Today I packed most of m clothes and my cookbooks. That's it, but I was alone with the boys all day...
Zebra--awesome on the money for your books. Also, a yard sale sounds like a great idea.If you really love your pots and pans, I might try to find a way to fit them. In any case, best luck to you!
Yay, somebody on Time Trade wants the new exterior door that is cluttering up my garage! (The trade will cover three months of music lessons for my daughter, yay!)
I agree with Poetry -- Zebra, take those pots and pans if you love them, if there is any way you can. You deserve to keep the things you love most. Maybe something else could be replaced if space is an issue. I don't know...just guessing. {{{{{{hugs}}}}}} You are such a strong person, I know you will get through this, and I'm wishing you grace and a good sense of humor as you pack up your stuff and transition emotionally.
Awesome deal, worthy!!
As for me, not much has gotten done today. But DH has gotten Friday off work, so he'll be able to help out a lot. We'll do some more this evening and tomorrow evening. We're trying to pack at least a little every day.
box #3 is officially sealed, inventoried and tagged.
This is the 1st box of books and all my books are officially packed and ready for shipping. One more box and all of DS books should be ready to go.
ALL MY YARN is packed and ready to go. I only kept out 2 skiens for a new project, the skeins for my current project and one project thats been on going. I have several skeins for the yard sale. (I also have more books to sell ugh)
The 3d box is NIB lego sets and NIB toys for DS. Transitioning is difficult and I'm glad he saved several sets since he will need things to keep himself busy once we get there.
DS has been taking apart lego models so he can pack them and there should be another box of ziplock lego's soon.
I HATE PACKING.
My goal was 20 boxes plus whatever fits in the car.. IDK If I can make that goal.
Several things from MY closet are in the yardsale pile as well. Many school supplies, office supplies, 
this is soooo hard....
We don't have 'time trade'.... i wish we did.
Tonight I readied another box for shipping. Sadly this was a box of photos of DS from baby to about 6 yrs ago. I say 5 yrs ago because I moved this box when I tried this x-country move in 2005 and it was still sealed. I can NOT believe I was moving unfilled photo albums... what a waste of space and $$.. by better packing and thinning of unused scrapbook supplies and unused photobooks I was able to go down 'one whole box size' for this!! NO the baby book is not finished yet but I am much better at crafting now and I see what needs to be done. Maybe when he is ready for college lol.
I am now up to FOUR boxes fully packed, sealed, labeled and inventoried. GO ME!
*more items found for the yard sale as well.
(did I really think photo albums would be difficult to find or scrapbook stuff??) someone should have slapped me in 2005.
I know, it came along exactly EXACTLY when I needed it. The one thing we don't have here is a local online free for-sale or barter board...Freecycle is only for giving away, and Time Trade is more about services than stuff, though you can post stuff and I got lucky with the door. Craigslist here is for the whole state and is centered at the capitol 3 hours away, so locals don't use it much.
We don't have 'time trade'.... i wish we did.
You are awesome, Zebra! I still have a whole tub full of photos. I would like to go through them but the memories are too hard still. I have plenty of non-emotional stuff to pack up first.
How far are you moving? Far away, right? I bet you can make your 20 box goal especially if you can ship some of the lighter stuff. Four boxes is great progress; keep it up!
I got rid of the roofing stuff yesterday. It made a nice clear space in my garage.
Today I declutter my husband. Yep, it's the final divorce hearing. That will lighten the load. 
I think I might take a load of scrap metal to the metals guy this weekend. I don't really have enough to justify getting them to come pick up. It should fit in my car. Every bit gone helps.
And the books. I am chipping away at that. The kids are eager to go through their spring clothes and I can't do that until the downstairs room is cleared of books. Thankfully our church is having a book sale in April so it will be very easy to donate anything that doesn't sell immediately to the used bookstore.
Poetry, I hope you get lots done in the next few days!!
Sometimes it feels like a mountain that will never be conquered. But we always manage to get to the bottom of it somehow. Last time I moved I had three kids under age 5. So I think this time has to be a little easier in some respects.
I am waiting eagerly for the "spring rush" of new real-estate options so we have something useful to consider.
