Packing Light: My Experiment with Carry On Only

I was traveling for work last week, a 4 day trip to the Washington D.C. area.  I decided not to check any baggage, which meant confining myself to a backpack and my purse.  Let's evaluate how that went.

Clothes and shoes wise, it wasn't an issue at all!  I took separate outfits for each day, pajama bottoms, and two pairs of shoes, so I didn't feel deprived at all regarding attire.  My tip:  rolling your clothes allows for tight packing.  But when it came to toiletries/makeup - that was difficult.

Trying to figure out what items conformed with carry on restrictions was the most tricky, especially when it came to contact solution, as I did not have a proper sized container.  I did take my Naked 1 palette, which fit perfectly in the top zippered compartment (where it says Marmot Granite) of my backpack.  And let me sing the praises of this backpack, which I've had since graduate school day and used to take rock climbing.  Love it.  My laptop also fit nicely into my purse, another much loved item that is starting to show wear.  I just bought another Sakroots purse during their recent Friends and Family sale, in the Optic Songbird print:

My biggest fail was forgetting to pack my eye primer, which meant creased and goopy eyes by about 1 pm each day.  Talk about reinforcing an appreciation for eye primer - a work horse if ever there was one - I haz it big time.

Sorry for the lack of posts this week, but I came back to work EMERGENCIES.  So, I've been (trying to) put out fires and decide on proper courses of action, which has used all of my available brain cells.  I've got lots of new/good stuff to play with, however, and I'm looking forward to CALM so I can show them to you.