Moving House - Decluttering - Childhood Toys & Books?

[roses2]

We're shortly moving house (abroad so a significant move & cost). I have so many sentimental items that I really want to take with me:

• large cuddly toys from my childhood which my kids now play with
• ornaments I made at school which are 20+ years old but in still in usable condition
• kids nursery paintings & drawings
• general toys such as lego

Given shipping costs are price per sqm where do you draw the line about what to keep and throw away?

My parents move around a lot and when my youngest sibling moved out they bought each of us an initialled trunk - all things of sentimental value had to fit in there and now each time they move they just have to move the trunks. Not sure if that helps! I think picking a suitable sized container and having a rule that everything has to fit in there will help narrow down the most important items.

We moved countries when I was 7. My mum packed literally everything. Every toy, book, jigsaw, even some baby clothes. I’m mid 40s now and my DC play with them. She kept all our school work too. My mum is a hoarder. I think I keep a lot, But not a patch on her. It is fun to go into her attic sometimes and go through it. Frequent movers that I know keep nothing.

Can you scan the pictures and drawings so that you have them digitally instead?

photograph paintings and drawings and then chuck. Maintain this policy in future.

ornaments you made; keep if they bring you joy. Otherwise bin.

don't throw away 'general toys' - lego is worth money and even for other stuff, someone else can make use of it.

What a lovely idea - one (large?!) box per person for sentimental reasons sounds like the right approach. I will try this on the week end.

Books I am in two minds about. I have lots of story books, encyclopedias. Some of which I've never even looked at but I keep wondering "DS2 will love that when he's 8 years old"...

Yes they were pretty large - sort of toybox/chest size? Mine has a mixture of old schoolbooks/art projects, toys, tat from teenage years, photos etc. It's really nice to rummage through when visiting my parents!

I have ended up buying second hand a lot of books from my childhood, often in the same edition, either because I didn't keep them or because they fell apart through re-reading, so there is that option for later. Make a note of the titles though otherwise you'll be on here doing one of those "I've forgotten the title but it had a princess in it" posts!