Tuesday, July 26, 2016

A Cheat Sheet for Moving

If you haven't seen it on Facebook, my family and I are relocating. Again. This will be our seventh move in thirteen years of marriage. We are neither a military family, nor in some kind of pastoral ministry. We just like to go where the best opportunity is for our family. So since we are becoming experts of a sort at moving, I thought I would give you this cheat sheet if you ever need to move. Enjoy and share with your friends, family or random strangers that might need some focus in their moving adventure.

1. Throw away as much as you can. As someone who once had two very large boxes of cardboard tubes moved, I can say with some authority that it sucks to have to move crap. Every keepsake or potential project piece you have in your home, you will have to find a box for. Then someone or you are going to have to move that box. It's not worth it. If you haven't used something for over a year, get rid of it. I would say even six months, but Christmas ornaments are worth keeping.

2. Be diligent about purging. Always be getting rid of things. Your kids toys, the pants that haven't fit in two years. The shoes that were so cute but feel like Hades has opened up beneath you every time you wear them are not worth it. See above rule.

3. Move in one day. Try to make your exit as fast as possible. A long drawn out good bye is awkward and painful for the one moving. It's tedious for the ones you are moving away from. Make your exit swift, like removing a band-aid.

4. Compile a spreadsheet of everything that needs an address change. So you aren't waiting for that credit card statement and then having to pay a late fee because it's in the dungeon of forwarded mail. Things like credit cards, retirement accounts, life insurance, subscriptions. All those things that just come in the mail and you don't think about them.

5. Check with your significant other before packing anything. Save yourself the hassle of having to unpack a box for that one specific item that's buried at the bottom of a pile of boxes.

6. Save the kids' rooms to last. They love their stuff. Transitions are hard on kids. Moving happens without a lot of input from them. Yes, kids are resilient and all that. But they don't always see the adult benefits of moving. They just see losing friends and not having their stuff. So save their rooms til last.

7. Hire movers. No one loves pizza so much that they want to help you move. Have a big going away party instead!

8. Try to rent where you want your kids to go to school. That way they don't have to make new friends when you finally find that perfect house.

9. Make the effort to say good bye. We all need closure. We need to see the end. Try as much as possible to let the people important to you where you are know that they were important. But don't make empty promises that you will see each other soon. If you truely want to see someone soon, then make the plan to do it before you move.

10. If you don't have set day for cleaning, make one. This is my biggest issue. I hate cleaning. But once you commit to having your house  on the real estate market, it's gotta be show worthy. Cause you want to get top dollar out of it.

Back to packing boxes
-K

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