I suppose this is “Part II” of my earlier “Moving Sale” post…
Now that I have started packing in earnest I am at a complete loss. I swear our house has become a clown car – every time I think I’ve emptied out some closet, room, cabinet, etc., more stuff appears! And I keep going back and forth about what to ship – one day I feel strongly about having our wood block print from Kyoto hanging in our new home, the next day I think staring at the granny-flower-paintings already there might be an interesting change of pace. Then, the next day, I think we may get a bit homesick if we have nothing from our past with us. But then, the day after that I think as long as we have each other and Skype (okay, and thedailyshow.com), we have everything we need…
Honestly, at this point, I have only ventured to seal two small boxes of books – the rest of our stuff keeps playing musical chairs in and out of boxes. I have a few pictures/paintings wrapped up all fancy in this picture kit I got at U-Haul, but can’t seem to get up the ambition to go the rest of the way and put them in the matching box. What if they don’t make it to Italy? What purpose would they serve stored here in our attic? Arg! I have a friend who, along with his wife and 3 kids, up and moved to New Zealand last year – he advised me that it’s nice to have some pictures, etc. from home – and he usually has good advice… but those pictures are so big and heavy…
I am ordinarily “the decider,” but really can’t seem to make a decision here. What do you think? In the immortal words of the Clash – Should [our stuff] stay or should [it] go???
New Mexico to Italy 
mysleepingdragon
/ May 16, 2012lol….I did all that in March and April. Ugh, it was mind bending. I had that feeling too, like where the heck is all this stuff coming from, I don’t remember it! We limited ourselves to 20 boxes, 2 picture boxes and said goodbye to the rest. I gave tons away to Freecycle (nice they come and get it) and had a small 2 day apartment sale, which only brought in about $225, but so be it. We sold the furniture months prior, sold some things on eBay and Criagslist. The car went to Carmax for a fabulous price. The best of all of it was a friend who simply came and cleared out the remaining misc from the apartment for his non-profit.
I shuddered though, reading your description, I hope we never have to do it again!
newmexicotoitaly
/ May 16, 2012Thanks for reading.
WOW! That sounds painful (and familiar). I appreciate you sharing, though – always nice to hear that other folks have been there! I have been considering Carmax in case I can’t sell ASAP – hope your “fabulous price” isn’t sarcasm?
Mind Margins
/ May 17, 2012I HATE packing, even for short trips. I feel your pain. I also packed up and moved to Europe long ago (Switzerland), but I was much younger and had much less stuff than I do now. Looking forward to reading about your adventures in Italy!
newmexicotoitaly
/ May 17, 2012Thanks for reading! I suppose one shouldn’t complain too much about packing for a move to Italy!!!
Mind Margins
/ May 17, 2012So true! What city are you moving to? I’m envious.
textiledznr
/ May 17, 2012I wish I could offer up some great sound advice but I am no better…..even though I’m not as bad as I used to be, I will still come up with reasons to keep something.
textiledznr
/ May 17, 2012Good luck and may the force be with you! 🙂
Brenda
/ January 1, 2014We did a trial move to Australia/New Zealand. When we left my husband insisted that we were not coming back. We kept a lot of stuff but sold a lot too including almost all of our furniture. We thought in terms of shipping it over one day. But in the back of my mind I wondered if we would end up coming back and I would be upset I got rid of things. After nine months of living out of a suitcase and bought kitchen gear there I do know how little we need or how little we will miss. But I see the other side of the coin too because after nine months we came back to the states and it was costly to replace many things we sold. I constantly struggle with how much stuff is to much? What stuff is important to me and what isn’t? I still dream of living in another country and if I do it again I’m sure the decisions will still be difficult. But for the most part I think just buying stuff once we get there would make the most sense. There are some things I could not part with though and eventually would have to ship them, like Christmas decorations I have collected for 30 years. It is nice you do not have to pay for storage. Storage fees add up. My aunt and uncle traveled in an RV and put everything in storage. Years later when they moved into a house again my aunt wondered “Why did I pay to save all this old stuff?”. Decisions like these are difficult.
I just started reading your blog and am enjoying it. I have a fascination with Italy and hope to visit there.
newmexicotoitaly
/ January 1, 2014Hi and thanks for reading! Not to ruin the rest of the story… but we did come back and it’s been interesting what we did save and what we had to replace ( a lot)….