OMG. We haven't signed the contract yet, but it looks like we are moving May 10th!!! WHOA! Our family vacation (to vegas) is May 1-8th so we are packing up all our stuff and sending it off by april 30th. Then living out of suitcases for 2 weeks! The only reason we are coming back to illinois from vegas is to get my car and my dogs. Then driving a baby and 5 dogs across the country. Chicago to Portland. I'm going to start purging/packing my office today. This is going to be HARD work. This is a 4 bedroom house with a huge basment (mostly packed already), and 2 offices... deciding what to keep and get rid of is VERY HARD.
HUGS to everyone who is in the 'moving rush'.
Worthy- yes I am moving about 2k miles. We are only taking what is deemed 'essentials'. According to my 11 yr old DS that is books and legos (and craft supplies). I am realizing that I don't really own anything, everything here is DS stuff LOL. Well I do have a few kitchen things like my Kitchen Aid 
My plan is to ship everything except spring/summer clothes and have the clothes in the car.
Slow and steady right?
Right now my son is in a total panic because where we are moving to is having 'snow' (read that as very very light flurries). He is questioning the weather and is terrified that he will freeze. Poor child who was raised in the desert. They are going to call him 'cactus kid'.
I CAN do this, I am empowered. This change is good. I WILL NOT have a mental breakdown.
zebra, I wonder if you're coming out here? We had flurries last night, and a hard frost. Though this winter has been extremely mild overall.
sk8, you are doing an awesome job. That is a huge prospect but I know you can do it. Sometimes it's easier to just tackle it all with a pile of chocolate and a pot of coffee and some hyper music on your headphones... Good luck and keep us posted!
I definitely have to have my house ready and on the market by June 1, which is suddenly looming closer. I am thinking of it as a sort of packing...decluttering everything we don't need, packing up and storing everything we can, and then having to keep the rest of the house simple and tidy (ugh -- that is the hard part).
Moving is so exciting, I wish we were already at that point.
Good luck to everyone.
I have a packing tip to share:
For those of you who are using 'free boxes' or grocery store boxes, don't use boxes that shipped/stored food in them as long term storage. The reasoning is animals/bugs can smell the food and you will get an infestation/critters. For long term storage seek out things like rubbermaid containers, photo copy paper boxes, or purchase some 'storage boxes'.
All my boxes come from my family pizza store and all my stuff smells like pizza after I move, every time.
Actually... makes me sad that won't ever happen again after this. :( I live three blocks from our family restaurant. Soon it will be 2,000 miles. I'm so glad we are coming home in June for a wedding. It makes the transition easier to bare. Yes I WANT to move to Oregon, so bad! I HATE Illinois. But everyone I know is here.. so it will be hard leaving. Also we decided today we are leaving the cat behind. I'm so sad... :(
I got rid of the crappy old utility trailer today. A friend wants it and I had to borrow a tow hitch and drive it to his (vacant) house. It was an adventure. At least the eyesore is out of my yard. I had no prior experience backing up a trailer, so it was...interesting. But it is done!!
I also got rid of three boxes of scrap metal and several large pieces -- there is a drop off near our house; very convenient.
And an unused fire safe -- selling it to a friend; dropped it off at her house to get it out of here.
One thing at a time.
I hope nobody minds that I keep posting my progress, even when it is small. This thread holds me accountable and allows me to celebrate and know others understand.
Today I made arrangements to give away a brand-new exterior door that has been languishing in my garage. I moved it outside (sheltered) for pickup later this week. Totally changed the "feng shui" 
in my still-messy garage. For the better, of course. I still have a lot in there to pick away at, but it's getting less overwhelming to look at.
I folded up some huge, messy tarps and secured them with bungee cords. Small thing but they are monstrous when not folded properly, and they've been kicking around the garage/driveway area unfolded for too long.
I am having trouble finding someone to come partner with me to get my shutters down for painting (and back up) and spot me on a very high ladder so I can wash the exteriors of four windows. Problem is, the windows are on the 2nd floor over a cement patio, so a fall would be Very Bad, and I'm kind of nervous about heights. The friend I could otherwise get help from -- who would even bring scaffolding from his work, if he could help, but he can't -- is getting married soon (but not soon enough) and is totally consumed with that 'project.' Bummer. Hopefully someone will come along who can help.
The other good news is I think our leach field has 'healed.' At least enough that it doesn't need replacing. It was being overused when XH was here (seriously, 2 hot baths a day? he was depressed...) The kids and I are more careful with our water use, and the sloggy part of the yard is now dried up and normal. I just don't have the $400 for the inspection that would tell us for sure -- but hopefully a potential buyer would, or they would be willing to take their chances. We'll see.
