Lessons learned while moving halfway across the country:

1. In a pinch, stuffed animals make perfect buffers for fragile contents.

2. Do not, in a rush to be super organized, pack your check book. In a box that you’ve already taped shut. At the very bottom of the box. Under 47 pounds of work files. And then realize you need that check book to pay all the people coming to your new residence to deliver all your new furniture, clean your rugs and paint the walls.

3. Serious consternation and stress can occur when it comes time to decide whether or not to throw out the half bottles of $20 Frederick Fekkai shampoo and conditioner lingering in the bathroom. Doesn’t make sense to pack them when I’ve already moved on to a different brand, but can’t justify tossing them.

4. Same dilemma, different product: Amaretto. To drink or not to drink? The big old glass bottle takes up some room in the box, and is quite heavy, but is drinking 350ml of hard liquor the night before moving a viable solution?

5. Abs of Steel, Buns of Steel, Thighs of Steel – moving is the perfect time to toss all those video tapes that I haven’t watched since 1993. And even then I watched them while eating a bowl of chocolate Haagan Daz.

6. There really isn't an efficient way to pack ice skates.

7. All of a sudden, when faced with the option of giving away toys they haven’t played with in years, children will suddenly discover said toy is their favorite and they absolutely cannot live without it.

8. When you’re still packing up at midnight, eating half a roll of chocolate chip cookie dough can really get your engine revving again.

9. After 14 hours in the car with two kids and a cat, even Radio Disney starts to sound entertaining – and singing along to every song on the High School Musical soundtrack doesn’t seem so ridiculous anymore.

10. New York is an awfully big state, and just because it's right next to Massachusetts doesn't mean you don't have eight more hours of driving once you hit the "New York Welcomes You" sign.

11. After 16 hours in the car, children who started out excited with the idea of moving will begin to question the sanity of the idea by asking/whining, "Do you really have to move to Boston? Can't we just turn around and go home and go to bed?" Twenty times. Every half hour. Until the volume of High School Musical is turned up so loud it finally drowns out their whimpers.