Settling In After Moving House Part 1

                                                                                                     Image:Marie Vonow

Moving house is a major event and if you have moved recently you are probably nodding your head. I think back to moving house when I was in my twenties (around forty years ago) and don't recall it seeming such a big undertaking. Have I just forgotten? Did it seem easier because I was younger and fitter? Could it be because I had less stuff, much less stuff? Whatever, the move is behind me. We are pretty much settled in and enjoying living in our new abode.

And I find myself able to get back into blogging, at last.

Finding a place for everything

One of the big parts of unpacking is finding a place to put everything and then remembering where that place is. There is a well known saying, 'A place for everything and everything in its place.' I totally agree it is good to have a specific place for everything and that place needs to be suitable and accessible.

What's the best place for each of these things?  Image:Clker-Free-Vector-Images on Pixabay

I don't see the logic behind putting heavy items at the back of a bottom shelf. Having said that, sometimes there is no option to the bottom shelf. It may be the one best able to bear the weight of heavy objects, especially if the piece of furniture was flat pack. My heaviest books go on the bottom shelf of flat pack book cases as the higher shelves tend to bow under weight.

I have needed to shuffle some items around from place to place as I have unpacked. Sometimes I have found the place I initially put something isn't as practical as I first thought.

There isn't as much storage in the kitchen in this house as there was in my other house. Therefore some kitchen items need to be kept elsewhere.

Fortunately there is a floor to ceiling walk in cupboard at the end of the hallway. I store a few larger kitchen items here, the ones I don't use much. It's also brilliant for storing appliances like fans and heaters when they aren't in use.

New Lounge Suite

The lounge room in our previous house was small which limited the amount and type of furniture we could put in it. Our current lounge is bigger so we bought a new lounge suite which is extremely comfortable.

Buying new furniture involved measuring the space available and working out where a couch would go and how many chairs would fit in the room. It would be terrible to get a lounge suite delivered and then discover it was too big for the room.

We did some internet research to see what styles, colours and types of covering were available. Then we looked at the real thing. I know there is the option of buying online but we wanted to sit in the armchairs and couch and feel the fabric before making a decision. This took time and meant traipsing from store to store, taking pics on my phone and making notes about price. There was also the cost of delivery to consider and I found this varies considerably between stores.

The couch and recliners required some assembling once delivered. More time and effort, but we decided it was well worth it when we were able to sink into those comfy seats!

The two reclining armchairs match the couch                 Image:Marie Vonow

Parting with unneeded furniture

Then came the task of disposing of the armchairs we no longer needed and didn't have space for. An ad on Gumtree found a new home for them. It all takes time though. Firstly I took some photos of the items and created the ad. Then I needed to respond to enquiries, followed by arranging a time for someone to pick up the chairs.

I have sold through Gumtree before and have discovered people are busy. Sometimes they have to arrange to borrow a trailer or ute and plans fall through. They may need to change the pick up time. Some people don't inform you they will be coming later or can't make it on the day arranged. Anyway, in the end the armchairs were off to a new home.

Extra Bookcases

Our previous house had floor to ceiling built in shelving in the lounge for storage. My son has an extensive collection of anime (animated media mostly Japanese, just in case you aren't familiar with the term) as well as manga (comic style/graphic novels influenced by a Japanese style) and games which occupied most of this storage space. Where would these items be housed in our current home? Yes, we needed to purchase extra bookcases.

Buying bookcases again involved measuring the space available and noting the information. More trips to furniture stores, this time both new and second hand. We settled for flat pack as it was the most economical and there was a good range of sizes and colours.

Then, more time to assemble the book cases and move them into place. At last we were able to unpack more boxes. Incidentally, I was pleased to be able to hand some empty cardboard boxes to the family next door who were in the process of moving house. Other boxes needed to be cut up to fit in the recycling bin and some of the stronger ones are being stored in the shed.

Other Furniture

I replaced a couple of other items of furniture for something more suitable for our current house. It has been exciting, sometimes frustrating and tiring but in the end I am pleased with the outcome and how the house has come together.

The point of this post has been to show that moving house involves more than packing up stuff and moving it from one house to another. As I got into writing I realised I needed to break the post into two parts. Even if I covered only the main points and didn't go into too much detail, there was quite a lot to tell about settling into a 'new' home. To put it all into one post would have readers falling asleep before they got to the end!