What in your home do you really *love*?

[Antonia]

Interesting conversation with the kids this morning on material things and what's really important to us led to the following question: if you had to grab only five things from your house on the way out (excluding the four p's: people, pets, pictures and paperwork, and assuming you could actually carry them out), what would they be?

I chose my grandmother's hope chest, my dad's clock, my mom's silverware, a box of baby clothes I've saved, and my family room rug (I just love it!) I was surprised to realize that my books did not make the top five.

So, what would you take? And what were you surprised to find you'd be willing to leave behind?

[Dayle in Guatemala]

1) family videos

2) my classic book collection

3) my cookbooks (my grandma wrote on some of the recipes)

And I guess I can't think of anything else I'd be willing to risk my safety for. I don't really have heirlooms or expensive collectibles, except some of my books. Everything else is easily replaced and would probably be replaced with something in better shape!

[PariSarah]

Does my laptop count as paperwork? I guess I'd be dragging it out anyway, since that's where all my photos are. But it's where my entire scholarly career is--notes, papers, everything. So that's coming with me even if I have to leave the wedding album behind.

So, okay. Five things. Laptop, Bosch mixer, my Icon of the Last Supper (http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3109/2383168756_506de1454b_o.jpg), my Taize dishes, and my hope chest/yarn stash. (Is that last part okay? The hope chest holds my yarn stash. They can both come together, right?)

[Jenny in Atl]

Ow, hard question! Can my kid's art work fit under the P's? If so...

I guess my jewelry box (nothing in there is worth much, just sentimental value), one of the Macs (either laptop or iMac), my silversmithing tools, my Jamaican steel mermaid, and Fi's fossil/rock/specimen collection box. She would run back into a fire to get that!

[Mad Charity]

I have the house I thought I would want to remain in forever, the stuff, etc. Now I have come to where I am ready to stick the pictures and dvd's in a lock box and sell everything else. I always thought I would want to always have bedrooms for my kids to come back home and visit and plenty of room for family dinners, etc. I really don't want any of that anymore. I really want to travel light and do a lot of traveling. My husband and I own rental property and we have decided that when the kids go to college we will just sell the house and make the rental property the only property we own! We are planning to rent apartments and houses ourselves, just here and there, until we find a place to land. Then we may not ever buy a home again. When I look around at it I can't help but wonder what I was so excited about. It's okay, it's just not a goal I would want to repeat. Isn't it strange?
I guess if I had a fire in the house and could only grab a few things I would, of course, get the pics and dvd's and videos and the kids. (duh) Then I would grab the cats and dog. :D The laptops. That's it. I really want to unload everything else. I want a backpack, a bike, and my running shoes. That's it really. I'm done with my stuff.

[JFS in IL]

I'd have to grab my one autistic son's meds, as many of his dvd collection as possible, his action figures...gee, this is all what my SON would have major trouble living without!

I'd grab my calender off the wall (it is my "spare brain"), my new digital camera,
my old zoetrope from over 100 years ago, and my Grandpa's WWI discharge poster (or does that come under the paperwork "P" already?). Maybe I'd get Greywhiskers my old worn-out stuffed animal from babyhood from the dresser drawer in which he sleeps. Oh - and could I manage to carry the mahogny bookshelf my dad made back in 8th grade shop class?

[Night Elf]

Nothing, other than the P's you mentioned. Everything else is just STUFF. It can be replaced or at least be a fond memory.

I am glad to hear I'm not the only one who just wants to drop everything and travel. I have never liked being settled in one place for more than two years. I'm so ready to move now after 3 years in this house and my DH refuses to even consider it because of the real estate market. I hate being tied down by things. Ick!

[j.griff]

Our computers- with the external hard drives (where our digital photos are stored), our out-of-print books and the kids' favorite books (13yod had me read Stellaluna to her thousands of times when she was little, and she "read" Brown Bear, Brown Bear" to me when she was 3, 6yos loves The Gingerbread Man, and the two Little girls have lots of favorites).
I like my dining room set- we bought it used off Craig's List, and we've refinished it together.
Wow, we just aren't "attached" to very many "things". I abhor lots of "stuff", and my dc are attached to me, dh and each other- they've never picked a favorite blanky or toy. I'll say our DVD's, I don't remember if that was covered before or not.

[KidsHappen]

My laptop, our medicines, one of my dd's bed set (it was mine and my dh's first), some Kinkade's my mother gave me, and my younger dds' blankies. Everything else is just stuff. It could all be replaced.


I do have an very old, crochety desk that is falling apart that I am very fond of. It is my favorite piece of furniture. There would be no way to remove it in any timely manner and I would miss it.

[Gailmegan]

Does the filing cabinet with all my grad school notes count as paper?

My husband's paintings (he's an artist) and some comfort items for the boys like blankets, stuffed animals.

