Moving houseplants to Florida

[DodgeGirl78]

We too purged, sold, gave away, threw away and donated so much stuff it was ridiculous! 25 years of marriage and you tend to accumulate LOL And yet our garage here is full of unpacked rubbermaid boxes LOL The bad thing is I too am hitting the thrift stores looking for treasures LOL The best advice I can give is: is it cheaper to move it or just buy it new when you get there?? For instance, the room our beds would have took up in the moving truck just wasnt worth it, so we got new ones here. Honestly my antique furniture looks quite odd in our beach inspired home here...wish we would have sold it at home where it would have brought a pretty penny lol

[SeaLark7]

Dodgegirl, we are planning to do the same thing - we need a new couch and chairs for the living room, but are waiting til we get to Florida to buy them. The biggest thing we are leaving behind is one of our two cars. We plan to sell it and hope that it will pay for the cost of the pod (which we will need in addition to the moving truck - I don't trust my fragile stuff to the movers). We are both retired and will see if we can get by with just one car in Florida. It sure would save on the cost of insurance and license fees !

[DanielAvery]

Being lazy ( ) I decided when I moved here that I would rent a place that was already partially furnished. This served two purposes. First and foremost, I didn't have to move an entire house full of furniture and other belongings. I only brought what I needed to live with (and sorry, but the houseplants did NOT make the cut). I put the majority of my stuff in a storage facility. I have gone back twice to "pick up a few things", which brings me to the second purpose: I have discovered just how little of that stuff I really need in order to live comfortably! The slash-and-burn attitude I had when packing for my move was bad enough, but now I'm thinking that I wasn't blood-thirsty enough when tossing out crap I did not need here.

[pslhomie]

George Carlin did a bit about having too much stuff. Once you get enough of it you have to buy a bigger house to put all of your stuff in and then you get more stuff.

[PhotoFlo]

Here in PA, we have a two story home that is ALL country décor, so obviously we have more stuff than normal, especially after 30 years! When we signed the contract for our new home in Florida, I made the decision that 90% of what we own was NOT going to be traveling with us. That was 10 months ago and we are not planning on the permanent move until next year. I had a sense it would take me that long to purge our belongings and it certainly looks as though it will!

I have been shipping some boxes and loading our luggage with essentials and things we want to keep when we fly down which has helped to eliminate some of the clutter here. We have some antiques and handmade items that although they are nice, I have adopted the attitude that if something happened to me tomorrow, I can’t take it with me anyway, so hopefully someone else may want them and enjoy them. There are some things that I think I want and then look at them again and say “what am I really going to do with this?” I am already feeling relieved with how much I have let go of and how much easier my cleaning is!

We already know that we are only bringing some of our existing furniture and are having new pieces delivered each time we go to the new house. I also know that with the few “must have” items I already have in Florida; I will probably discover that I no longer need some of them once I get there permanently, but it won’t be a monumental task to sort through. I haven’t moved in years so I am hoping that by doing it this way, it will be a lot less strenuous when the actual move takes place, it already feels as though it will be! Time will tell…….

[HarryWho?]

Some people find it easy. I have a friend that moved with his SUV. He donated stuff, had yard sales, gave stuff to friends, and threw stuff out. I wish I was like that.

[SeaLark7]

I have been a "collector" for years.. figurines, teddy bears, books, plates, etc. Boy is it coming back to bite me now ! So many of the items that I paid full price for are now worth nearly nothing, yet I can't bring myself to just donate them to Goodwill. I wish I could go back in time and tell myself to not be such a pack rat/collector !