Day 29: JoePa’s Turn to Help

I wouldn’t want my dad to feel left out of the fun (plus…we need all the help we can get!) so we found some good jobs for him today…

1) Transport the break-ables.

Sure, I packed a ton of fragile stuff for the movers to move, but there was some stuff that would’ve taken far too much time (and far too much bubble wrap.  that stuff is expensive!). That’s where JoePa and his SUV come in.

see all that stuff on what could be a dining room table? we loaded it into JoePa's car (and ours) - and brought it over to the new apartment today.

So now, the extra special fragile stuff is safely in the new apartment, and won’t be in the movers’ way as they’re dealing with all the bulky stuff on Monday.

2) Charity Drop-Off

I’ve mentioned it before, but moving is a great time to go through EVERYTHING  and weed out what you no longer want or need. Clothing that doesn’t fit, kitchen duplicates (you know you have about 4 potato peelers…), and anything that you just never use (be honest). There are wonderful organizations who will benefit from your cast-offs. Obviously, it’s best to send those donations out before moving day – why pay to move something you don’t want to keep?

these aren't making the move...

neither are these.

Luckily, we were also giving away a pretty large collection of bags – RB did a great job consolidating it all so that we could easily load it out.

ready for departure.

I should mention that RB is a great packer. In fact, he is such a good packer that when we go on vacation, I leave my stuff out and he packs it. Imagine that. Anyway, RB had been hard at work packing other stuff for a few hours before he got around to the donations pile – and a few hours of this kind of physical work really does take away from your level of sharpness. But, when I saw this pile and complimented RB on a job well done, his response was, “I like to put things in things.”

I know what you mean, RB; I know what you mean.

A Thank You.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – we have a wonderfully helpful and supportive family. Big thanks to JoePa and Barbara who spent their day:

• Driving to the city to load the car with breakables.
• Driving to Brooklyn to unload the breakables from the car.
• Unexpectedly having to push/dig our car out of an unfortunate pothole/snowbank situation.**
• Driving back to the city to load the car with donations.
• …and sometime in the near future, dropping them off for us.

With all that stuff out of here, we can actually breathe among the boxes! It was starting to get pretty claustrophobic. Giving ourselves the rest of the day and night off — anything that’s left can be dealt with tomorrow.

**Brooklyn is so neighborly! A man on the sidewalk who saw what was going on came over with a shovel and helped push the car out too! Unreal!

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Day 13: The Best Nation? DoNation

This move is really allowing me to do something I love….get rid of stuff.

Today’s list:

• Between the 50 books I was able to part with (that aren’t on my Bookins trade list) and the 10 books RB was able to part with, our local Housing Works thrift shop received some lovely additions to their library.
• Over the course of 5 years, I seem to have collected quite a few vases – the kind that come from a florist with your flower delivery.  I certainly don’t need all of them, so I’ve kept 2 (in different shapes/sizes), and I dropped off the rest at a local flower shop to be re-used in future arrangements. They were especially happy to get them before Valentine’s Day
• There are some sheets and towels that are just not worth saving. Maybe they’ve got holes. Maybe they’re threadbare. Maybe you just don’t like them anymore. I’ve hung on to a few of the sheets to use as drop-cloths when we paint the new place and kept a few of the towels to keep around for rainy/snowy days (they’re good to lay down under your wet boots). The rest are going to a local animal shelter that will use them as bedding.

It’s true what they say — one person’s trash is another person’s treasure. I’m happy I can find uses for my old stuff — and even happier to have it out of my apartment.