Moving Part 2

Now that everything we we're going to be taking or storing wasn't sold (well almost - we have 2 large loads to take to the local goodwill & a donation of 150 lbs of food to the local food bank) we were ready to pack. Sounds easy enough - everything else is going to one of 4 places - suitcases to fly with us, storage - to sit and wait for us to return, goodwill - there's lots of little stuff left & shipping. Steve found a company which ships personal home items overseas for a reasonable price (read $1200 for 100 sq ft) which is pretty reasonable compared to some other shipping companies.

So 100 sq ft is about the equivalent of 33 medium home depot moving boxes, sounds easy enough right? Fit everything you need for the next any number of years into 33 boxes, and put them on a boat and wait 5 to 8 weeks to get them.... yes I am being super sarcastic.

So in an ideal world the house would be super organized and we would know exactly what to bring and what to leave behind. Unfortunately that's now how this went. It was more like a tornado, stuff everywhere, no origination, no going back and double checking to see if we packed what we really needed and not just stuff we thought we might like to have. It just all went into boxes, until we had way more then 33 boxes. We had golf clubs and shelves and art and computers and more clothes then we could ever where or wash and it all went into boxes. It took 3 days (not full days, but still 3 days) of packing to get it all in boxes. And after the dust settled and everything was in a box we had 2 full pallets.

Pallet 1

Pallet 2

After packing all this stuff in boxes, we loaded it all into a big box truck - that's everything we own fit in a box truck U Haul. If that's not a life altering experience I don't know what is. 

Now we were left with the task of getting the rest of our stuff into 4 large suitcases and 2 carry-ons & 2 personal items for the flight to the UK - let me tell you sir this kinda packing is an art! We even bought a scale. In the end we had one overweight bag (65 lbs for $100) and 3 50 lbs bags. Plus carry-ons weighing about 30 lbs a piece and personal items (backpack and a purse) coming in at about 35 lbs and 20 lbs respectively.