When traveling, Chris and I rarely check bags when we can prevent it. There’s always anxiety around a checked bag getting delayed (or LOST), especially in a post-pandemic era where it seems like every week, we hear stories about bags getting lost and never found…or turning up in some random city weeks or months later. There are some guaranteed exceptions, though, such as when we go back and forth to Australia, as well as a few times when we’ve traveled with Kaia as a baby (all that baby stuff really accumulates!), and also, certain countries where I love “things” — France, Japan, and Korea. The idea of visiting a place like France and not checking a bag with goodies to bring home seems like such a waste. You went all that way to a glorious, delicious country, and you’re not planning to bring ANY of that deliciousness home with you?!

This time, amongst a large stash of discount French pharmacy items for myself as a gifts, we’ve also purchased and packed tea, chocolate, caramels, pates de fruits, and perhaps the most nerve racking item: French butter, specifically Maison Bordier butter (formerly known as Le Beurre Bordier). La Bon Marche actually does sous vide/vacuum sealing now for just one euro per bag (you can fit about 6-7 Maison Bordier blocks into it), so that eased my worry around the butter getting back to the U.S. fine and without going bad. In addition, some of the French pharmacy items are packaged in glass, so I had to wrap them up with all my clothes in my packing pods to alleviate my worry about them breaking. In the back of my mind, I always have this tiny worry that things I pack in a checked bag will break, even if I know logically that I’ve done my due diligence to cushion it well. I always remember the story of one of my friends coming back from Italy with several amazing wine bottles to open her luggage and discover the bottles had broken, and all her clothes were stained with red wine.

Well, knock on wood: to this date, I’ve never broken anything in a checked luggage. So hopefully my good luck continues and I’ll be able to breathe a sigh of relief after we fully unpack when we get back home later today.