After about a half dozen trips to the dump, we finally downsized as much as we were planning, and made plans for hauling what remained. We settled on renting a 24′ straight truck as well as a car dolly.

We emptied the house on the first load and hauled what remained to the storage unit we rented. With the truck full, we loaded Sherry’s car onto the car dolly. For the 1st run. it was myself, Sherry and Jackson riding in the truck. The cats were left at Cassi’s. After the 11 hour drive, we arrived at the property in Missouri for the pre-closing inspection, where we unloaded Sherry’s car and used that to get around as the truck was parked and locked at the farm for the night.

After a night in the hotel in town, we closed on the property and were unloading the truck by noon. It was simply Sherry and me on a 2-wheeler with a ramp. Sherry would assist guiding the heavy stuff down the ramp but we wheeled it all ourselves and finished the truck in a couple of hours. It was at this time that we discovered a new litter of kitties recently born in our barn . The feral mama, spooked by our presence, appears to have abandoned them. Not good for them…

In the morning, Sherry, Jack and I all jumped back into the truck for the return to MN for load #2. The first stop was to clean out our storage unit, which took a couple of hours. Then, we headed to Johns to load the rest of our outdoor junk onto the tail of the truck. Finally, we loaded my car (convertible) onto the car dolly for the 2nd trip. With everything ready for the road, we returned to Cassi’s for the night using my pickup.

Early, the next day, we headed down to Johns to get the truck w/loaded car dolly and hit the road for trip #2. I was solo in the truck and Sherry followed in my pickup with Jack, Lola and Luther all riding along.

We arrived after sundown so parked the truck and unloaded in the morning. The truck and trailer were returned to Rolla in the afternoon.

We spent the next several days putting away various stacks of treasures, which still continues to this day.

I remember going into it how intimidating it all was but we managed it in small chunks until we were ready. With the house already spiffed up for the sale, we had most everything boxed up and ready for the move and of course, used the opportunity to get rid of stuff we no longer needed or wanted. However, moving from a single home on 1/2 acre to multiple buildings on 20 acres, I wouldn’t exactly say we downsized.

The big UNKNOWN was how much capacity we would need. It would have been great to do it all in one trip but with 3 vehicles + a camper, we’d need to make a few trips anyway to get all those down there. We looked into hiring movers and checked out various “POD” options but none of them offered the flexibility to take the time to carefully load for a few days prior to departure. Renting the truck for a few extra days really helped calm my fears about running out of room. Combined with excellent help from family, we easily emptied the house in one afternoon and I could see then that everything that was left would easily fit into the 2nd load.

As it turns out, our estimate was just about perfect as both loads were full but we didn’t really have to rearrange much to fit it all in. I was (rightfully) worried about weight so we hit the scale in Owatonna to see where we were at. It turns out we were slightly overweight on both trips. Not overall weight but the rear axel was over due to the car dolly and by that point, rearranging/reloading wasn’t an option so we held our breath and pressed onward. Luckily, our first trip was on a Sunday so scales were closed. On the 2nd run, (a Thursday), we had to avoid the scales but that likely only cost us a half hour of extra driving.