There is so much this house needs done, I won't get it all done before listing the house. Anyone else in that position? Did you just keep working on things after you listed it? I feel like that would be a failure of sorts, but I just can't imagine getting everything spiffed up in this long-neglected house (from before we bought it). Hard sometimes to imagine prioritizing, but I'm going to have to draw some lines. What did you do?
Good progress! Everything counts!
The countdown here begins tomorrow. We are closing and packing up the tuck APRIL 30th!! Tonight I got most of my book shelves packed! Donating about half to goodwill, and brining half (about 10 small boxes). Feels so good to have 1 room (of uhhh about a dozen lol) about half packed!
Worthy, did you clean your tarps? I have a few big tarps that are really dirty, that I'd like to use to cover furniture in the truck for the move, but I'm not sure the best way to clean the tarps!
Anyone have any tips!
sk8, I just left them out in the rain a couple of times on my paved driveway! Lazy girl's way to clean them. You could hose them off on a sunny day and let them dry -- just get them folded up before it rains again (which is what I failed to do, a couple of times)
That's not very good advice. Ours were not horribly dirty.
The snowball is rolling and growing! After moving that exterior door out of the garage, I swept and moved a few things around, and suddenly had the energy and motivation to tidy up a bunch of other things. The garage is looking better and better and better. It's literally one box at a time, one shelf at a time, but it adds up.
I also realized yesterday that my natural method of "crisis decluttering" is to put all the clutter in the center of the room. I get the surfaces and perimeter tidy, and rake everything on the floor to the center. Everything that isn't immediately tidy-able goes in the piles(or in the box or whatever I put there for collecting stuff temporarily). And then I have this mountain of JUNK in the middle of a visually tidy room, and it lights a fire under my butt to decimate that pile. Trash, recycle, sort, file, relocate, donate, decide-what-to-do-with...I do it as fast as I can. I can too easily ignore random items, but I can't ignore a mountain.
I have been doing this for awhile in our living room, only all the clutter goes on the coffee table (so I can vacuum). The kids have to go through the pile by a certain time, after which I claim whatever is left and process accordingly. I have one box in the living room next to the couch that we call the "odds and ends box" -- it's for quickie cleanup when we don't have time for a big pile sort and there are only a few things laying around.
I realized that I'm a "pile method" girl when I realized last night in my garage that I'm tidying the perimeter and shoving stuff into the center of the garage...and the center pile is shrinking, yay!!
I am dreading having to tidy the house in a hurry to show it once it is on the market. I think the above method will help, but I would love other ideas from anyone who is selling their house.
That seems like a good method, Worthy! I like it!
I sorted winter clothes to be packed away. I need some low tubs that will go under a bed, though, to store it all in.
I have a MOUNTAIN of bags to be donated in my kitchen. Seven giant trash bags, and that doesn't include the many that I have just thrown away. I still need to find a place to take all this stuff.
I bought a label maker on Friday. That thing has changed my life. Unfortunately, I already ran out of tape! I need more! I managed to go through all my paperwork and sort and organize it all, and then I labeled the boxes. It looks fantastic! I did the same to the kids' art supplies. Their art stuff is now in one small storage box, rather than the two boxes+crap on the floor where it used to be!
The kids' room looks a bajillion times better. It's much harder to make a mess with so little toys! There is still plenty to play with, the difference is now they can actually find it, and once they find it, there is space in their room to play with it!
Worthy, I like that method a lot. I actually bought a nice basket with a lid (its box shaped) at hobby lobby, just for all those little odds and ends, and when it gets full I clean it out! It hides the random stuff really well and if we need to clean up quick we can throw random stuff in it.
I got a lot done last night... then my period started, and now I'm feeling bloated and crappy. I made my son's easter basket after grocery shopping this morning. So thats done (and hidden) before we go out of town to look at houses this week. BTW, Wish us luck we have to find something on this trip of face not haveing anywhere to go to when we get to Oregon in May! Eek!
Anyway.. I really need to get going on the garage, I want to get it cleaned out so I can start storing packed boxes there so we don't have to bring them down to the basement and back up. If I don't get started on the garage today I will tomorrow, then tuesday its off to Portland!!!
Follow Mothering