Everything else is replaceable.

[chickenpatty]

Our Bibles, especially dh's old & very used one. Dd's diabtetic supplies, of course.

Then, I'd swing the kitchen french doors open and shove my huge farm table & benches out! I might try to save the piano, but it's coming apart as it is.

[percytruffle]

Great question. I've thought about this before and mostly came up with the four p's you mentioned. Other than that I would take my dh's computer where all the recent pics are stored, my paintings (If I had to choose just one it would be the painting of my ds on the beach as a toddler that is on the sidebar on my blog), the set of mis-matched silver plate silverware that came from my dad's parents' house, my recipe box because of the handwritten recipes from my now deceased mom, and my jewelry (not that there's much of it) because dh gave it to me.

Most of our paperwork we need to protect is in a fire proof safe. Hopefully they would weather the fire.

The rest is just stuff. I could leave it tomorrow and be just fine, maybe better in fact.

[Remudamom]

Family movies
grand piano and the electric piano (can that count as one???)
reproduction stove
oriental rug
laptop

I guess if two pianos count as two I'd leave the laptop, my girls love their pianos.

Ugh, I had to edit right away. I'd also want my silverware and my polish pottery. I think I'll trade the stove for the silver. And an antique bull my dad gave me from China. And my Breyers horses. I guess I'm too attached to things, but in truth, if the four Ps were out, I'd not worry about the rest.

[Mekanamom]

Hmm, two of my P's are on the computer... paperwork and pictures. But it's a desktop. Maybe I should look into getting a better laptop that can handle all that stuff so it's easy to pick up and go.

People, pets, pictures and paperwork... the only other things I'd really want to grab are sentimental family heirlooms:

The tapestry my great-grandmother painted
The piano my grandfather restored for me
The china set from my grandmother
The silver set from my other grandmother
The antique couch that my ancestors brought across the country... walking... with a handcart...

Everything else can be replaced.

[Virginia Dawn]

Other than the 4 p's, I love the lladro that I bought overseas called "Facing the Wind," the large crewel work embroidery of a tiger that I made when I was first married, and my personal writings (poetry and other work). But except for my writing, it could all burn with out making too big of an impact.

[JenneinAZ]

I would get my daughter's Piggy and Herman (the critters she sleeps with), my older son's blankies and my younger son's blankie and bunny. Everything else is just stuff.

[Brigitte]

I would get my daughter's Piggy and Herman (the critters she sleeps with), my older son's blankies and my younger son's blankie and bunny. Everything else is just stuff.

:iagree: I woud grab F's Big Birds and "Hospital Dog" - the dog they put in her isolet in the NICU and L's Baby. That's it, besides the 4 p's. I am sitting here in the middle of a cluttered house wishing it would all go away anyway. The thought of sorting through it all and packing for our move has me over the top. If I could walk away from it all now and start with a clean slate, I would.

[battlemaiden]

We haven't had our household goods (stuff) for four months. I don't have the things I love.

Surprisingly, I miss my stuff more than I thought I would. I'd like to say I haven't missed a thing and I'm ashamed at how easy it is to live on so little, but that simply isn't the case. I miss our books, my kitchen supplies, my paintings/tapestries/rugs. I miss the beautiful things. I miss my bedspread and my children's quilts. I even miss a good portion of my children's playthings (but not all;)).

I would grab our Bibles, my purse (was that one of the p things?), our camera and digital recorder, and my laptop because those are the only things of value we have in this rental house.

Good question.

Jo

[Eliana]

1) My kesuvah (Jewish wedding contract - well, it's actually his commitments to me.)

2) The computer (though that is really for practical reasons - it has my writing, old letters from friends, address lists, our book, music, and dvd catalogs (so I know what I need to replace!) ... it has most of our Cd collection backed up on it too...)

as many 3) books 4) cds and 5) dvds as we could fit in the car....


though I'd probably leave most of the cds and dvds and just take books....
the small, blue, hardbound copy of Richard III which I have had since I was 9; my first copy of Pride and Prejudice; the copy of Middlemarch my mother gave me 20 years ago; the pocket-sized copy of Mesillas Yesharim (pathways of the just) which I carried in my purse for the hardest year of my life; the rough-textured, orange hard bound of Mattingly's Catherine of Aragon bio; my shiny, new hardbound Bujold compilation Miles in Love (and as many other Bujold's as I could grab!); McKinley's Sunshine; Willis's Passage & to Say Nothing of the Dog; Slonczewski's Brain Plague; Palgrave's Golden Treasury; our family Tanakh; some of my husband's Gemara's; our main halachic reference books; my homeopathic Materia medica

and the picture books we have read so many times to each child that we can recite them from memory... and some of the chapter books I had as a child and my children are now loving to pieces ... the Russian Art book I fell in love with in a little shop in Iowa, the Anguissola book I hunted for for years


