Chaos, Craziness and Dust

Last post was all about selling 'stuff.' The blog I created to help with the selling process worked fairly well. Lots of calls and texts, and emails. Lots. Asking me to "send me another picture", "what are the measurements-again", "is it really gold gold, or more of a yellow gold, or does it have green in it?"  Seriously? To some of the responses (mainly text, after the 3rd one usually) I would type "just come by and see it please."

It was exhausting. My living room was filled with tables of stuff, and invariably when someone would come over to look, they would ask "what else do you have?" - and I would tell them that I could only get so much ready at a time because I had to clean the item, take pictures, post it etc.....and some people would ask to go through my house!! What?

So I posted earlier this week about contracting with an estate sale company. I'm still very happy about the decision to contract with them.

They will arrive July 9th and work for 10 days straight to get everything staged and ready for the sale. My estate sale will be held July 19 (my 49th birthday OMG) thru July 21. So that means any and every item I do not want sold must be put away, hidden. Since we are not selling my master bedroom furniture, we decided to keep that room off limits. Unfortunately, the sitting room part of the master bedroom WAS my staging area for items I was getting ready to sell, so it is full of stuff that I need to move OUT of the bedroom. Augh. This is embarrassing, but I am posting a picture of what it looks like this morning, even though yesterday I removed many many boxes of stuff:

As soon as they leave on Monday I start emptying out the sitting room. Oh crap, I have to clean out the drawers of the antique dresser that's in there, and sort through ALL the craft items I put in there, and..... the Lane chest filled with blankets and quilts. Chaos.

Tuesday thru Thursday I spend removing photos from frames. Dusting off the frames. Getting sick from all the dust. Cough cough. Going through old photos and removing the ones I want to keep and giving the rest to the children's father. Most of the photos are copies, and the rest are in 30+ photo albums, many which are 'scrapbook style'. Yikes! More craziness. I decide to bargain with my ex - he scans the photos for me, he gets to keep the albums. He accepts the offer. Albums are stacked up and ready for him to take. So is the gigantic box of photos, negatives and other stuff. More dust, some of these albums haven't been looked at since I moved in the house 8 years ago. Cough.

Dozens of board games are stacked in one corner of the man cave/bonus room. I stirred up the dust on that project, as many of the games have been sitting for a long time, some of them are little kid games and my kids are 18 and 24 now. That's lots of sitting and collecting dust!

What the heck are we going to do with all those CDs? Covered in dust too.... cough.

Kid's rooms - my older son's stuff that he still has at my house. Guess what? His father can take that! He doesn't know it yet, but it will be waiting for him when he gets the albums.  Since Alec is going off to college in a few months, he won't have room to store things, so maybe I can get his stuff over to his dad's as well.

All this has to be done before June 23rd - this is where the craziness part comes in: Ken's daughter and her two boys, ages 4 and 11 months, are coming to visit for 5 days. YIKES! My house is not, and has never been childproof. Now it is a complete hazard, a serious danger zone. I pray the children don't get hurt. They may need hard hats. I will need more than wine to calm my nerves, at least I have plenty of vodka.

For those of you who have decades of 'stuff' just collecting dust, get rid of it NOW. Do it years before you move. If you think it will only take a month, triple that.

Today I am heading out to get medium weight drop cloths to put over the white living room sofa which we are not selling right away. Then I can stack stuff on top, move the rest of the items out of the sitting room, and the suitcases that are blocking half the master bath can take their rightful place on the floor, to be filled with Ecuador bound items. The Space Bags are at the ready, waiting to be filled.

It's really happening. Cough cough. Soon, the dust will settle, the craziness will turn to calm, and all the chaos will have been worth it.

Hasta luego, chao chao, and all the good stuff,

Tami

Estate Sale is ON!

Alrighty, yet another twist in my endeavor to sell all our stuff.....just this morning I contracted with an Estate Sale company to take over. I was not woman enough for the job. Drove me nuts sorting, pricing, taking pictures, answering STUPID questions from buyers about all the stuff, etc. It was just too much and I surrendered!

So 'Loose Ends by MJ', a group of ladies that come in and do it all for you, are coming in and doing it all for me! They are charging a $600 (not to exceed) set-up fee and for expenses, spending 10 days pricing and sorting and setting up the house, and then taking 25% of the sales price as commission. I think it is pretty darned fair! Most companies charge from 30-35% and their set-up fee/expense charges are a lot higher.

A contract is signed and all we have to do is remove anything we do not want sold. I have 1 month to get those items packed and put in the bedroom. The bedroom will be our safe haven! First though, I have to remove all the 'stuff' I want sold FROM the bedroom.

Everything we are not taking with us to Ecuador will be sold, except for the basic sofa, bed, dining table stuff needed to stage the house. Ken and I are both feeling a bit liberated already....that is, until we walk into our living room and see tables FILLED with 'stuff' and then we wish it was already July 19th. Or better yet, July 25th, when I get the check from the sale!

