I read all the advice online about long distance moves where they say throw out and give away all the stuff the movers won’t take. Forget that. I had no interest in starting out with a blank refrigerator, no cleaning supplies, no automobile fluids on arrival at my new home. Oh please, who wants to take all your partially used crap? I am totally against waste and throwing things in landfill, so I needed to figure out how to take the stuff with me.

Packing the “not allowed items”

I had a friend with a pickup truck and trailer who was willing to help me move. If that opportunity had not existed I would have rented a truck to move all the things the moving company would not take or I didn’t trust them to take.

I packed all the fluids, aerosols, matches, whatever that the movers wouldn’t take in plastic containers. I put everything in trash bags inside the containers and sealed them. Good thing since we drove through monsoons getting from Texas to Tennessee.

So I am now here with all my cleaning supplies, automotive supplies like oil, brake cleaner, etc, and a lot of food.

Packing food

The food was the somewhat tricky part. I had two coolers. One for the refrigerator items packed in ice and one for freezer items packed in dry ice. I bought the ice and dry ice Monday night. Packed both coolers on Tuesday before the movers arrived. I drove to Tennessee on Wednesday and Thursday. This was in January — on arrival all the refrigerator items were still very cold and there was lots of ice. The freezer items were so incredibly frozen I had to let the cooler sit open for a little while before I could pry the items out of there.

I did NOT move meats. I had been careful to consume all meat before moving. But I had a lot of frozen veggies, fruit, dried food for camping, and incredibly expensive homemade basil pesto that I wasn’t about to throw away. It all arrived perfectly. As far as the refrigerator, I didn’t move milk, eggs, or mayo. But all the less perishable things like catsup, mustards, marinades, sauces, salad dressings made it fine.

It was nice to be able to partially load the refrigerator upon arrival.

So while the movers have limitations that ensure the safety of your belongings — would you really want a bottle of bleach to leak all over your couch? There’s no reason the stuff can’t come with you if you’re willing to do a little extra work. I’m frugal so this kind of stuff really matters to me.

What I didn’t trust them to move

My computer is my life (since I design web sites) so that baby was carefully packed in the back of my SUV and made the trip with me. The movers could take the monitors, the printer — those are easily replaceable — but the hard drives with all the information all went with me.

I also love my motorcycle, so my BMW F650GS was loaded on the trailer and moved with me.

Important papers, family photos weren’t leaving my sight and also came in the truck.

And most importantly — my dogs. Nikki and Ellie, my yellow labs, rode with me on the way here. They’re a little stressed by all the changes, but I also packed their beds. Those beds have been a constant in their lives and they know all is okay if the beds are there. We got here before the movers and I was sleeping in a sleeping bag. The dogs were in their usual beds. Yes — they’re spoiled and pampered in some ways, but I didn’t want this to be any more traumatic than it had to be.

The plastic containers of all the things the movers couldn’t take rode on the trailer with the motorcycle.

I brought a big tool box so I could start working on my new “fixer upper” that was wrapped in a trash bag and sealed with duct tape, I wrapped my huge potted rosemary bush and it survived!

Prior proper packing…

FYI — I believe in using a ton of tie-downs to make sure there are no problems in transit. I had everything so strapped down not one thing budged on the 900 mile trip and everything was in good shape on arrival. As I mentioned, all the stuff in the plastic containers was already sealed in trash bags. I used duct tape to secure the lids on the containers and then lots of tie-downs to make sure no lids would blow off or containers move.

The computer and important papers were in the very back of my SUV and the dogs rode behind the front seats. I used tie downs to make sure the boxes wouldn’t shift and scare the crap out of the dogs while I was driving. I also had a full bag of food to give me a little time to locate their food before it ran out.

In the end…

A lot of care on the front end prevents a lot of problems or heartache along the away or on the back-end. Proper packing takes a lot of time and is a total pain, but in the end it’s worth every second. And bear in mind this packing was done in torrential rain. If I can say take the time after that experience, it’s even more worthwhile in decent weather.