Salute to Spouses Blog

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To pack, or not to pack, that is the question

As I look around our home assessing our most cherished, adored items and prep mentally for the next move, my thoughts always return to the same sentiment: Why the heck did we bring this?

After two years we have boxes that have never been unpacked. Pictures, never hung on the walls. Clothes, never been worn. Holiday decorations, never celebrated a single moment.

And seriously, I can’t even explain what was floating through my mind when I decided my wedding dress had to make the cross-Pacific move.   

If I was asked for a single piece of PCS advice this is it: store it, baby!

We moved to Hawaii with three kids, a dog and myself seven months pregnant. We moved here with – you may want to sit down – 13,000 pounds of stuff.

The guys from the moving company in North Carolina who packed us were running a betting racket to see how much over our allotted weight we would be.

Luckily, we slid under that number by the skin of our teeth. But now with five kids, I’m not sure we’re going to be so lucky.

Our biggest mistake? Overestimating how important that little glass trinket would be on the table at Halloween …

Or promising ourselves that we really would read all 20 of those books that have been sitting on our shelf for 10 years ...

Or believing that we really needed to bring the good dishes.

And the books and books of baby pictures? Puhlease! We haven’t opened them once!

Store it, store it, store it!

If you are heading overseas, the government will pay to store your stuff. There is a set monetary amount they will allot you each month, in a storage facility of their choice. Read between the lines here to mean the lowest bidder, in the most crime-ridden side of town and never, ever in a climate controlled facility.

Quick hint, you can pay the difference and put your goodies in the storage facility of your choice. Whoo hoo! Climate control bound!

I know it’s a struggle to part with sentimental objects. I know I wanted my kids to have memories of the same holiday decorations adorning our house ever year. I wanted them to have access to every toy they loved, every baby picture in case they had a hankering to pull it out.

But like so many aspects of military life, there are choices to be made.

And wouldn’t you prefer to choose what to leave in storage, rather than what to sell in order to meet your shipping weight limits?

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