Packing House up????

[holland]

Hi all,

Just asking for a little advice...shipping company are coming to pack house up...but how much organising did you all do before hand...If it was left to my hubby the house would just stay as it is and they would just come and sort it all, but I'm thinking I maybe need to organised things into neat piles to make it easier for packers ( and me at the other end??). I know we have to collapse all furniture and stuff.

Also, we only have to do a list for insurance purposes and Masons have said they make a detailed list, am I being too much of a control freak thinking I should catelogue everything using a colour coded system??? Have other people just used what the shippers have noted down for their inventory???

Am I panicking too much??? Probably...I have been known to be a bit of a 'Monica'....should I be taking a phoebe approach!!!!!

j xx

[tigerlily]

Maybe a somewhere in between approach-

There are lots of things that you really don't want the packers to take (whole spices, open breakfast cereal, jewelery, your passports and luggage, etc...) that just walking out seems a bit dangerous. I'd pack up everything that you want to stay with you on the airplane or that you are going to need after the container goes and stick it in your car (provided that's not going in the container too!).

I can't think how your catalogue system could work if you are not packing the boxes, you'll have no idea how your catalogue relates to the actual packing list. Though if you want a really detailed list for insurance that includes the title of each book and the brand name of each item that would make sense I guess. For me, it would be much easier to take photos of everything rather than write it down.

If the Monica in you needs something to do, how about cleaning all the sports equipment/lawn mower/garden chairs? I'm currently throwing out lots and lots of things that I wonder how I ever have held onto for so long! That's another very fun task.

[kiwidebs]

My suggestion is to move everything out of one room and use that room to store things you don't want packed (passports, kids precious bedtime blankies etc) and put a sign on the door saying nothing in here is to be packed. In our case they packed over two days so we kept the kids beds intact until the second day, packed our suitcases and had them in the kid's room but moved out toys, furniture etc so most of the packing could be completed. I was amazed at the speed the packers moved - similar to watching locusts swarming and consuming a field of grain!!! By the end of the first day most of the house was in boxes, and they pack EVERYTHING - including an unopened bottle of medised (yay, cos you can't get it here) and a bottle of Calpol (my kids took ages to get used to Pamol).

Good luck.

Debs

[holland]

do they just take medicines that are unopened?? What about shampoos and stuff, did you take them?? I plan on cramming stuff into chest of drawers and stuff...what about body lotion and stuff??

J xx

[kiwidebs]

I don't think they're meant to take medicines etc at all - but they just cleared out my cupboard where they were and packed the lot!! They refused to pack my unopened spices though.
As for shampoos etc. I had a big clear out and threw out loads of stuff. I thought I'd start our new lives with uncluttered bathroom cupboards - well, 18 months in and our cupboards are as cluttered as ever. Even at the price of personal hygiene items over here!!!

[Jo Jo]

We're getting ready for the shippers too! I am currently typing up an inventory of items for insurance purposes (to try to work out how much I should insure for - it's pretty scary!)

[holland]

Oh my gosh....think thats my weekend Job Jo Jo, How are you getting on? Do you have a 20 ft container?? Are you taking shampoo's and stuff?? I have LOADS of body shop body butters I love them, hope I can take them?? Are you taking any food items, we have been told to take nothing at all???
At the moment, if you wanled into my house you wouldnt know we were emigrating in 7 weeks, think I maybe need to start doing more!!!!

J xx

[Jo Jo]

Yup, we do have a 20' container. I'm not packing any shampoo or anything in the container - I am going to take what I can when we fly and that's it. Though I did take a load of toiletries over with me to NZ in August so know I have nice stuff waiting there for me. We're not taking any food either. I am going to stock up on contact lenses and eye drops, though.

Our shippers come to pack next Tuesday and we have SO much to do before then!! Aaaargh!

[mgbridges]

I think I've rambled but hopefully this will help...

ORGANISING - we started quite a long way in advance going through stuff. e.g: filing or throwing out all the paperwork that was lying around the house, finding out exactly what was in the garage, getting stuff down from the loft. Firstly we put on Ebay quite a few computer related bits that my OH no longer wanted. Then a fortnight before the removal company came I hired a skip to clear a lot of stuff in the garage we weren't taking. It was very handy - as I found stuff I wanted to chuck I simply chucked it rather than having to have a million and one black bags waiting for the dustbin men!

One thing we could have done but ran out of time to do was go to a car boot sale. Our local charity shops did rather well out of us as did some family and friends when I cleared the loft of all my son's old baby clothes, equipment and toys.

The other thing I'd suggest is using Freecycle as there were some items we didn't want to take but I was loath to throw away.

REMOVAL MEN - I tried to gather things together, e.g. all our pictures off the walls (removing hooks where possible to avoid other things getting damaged when moving past them). I put all our wooden ornaments together for MAF purposes. Putting stuff in the car is a great suggestion, I did and it helped to reduce my stress levels. I don't think you necessarily need to group stuff I just figured that at least that way when I came to unpack similar items would be in the same box. I stuck labels on the cupboard with all the food in it and the one with all the cleaning products in it saying 'don't pack contents'. The other thing I did was pack our suitcases and make sure all the men that came to pack knew they weren't to go.

As an aside before you start dismantling all your furniture check with your removal company whether you need to do so. We used Allied Pickfords and they dismantled our beds and anything that was too big or cumbersome to get down the stairs. They even came equipped with their own screwdrivers and alan keys etc. They were very conscious of the fact that I still needed to live in the house whilst they packed over 3 days, fortunately son was on hols with grandparents and OH was already in NZ. Also be careful about overfilling chests of drawers etc. It can make them too heavy to move and the contents of each draw will end up having to go in a seperate box.

INVENTORY - the removal men will do an inventory but its not very detailed. Its a very basic description of what's in each box. If you need an inventory for insurance purposes I'd suggest doing one yourself, especially as you need to put a value on everything. You don't normally need to go down to the detail of individually valuing each shirt or sock but being able to detail 40 x harbacks and 40 x paperbacks for your books puts a more realistic value on them. We were offered the option of insuring on a per cubic meter of stuff at a set rate and once I started adding everything up it worked out about the same so thats what we did. I'd done the international moving thing before and found doing the inventory one of the most time consuming and stressful things to do so good luck with yours! Taking photographs sounds like a good idea to me too then at least you can sit down at the PC and type up a list.

Thats about all from me, sorry for rambling yet again, its a bad habit of mine. Good luck and remember to have the odd glass of wine at the end of each day - helps with the stress!

Anneliese

[holland]

Good Luck Jo Jo!!!! We have three quarters of a 20 footer, but Im paranoid they've under estimated...are you filling chest of drawers and stuff before they come? or are you leaving the stuff out so they can see it and then pack it themselves??

J xx