Preparations

So, I leave in 9 days for Switzerland. Yay! I'm nervous and excited and anxious. The only thing making me nervous is the flight. I'm not scared of flying, but it is a longggg longggg uncomfortable flight. It will be fine, just not very fun. Anyway, I have been preparing. I got all of my art supplies, except I need to get last minute tape, and I have even packed already. I need to go through all of my clothes again and ween some stuff out. I packed for hot and cold weather because the weather in Switzerland is iffy right now, but I think I have too much stuff. I'm a "better to be safe then sorry" kind of packer. Oh well. Anyway, here are some pictures of all my packed up supplies. Observe the beauty. 

Here are my tubes of paint individually wrapped in saran wrap. My paints are always organized by color and are probably the most organized area of my life. I wrapped them because I heard that in checked baggage things can freeze, but I also heard that they explode from cabin pressure when you carry them on. I don't know what I will do yet, but at least they're wrapped and won't explode on each other or any of my other stuff. I'm worried about bringing them in my carry on because they will all have to fit into one one quart baggie, and I just don't know if that's possible. Anyone know what the best idea is? 

Also in the picture is my new expandable... thing. I don't know what its proper name is, but it expands to hold water and then squishes down for easy carrying. Next to it is my pencil case! 

Inside my pencil case are all of my exciting new pens and then my two mechanical pencils, which aren't new but have new lead in them. 

On the other side of my case there are a few pens, including my new fancy gold paint pen, and some erasers and a sharpener and some lead for my pencils. 

Here are my two lovely new palettes. Well, I actually got 3 but Zach is using one for his gouache. I don't need three anyway, that would be silly. But here they are with all of my paint colors squeezed out so that I have some with me just in case I feel like painting on the plane and decide not to carry on my tubes of paint. 

Here is my new moleskin sketchbook especially for the trip. I probably won't completely fill it, but I would like to. 

Anyway, that's all my loot for now. I didn't take a picture of all of my watercolor blocks I bought, but there are multiple sizes. It's very exciting. I probably won't take a picture of my suitcase just yet. I'll wait until it's really packed and ready to go.