Three times is a charm

This is the third time I am packing up all my belongings. The first time was when we moved in our little house. The second time was when we replaced the popcorn (acoustic) ceiling with smooth ceiling and repainted the entire interior. This time I am packing up all the rooms to have the old carpet replaced by Brazilian cherry wooden floors. There were other packing and unpacking episodes, but they were smaller in size: i.e., when we unpacked lots of inherited belongings from our friends who were moving back to Europe. Or when we had to pack up the bathrooms, and the kitchen when we remodeled them.

This is day two of the packing. I expect at least one more solid day of packing and moving remaining. I am doing it all by myself, while the rest of my gang are vacationing in Argentina. I could have used the extra hands. It is however much more troublesome to live in a place with four while it is all packed up. All I need, is a small bag with a change of clothes, a toothbrush, a comb and my laptop.

I've gone at it systematically, starting with cleaning out the garage, where all the stuff somehow needs to fit. Next I started with the kids' rooms and then the living room. How can so much stuff fit in such a little house?  A couple of observations:

• It appears an enormous amount of stuffed animals survived the last trip to the slaughterhouse (Goodwill). 
• We got to do better and clean out old toys. I am pretty sure the wooden train tracks have not been used in years. 
• Lego is everywhere. 
• So are the little hairbands. 
• How many purses and little bags can a little girl have? Wait don't answer. I know, as with shoes, not enough. 
• How many clothes can a little girl have? See previous answer.  
• Cleaning out and packing up my daughters room, you learn a lot. For example, she loves to tie many toys together and is quite skilled at it. Note to mom: no more yarn for her! 
• Time to institute the law of Conservation of Toys: want a new toy, get rid of one first. In this house the total number of toys shall remain the same. 
• And finally, there should be a law that all mattresses come with handles.

Tomorrow I am taking a break from the real work to go back to my day job. A quick peek and I am looking at over 200 emails and a bunch of meetings. I love my other (packing) job. 

TGIF?