleans: Part 0

Come hell or high water...

We will be loaded up in the car and hitting the road early Saturday morning. My main goal? Make it out of Kentucky! But today is only Thursday. So, I have a bit more preparing to do before we take a 1400 mile round trip adventure.

The Itinerary

As far as activities planned for our time this weekend, we are going for a relaxed approach. As I have said before, @thatsweeneyguy and I are making this trip with our 8 month old son so, we need to make sure that anything and everything we do he is okay to be right there with us. There are obvious things to check off the bucket list while in the Crescent City and I do have a few things up my sleeve so, make sure you're watching for future installments coming this weekend.

For obvious safety reasons, I will not be disclosing our exact location for our vacation destination, but I will keep you informed enough to know what is going on :). We will venture down I-65 out of Kentucky, through Tennessee, and just into Alabama, to a little town called Cullman, where we have a hotel booked for the night. Sunday morning, whatever time Steembaby awakens us, we will load the car back up and make another 5 hour drive into the heart of New Orleans for a two night stay, before we head back home to Kentucky sometime on the fourth day of the trip. Depending on what time we depart, we will drive as far as we feel comfortable before finishing the remainder of the roadtrip the next day. We do not have a room booked for this night so, we can drive further than halfway if we want to. I am always one wanting to get in the the car and go wherever, but when it is time to get home, let's burn rubber!

What am I packing?

Before we get any further into this, I need to first inform you: I am an over-packer, but hey, there are worse things to be than prepared. As an added bonus, I am giving you an exclusive sneak peak into how I am going to be going about creating images for my @bujo posts with a look at my master road trip packing list.

Some of this is pretty self explanatory, but there are some key points that I would like to cover.

Steembaby road trip necessities

As far as weather goes in Kentucky, we have an old saying... "if you don't like the weather here, just give it five minutes" haha. Three days ago it was 70 degrees and sunny and yesterday it snowed, so we will likely be heading South in cold weather. I haven't really looked into the weather in Cullman (because we are just there to sleep), but I know New Orleans is always that perfect summertime weather. So, when it comes to Steembaby, we have to make sure we have all of the bases covered.
I have packed enough clothes duration wise for him for every weather situation. It may seem strange, as I will probably be bringing home about half of these clothes clean, I would rather make sure I have everything he needs to be comfortable while we are so far away from home.

Here is a quick breakdown of what I have packed for him

(4) long sleeve onesies
(4) long pants
(3) sweatshirts
(5) pajama sets
(7) short-sleeve onesies
(4) shorts
(6) pairs of socks
(6) bibs
(3) towels
(5) wash cloths
I also packed his beanie, sun glasses, and his shoes

I am so excited about his swim gear! I believe it is important to expose children to water from a young age and this trip will be the perfect opportunity to get Steembaby in the water for the first time.

The hat is to of course shade his little face from the sun, a suit rather than just trunks to again offer more coverage, and water shoes. I am not sure where we will end up getting in the water at (could be a pool or the ocean), so I want to make sure he doesn't hurt his feet.


Steembaby loves his blankets! I have him 4 minkie blankets packed, 3 muslins (these are great thin blankets that can be used to shade the stroller or double as a burp cloth. I don't go anywhere without one of these), a highchair/shopping cart cover, and a HUGE quit my grandmother made for me that we will spread out on the grass when we stop to stretch our legs during the road trip.




The last thing I want to show you isn't really for the trip itself, but this adventure certainly caused me to go ahead and make a big change.


It's time for Steembaby to come out of the infant seat. I am a huge advocate for car seat safety, and I read that making the switch to a convertible rear-facing seat is better done sooner, rather than later. Here is the article I read that led me to the decision to buy a new seat before we began our trip.

New Orleans History

New Orleans is a port city at the mouth of the Mississippi River and was founded in 1718 by the French. In 1763 the Spanish was ceded control of the area after Britain's victory in the Seven Years' War. The oldest remaining buildings in the city's famous French Quarter are in Spanish Colonial style due to many fires worth damage of the original French structures. In 1800 the Third Treaty of San Ildefonso was signed and the French were again given control of the city. It even served as the capital of Louisiana from 1865 to 1880. Despite the reputation that comes along with being a port city during the slavery years, New Orleans was one of the more progressive cities when it came to people of color having rights. I will be talking more about the history of this iconic city in posts to come.

All of that is really cool, but... why NOLA for Spring Break?

Sure, I'll admit it isn't the first city you think of when it comes to Spring Break, but New Orleans is my favorite city. Just the image that comes to my mind when I hear the name of this wonderful city makes we want to load the car up and go now. Everything from the location, geographically to the weather, the food, the culture, the atmosphere, the architecture... I am also a huge history buff and this place is packed full of history! I haven't found anything about this city that I don't love, but if I do, I will let you know

Home away from home

Since we will not be out exploring the city too late because Steembaby turns into a little demon just after his bed time, I searched and searched the internet trying to find the perfect location for us to spend our nights in The Big Easy. Staying cooped up in a hotel all night was just not an option for us. After a few days of digging through Airbnb, I came across this magical gem.

These pictures are from the website that the host provided. We will be sure to show you any more cool features that come with our new little home for the weekend!

This house beautiful in my opinion. You can tell the host put a lot of effort into making sure every detail was just right. Having two bedrooms was another must for us and isn't something we could have obtained practically in a hotel. We want to be comfortable here as this is our end destination and Steembaby sleeps a lot better being just in the next room because we go to bed late and are restless sleepers. And in case you're wondering what the last picture is of... it's a nail station! I am super excited about attempting to do my nails this weekend AND it is already included in our room cost.

That about sums everything up so far. As you saw on the list there are few last minutes things we need to do before we go and we will take care of them as well as load the car up on Friday so we are ready to go first thing on Saturday. I can't wait to hit the road and I'm so excited to bring Steemit with us! If you liked this post you know what to do! :)