I’ve been learning this lesson in more than one way lately. As we prepared to move from Kyiv back to Seattle, we decided that shipping our things was just too expensive. That meant we would be moving belongings for 5 people over 2 years with just suitcases. Each person gets 2 suitcases on the plane free, but we needed to check my viola, so that left 9 suitcases we could check. It sounds like a lot (and it is), but not for 2 years worth of clothes, toys, books, household things, etc.
So I knew we would be giving away a lot of things. We were also able to sell some of the bigger things we had purchased, like our mattress. At first it was easy. Get rid of all those old toys we don’t use anymore, the books that are ripped, the clothes I never wear. But I quickly realized we still had a ton of stuff. I have to admit it was hard to give away some things. I wanted to keep the kids’ legos, and the Little People palace, but they were just too big. Somehow we got it down to the 9 suitcases, viola, and then of course the carryons. One thing that made it easier for me was knowing that we had lots of stuff in storage in Seattle. And Darryl’s promise that I could buy a new wardrobe with the money we saved by not shipping things. But apparently I hadn’t learned the lesson well enough.
We returned to hour home in Seattle to discover (okay, we had a heads up a couple days earlier) a lot of our “stuff” missing. Most of the furniture and kitchen things we had left for our renters to use were no longer there. Not a dish or glass, no couch, no bed.
We’ve gone through a lot of emotions. Now, for the most part, we realize it was just stuff. Its taken me quite a few days to get to that point, which is really too bad. Because it really is just stuff. Our family made it here, and Kathryn and Amelia love our house, going up and down stairs. And running around everywhere since there is no furniture!
Then we started unpacking some of our boxes from storage. I kept thinking, why did I keep this? We don’t need this, etc. If I’d had it in Kyiv, I would have given it away before moving. So I guess the lesson is that its just stuff and we really don’t need that much of it.