Friday, April 1, 2011

Thank you all so much for your sweet thoughts you wrote about my last post. We really are excited about this new job and this move - everything is just working out so smoothly, and we just really feel like this is the right move for us - and we can't wait!


As you can see, the packing process is well under way. These are not the only boxes we have finished so far, some of them are just in other rooms, and they are too heavy for me to want to move them to our wall-o-boxes....so they are waiting for Jon and his muscles to come home!

Now, I have some thoughts about moving (I know, you are not surprised - I have thoughts about everything!) and I am going to share them with you:

1) I do not like packing! My dad says that the first punishment given to Adam and Eve after eating the fruit was having to move out of the Garden (as you can tell, he does not like moving either!)

2) Even though I don't like packing, it is nice to go through all of our stuff and get rid of a lot of it. Our goal is to not have to buy any new boxes....it's amazing how much junk you collect after even just a few short years!

3) This is our 4th move in 3 1/2 years, so we have a little bit of a system. Our boxes are already labeled, so most of the time we can just make sure we fill the boxes up with what it says on the outside - we already know that the stuff will fit, and we don't have to waste more Sharpie ink

4) Sharpies go dry much quicker when you are writing on a dusty cardboard box.

5) Clothes make really great bubble wrap. Bubble wrap is kind of spendy - and, we have used paper towels in the past, but that's a huge waste! Of course newspaper works great, but when you run out - clothes or spare material are a great alternative! It's summer, so it's not sweater season, so why not use those sweaters to wrap up your breakables? You need to bring your sweaters with you, and this way your breakables get padding, and you don't have to waste an entire box on sweaters! (Dirty clothes are great too.....of course none of you have enough dirty clothes just laying around to use for a move like I do...)

6) Last time we moved we ended up moving all of our stuff at least 4 times! We would stack everything in one spot, then we would need to clean that area, so we would move everything to a different spot! When we were finally moving them into the truck, they were in a back bedroom and kind of hard to get out. Not very bright on our part! This time we are stacking everything right next to the front door - duh right? Live and learn I guess.....

7) Finally, the last time we moved a lot of our pictures and picture frames (you know, the ones that go on the wall) got all scratched up or broken...and I am trying to figure out a better way to pack them. The problem is that our pictures are all different sizes and they don't fit in boxes very well. Do any of you have ideas about packing these difficult pictures?

So, those are my (incredibly boring) thoughts about moving. I am really excited about getting up there and unpacking - I think unpacking is fun because it's always nice to put your things in a nice new place.

If any of you have any brilliant moving tips that you have learned - I am all ears! Anything to make this process easier would be so great to hear!

5 comments:

Brenden+Nikki said...

I think you definitely have it covered! I don't know how to move pictures either...we had the same problem!

I'm so excited for you guys the more boxes I see....but sad at the same time :(

Kay and Krystal said...

Hmm...no good packing tips we have only moved once and it did NOT go well. I'm however going to blame it on the fact that we had 2 weeks and when I found out I had a 2 week old baby. Good excuse? I think so. However since we are moving this summer sometime I really like your thoughts..so any others would be great to have!

I'm so happy for you guys too!

Laurie said...

My advice for moving pictures/frames? Wrap them in blankets, sheets and/or towels. You already caught on to how your clothes make great bubble wrap for boxes - now use your blankets/towels for bubble wrap for your pictures and other framed items. Last time I moved, I wrapped my big frames in my extra quilts/bedding (then taped around the corners, to hold it tight) and when I got down here and all moved in.... all the frames were safe and sound.

Good luck, and I'm so excited for you and Jon to be closer to family. When I come home, we'll have to get together for a) chips & salsa at Eva's or b) pie at Trapper's. Deal? Deal.

Whitney and Michael said...

Yes, like Laurie said, using blankets/towels and such work great or the pictures. Also what we did was put some of the more fragile stuff like that in our cars instead of the moving truck so that it would be safer and less likely to bounce around. Also I don't know what moving truck you are using (if you have to get one instead of using someone's friendly trailor for free :) we found that Bugdet truck was lots cheaper than using U-haul, even with having to go to Payson to pick it up (which is where you might have to drop it off, if you were to use them, cuz its the closest to that area).
It is also never fun to have to make the move in separate vehicles, although since you are only going to snowflake it wouldn't be that much alone time driving (when we moved up here to idaho we had to drive separate cars/moving truck the whole way- and it was in winter, it took us 18+ hours- luckily you won't have to worry about that kind of stuff! :)
I am excited for you though, I miss being closer to family, so that is great you'll get to be close to your fam! :)

David said...

Hey Mal! Dave and I got a lot of blankets/sheets/ towels when we got married. I stuck a few frames into our linen boxes when we moved, alternating padding thickness between 1 to 2 inches of linens between frames. It worked out great for our 8x10 and smaller frames.

Loves!