Category: Moving

Post-it: Empty and clean flower pots

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Part of the “stupid little Post-its” series, in which I give you a glimpse into some of the “stupid little things” I’m working on to prepare to move.

I spent about an hour collecting all of my indoor and outdoor pots, dumping out the soil and dead plants, then picking which ones to keep. For the keepers, commenced soaking and scrubbing them in my bathtub, disinfecting them, and putting them outside to dry. Stupid little thing.

shower/tub/utility sink #apartmentlife

Ep. 4: Simplify and Execute

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Are you excited?

I will be. Once all of this stuff gets done.

But they’re packing you up and moving you. How much can there be to do? You don’t even need to pack!

True. My agency provides movers who magically come to my home, wrap each item in packing paper, place them in boxes, and haul box after box out onto their truck. Preparing for this part of moving in itself is a little more complicated than just living in your apartment until they show up and make everything disappear. There is some prep involved, which is another story (blog post). Let’s just say you don’t want your plunger packed with your pantry items (lesson learned the first time I moved).

But there is so much more to packing up a life and moving it than packing up physical possessions. …and I’m just one person! I can’t imagine moving a whole family so quickly.

Eating an elephant one bite at a time -or- Simplify and Execute

I love an organizational challenge as much as the next nerd. Part of the masochistic joy of a crazy task like moving to Alaska is coming up with a system to get SO MUCH DONE, and then stand back and admire it once it’s all over.

My system this time relies heavily on Post-it notes, a sharpie, and lots of boxes.

The number of Post-it’s has increased since this photo was taken. Also I know my plant is dying, I threw it away this weekend because it can’t come with me anyway.

As I think of things I need to do before I move I write it on a Post-it, and stick it on the “to do” area of my bookshelf. Once I do it, I get to move it over to the “done” area on the back of my bedroom door. Even though this method lacks in prioritization, uniform granularity, color-coding, and other more advanced characteristics of a killer nerdy System, it has some great advantages:

  • It prevents overthinking, interrupting, and drowning. When something pops into my head starting with “oh yeah, I need to remember to ____ before I move”, I can write it on a Post-it, stick it on the wall, and move on.
  • It makes getting stuff done easy. When I have free time and I think “I have so much to do, I know I should be doing something, but what?” I can pick a Post-it or two, and move them over.
  • It makes patting myself on the back easy. I can write something on a Post-it, do it, and move it over to the victory wall, and stand and admire my progress just by looking at all of the happy bright colorful squares piling up.
  • It gets rid of Post-its. I have a lot. It’s one of the things I discovered during the pre-pack purge (again, a topic for a future post). Lets use those babies up!

Stay tuned for mini-posts about some of the stupid little Post-its.