Interesting note: when the ladies came in this morning, the first thing they told me was another couple from Huntsville is also moving to Ecuador! They did their 'estate sale' last weekend. And everything was sold. Wow, great news! Hope our sale goes as well as theirs!


Hasta luego, chao chao, and all the good stuff,

Tami

Selling 'Stuff'

This past week has been a whirlwind of activity. Today it has been one week since I resigned from my crazy stressful job. The resignation was immediate, and since then I have put in some serious hard work! Every day my goal is to clean out at least a couple of drawers or a closet, throw away or donate 'stuff' and post items to Craigslist. This is a LOT of work!!

I have started another blog called 'BuyMyStuffSoWeCanMove' ---the link is here:
http://buymystuffsowecanmove.blogspot.com/

Posting items on Craigslist is a pain when you have a lot of things to sell. It was getting old, having to repost and re-write listings, finding the pictures, etc. There are so many new listings every day, and once your listing has been up for a week, it gets lost in the mix. Too many items to look at! So, I thought, why not create a blog, with descriptions and pictures of my items. I will post my blog link on a Craigslist ad, and put up a new 'ad' each week so it stays fresh. Putting up one new ad is easier than reposting dozens upon dozens of pictures!

Once the item sells, I remove the picture from the blog. Each day I will add more items, and I am really hoping each day I remove pictures = cash in my pocket.

Having a garage sale is in the works, but I do not want to put my nice crystal out on the lawn! Not to mention my silk drapes...the birds would have a field day, lol.

And as always, I will be donating a TON of items....already have boxes upon boxes filled to the brim with nice brand-name summer clothing....will be adding more each week to the donate pile!

Hope this helps my fellow wanna-be expats - I always want ideas to help me get rid of 'stuff' - if you have any please comment and share your tips.

Hasta luego, chao chao, and all the good stuff,

Tami

SOLD!

An interesting thing about changing ones life, at least for me, is not bringing my old life "stuff" with me. I am reading on various forums about how people MUST have their ALL things, they just can't depart without their whole house of furniture, pictures, knick-knacks (I call them crip-crap), and yes, I have a few of those crip-crap items too. I am NOT knocking their decisions. I am NOT thinking they are silly. But reading their posts and comments over the past year has got me thinking about what I am going to do with all my 'stuff.'

Last year we had researched getting a small container. Then maybe just a pallet or to share a truck or something with another couple. And now we are down to carrying a few footlockers along with our suitcases. Keep a few things in storage in Florida and we can (if we still want) pick up items on return trips to the US. Or make the kids bring them to us when they visit. It's interesting how perspectives change after making an exploratory trip, and then actually planning the move.

I do plan on bringing some items from my kitchen. I love to cook. Things many of you out there on the forums and who are already living in Ecuador have recommended to bring. Small appliances like my Vitamix, food processor, small food chopper, and some of my nicer cookware. I plan on selling pretty much my entire kitchen except for the small appliances. Hopefully they have plenty of wine glasses there in Ecaudor!

A select few photos are in the keep pile. Pictures of our travels to Costa Rica, my favorite is the collage of feet, yes our feet, that my husband gave to me a few years ago for my birthday. Pics of our feet all over Costa Rica, perched up overlooking the Pacific ocean sunset, buried in the black sand on the Caribbean, etc. Love that collage! Here are just a few:

Now, isn't that more interesting and memorable (at least for us, haha) than looking at a picture of a piece of furniture? Furniture can be replaced. Memories, priceless.

And of course a collage of our wedding in Barbados!

And pics of the kiddos, right now at 4 kids, 2 spouses and 3 grandchildren. 2 babies born last year alone. But I may sell the frames and buy those in Ecuador. I have seen some pretty frames there, and of course the prices are so much lower than in the US. Thank goodness for digital photos, my next big project is converting all our old prints to digital.

But what am I NOT keeping? My entire room filled with stamping supplies. Which brings me to the title of this post. SOLD! I sold ALL of my stamps. I had hundreds. Yes, every one of them! How freeing. Now I can post more items on Craigslist and my kitchen reno fund gets closer to the magic amount needed.

Christmas items. Sold a TON last year. Sold some more this year. I now have them all separated into what I am keeping (a small Rubbermaid box), versus what I am giving away to my kids or selling (several Rubbermaid containers!)

Not keeping: furniture. There's plenty in Ecuador. Closet filled with gorgeous designer (the good ones like Nicole Miller and Betsey Johnson) dresses. I'm going to take a few, just in case, but only a few. Taking over a dozen to the consignment shop next week! Crip-Crap. Many items are on Craigslist now. What the heck am I going to do with Swarovski crystal figurines. Really?

Just looking at the pictures above brings a smile to my face. I am so looking forward to the day I can not only snap a pic of us on the beach in Ecuador, but wake up to the sounds and sight of the beautiful ocean every single morning. Now, that's a memory I can't wait to make!

Tami