After people learn that we’re moving internationally as a family, and understand why we’re moving to Medellín, the next thing they usually ask is what we’re doing with all our stuff. When preparing for an international move, this is a big consideration!
In this blog I’ll share how we approached the move.
As you can imagine, after living in the same city for almost 8 years, in the same house for 4 of those years, and having 3 children, we acquired many possessions. Despite trying to live simply – and living within the constraints of a 1,400 square foot house with no attic or basement – we certainly had plenty to sort through before moving.
We decided early on that we weren’t going the route of shipping our stuff. The cost and logistics didn’t seem worth it for us. Most of our larger furniture was some combination of old, well-used, and/or second-hand. We also thought that if we needed to furnish in Medellín, we could acquire new/used furniture for a similar cost of shipping. Further, we decided not to even store the majority of our large items. Here again, looking at the 2-year storage cost of a unit large enough for our furniture, it just seemed like we could probably buy stuff when we got back. Lots of thinking, looking, research, and conversations underlie all that, but that’s the summary.
In short, we sold or gave away a large portion of what we owned, stored a small portion in a storage unit, and packed up 10 checked bags to take with us.
Here’s a Breakdown in More Detail:
The Joy of Giving Away
Firstly. An overarching principle that turned out to be wonderfully freeing and life giving. Which is simply that we gave away lots and lots of items to friends. And donated another large quantity. We tried to be as intentional as we could, and sought to avoid throwing away much of anything. If I had an item that I loved in theory but hardly used in practice, and could think of someone I knew who would enjoy it, I offered it to them. I loved leaving little pieces of our life with beloved friends. We’ve been given so much, it was wonderful to be able to give back.
And then from there…
House
We rented our house, so this was about the easiest part. Our landlord graciously extended our lease for a few months to match up with our departure timeframe. All we needed to do was clean out the house and turn over the keys. Gosh, we loved this little place, but it was easy enough to say farewell!
Car
We owned a single SUV, and sold it to a neighbor about a week before we moved. We needed a vehicle to travel to visit family up until our departure day. But they needed a new vehicle sooner. So as part of the agreement, they paid for us to get a rental for our last days in VA and the duration of our travel to see family. We used Kyte (a first for us), and they dropped off and picked up the rental from our home. It was great.
Furniture and Other Large Items
We sold almost all of our furniture, except a few pieces that we inherited from family or that we really love. Our storage unit is 5’x10,’ so we knew we wouldn’t have *too* much space for bulky furniture. This also applied to outdoor items like patio furniture, trampoline, yard tools, etc. We sold almost all of these items on Nextdoor.
Kitchen and Clothes
These were the hardest and most painful groups of possessions to sort out. Kitchen supplies and clothing consist of SO many individual items, none of which individually feels like a lo. But taken all together they’re an immense amount of items and space. With clothing this was compounded by having 3 girls. So we had to think about what we wanted to take with us right away, store to pass to the next kiddo/bring down with in the future, and store for a return to the US (e.g., cold weather clothing). Both of these categories were a mix of sell, give to friends, donate, throw out, store, and take with us. Sorting through kitchen and clothing was honestly the hardest/worst part of it all!
Other Categories
Books– We substantially downsized our book collection, mostly giving away to friends or donating to the local public library. We’ve carted 15+ boxes of books from house to house – mostly to have them sit on a shelf – and we finally decided to break free of that attachment.
Art– Our walls were covered with SO many beloved paintings and photos. But we had too much. So we sold the less sentimental pieces and those that had been sitting in a closet waiting “for the right space.” And then a dear friend came, bubble-wrapped everything, and packed it up in boxes to store.
Pantry/medicine cabinet/toiletries– We gave all our leftover cleaning supplies to our housekeeper. We gave lots of unopened pantry/food items to neighbors and friends. And yet, in the end we still ran out of time to really do a thoughtful giving-away of the hundreds of remaining small perishable/expirable items. But I really didn’t want to throw out bags and bags of things that could be used. So I posted on Nextdoor and a kind retired woman was willing to take all our extra fridge/medicine/pantry supplies, sort through them, keep what she could use, and give away the rest on Buy Nothing. It was a great solution for us that (hopefully) got more items to homes where they could be used!
It was honestly kind of overwhelming at times, but we did it!
Our Storage Unit
So what did we leave in our 5’x10′ storage unit? A “starter set” of items for when we return. Winter clothing, kitchen supplies, art, favorite toys, a couple of boxes of books, kid clothing to pass down, our Christmas tree/decorations, and our car seats.
It started about as the photo above, and ended as below:
What we Packed
We packed 10 checked bags to take with us to Medellin, 8 of which were duffel bags, plus two standard suitcases and a carry-on size suitcase. We chose duffel bags over suitcases to maximize the pounds of actual stuff we could bring (i.e., not losing 7+ pounds *per checked bag* in suitcase weight). Plus we wanted to be able to easily pack away our bags in a closet for future use, thinking it would be tricky to devote limited apartment space to store 8+ suitcases!
Here’s roughly how we allocated the 10 bags (though in the end we somewhat distributed the heavier items to even out weight): Kid clothing and shoes (2), Liz clothing and shoes (2), Spencer clothing and shoes (1), Kids books, blankets, stuffies, and toys (1), Toiletries, medicines, homeschool supplies (2), Pantry items, snacks, kitchen supplies (1), Miscellaneous/overflow (1).
We also brought our double *and* single strollers, a baby carrier, and two Ride-safe travel vests.
We brought items we knew we would use, help smooth our transition, and/or that we weren’t sure if we could easily acquire in Medellín.
This whole process took months of going through each item we owned to decide whether it should be given away, sold, stored, or brought with us.
It was a lot. Even starting 6 months out, we still scrambled at the end, putting in some 12 hour days to get it all sorted out. But it was an incredible forcing function to reset.
I feel like we did the best we could! And we feel SO great having less!
And after all that, away we went! If you’re preparing for an international move, I hope this is helpful for you! If you’ve already made the move, share in the comments how you approached it!