I'd grab the cd that was playing when my son was born, the Four Seasons cd which was the first my husband and I bought together.. but most of the music is backed up on the computer, and I don't have as much attachment to the actual cd the way I do with the books.

on dvd.... my most amazing b-day present: the complete BBC Shakespeare collection (UK region setting - found on Amazon marketplace, otherwise an impossible dream!); our literary adaptations collection; Hands Across the Table; One True Thing (My mother and I saw this in the theaters shortly before we learned that my grandmother was dying of cancer - I saw it again afterwards, but my mother, who went back to live with my grandparents for 9 months, hasn't been able to see it since);

Almost every book, dvd, or cd we own is vividly important, on one level or another - our other stuff is, for the most part, just useful, not loved for itself particularly.


Oh - my art prints!!! A photo of the Kosel (Western Wall), a gorgeous Monet... the Utamaro print that my grandparents had given me a puzzle of when I was small ... oh, dear. I guess I'll put my cds back (since almost all of them are backed up on the computer), and take my wall art instead...

[astrid]

The cookbook for which my grandmother "traded a good settin' hen" in 1929.
Her carnival glass devilled egg plate
The antique dessert plates I bought with a waitressing tip earned from Katherine Hepburn (really!....I think I hyperventillated on her salad!)
My Best In Show trophy and ribbon
Dd's baby book (does that count as pictures?)
Our wedding album

[Danestress]

Well, since you exclused people, pets, pictures and paperwork ....

I guess I would save the china and silver (you can count that as two things) that have been passed down through the generations

A large rug that was always in my grandmother's house and that makes every house I live in feel blessed by her (it's very pretty, too)

really, everything else can go, I guess. It's all replaceable. I have some jewelry - none of great value but some of sentimental value. I guess I would take that. I'd probably take my computer just because it's the resevoir of my life so I sort of need it, though I certainly don't "love" it. Oh, I know. Painting my husband has painted for me. Can I take all of them and count them as one thing? Oh, and all the origami my son has made. I guess I would need to take that and leave .... I guess the computer. Since I have the photos off it already since you said I can have photos as a "gimme."

[Dot]

Photo albums of the kids
Small glass bowl my dad bought as a child for his mom
The bed my dh's great-grandpa built
Chest of drawers my dad had as a child
Collection of dinosaur bones my dad gave me

[Quiver0f10]

The only thing I own that means much to me is my computer, but even that can be replaced. I would be upset if it got ruined, but it wouldn't be devastating. I don't really have anything nice and worth value ( That sounds awful lol) The only thing that really matters to me are my kids and DH.

Ok editing this to add the kids pictures and buckets of school papers I have saved.

[camibami]

The 22 scrapbooks, hands down. Other than that, probably my great aunt's trunk she took to China in the 1910's. It is gorgeous and beat up, with her intials embossed on it.

And, it contains every letter, school paper, etc from my entire childhood. Someday when I die, the girls will be in heaven reading letters and notes from my high school boyfriends.(Yo, Cami, like, do you, like, wanna go see Wham with me? Like, I totally think you are, like, hot.);)

[Margaret in CO]

I'd take my grandmother's cut glass vase, my Japanese doll from my dad, my dad's navy sword and my laptop.

[Rhonda in TX]

Tapestry DH's grandmother made. She went blind while working on it, so somebody else had to finish it, but it's the last piece of needlepoint she ever did.

Antique chair that was my grandparent's

DH's bass (that would be first!)

childhood mementos

[Ravin]

My floppies, computer (for the hard drives) and 40 gal. tote full of notebooks. AKA everything I've written since age 8.

My copy of Teutonic Religion (it's out of print and would be very difficult to replace) and the doily made by my great-grandmother that serves as an altar cloth on our family altar.

That would pretty much be it, I think.

[lynn]

My Thomas Kincade pictures dh bought me for my bday.

My parents and inlaws wedding pictures.

My sisters wedding picture because both my Oma and Nana are in it.

[Krista in LA]

I would grab the grandfather clock that my dad made us for a wedding present, my grandmother's locket, my grandfather's watch, my great-grandfather's baptism certificate, and my grandmother's kitchen table. I'd yell at one of the kids to grab my laptop. :lol:

[Old Dominion Heather]

A platter that belonged to my great-great grandmother, old framed photos of my ancestors... although I really should just go ahead and scan those suckers, dh's original framed art (his own art), the dog, meds.

[Merry]

I have four crosstitched pictures worked by my mom, grandmommie, and great-grandmother. Those are absolutely irreplaceable. Can I count them as a group? Because I would also want to take four of my grandma's stuff.... pearls, makeup box with jewels on it, an antique powder compact , and a small Oriental rug.