Start your New Year right ...

Some wait for Spring to do their deep cleaning. Since Florida doesn't have the traditional seasons, we got started this week! What has made the most difference for us is getting rid of stuff we no longer use or need.

Rather than letting perfectly good items go to waste, we always donate what is in good condition. Here are some of our favorite resources:

Furniture and household goods:

Manatee Habitat for Humanity 355-7082

Sarasota Habitat for Humanity 363-0777

South Sarasota Habitat 493-0529

Food:

All Faiths Food Bank (Sarasota) 379-6333

Food Bank of Manatee 747-FOOD (3662)

Clothing:

Goodwill 351-8945 (for home pick-up)

Salvation Army 1-800-958-7825

Of course there are many other places that welcome your donations and you may have your favorites already established. But if you have not, please look into these or do your own research because the charities who receive donations can turn the proceeds of sales into life-changing intervention programs.

Not only will you enjoy the benefits of cleaning out and making a fresh start in 2012 but also local nonprofits will be able to reach more families in need and do more good.

Got change?

Recent survey data we saw today showed that in 2011, 61% of moves in 2011 were for "life stage reasons." Our clientele definitely reflect this trend - getting married, having children, children moving out, job-related relocation and retirement - are common among the people we move.

No wonder moving can be so stressful! People are not only dealing with the logistics of the move but also these BIG life changes. No matter how joyful or welcome they may be, stress always accompanies change on this scale.

Add to it moving during the Holidays and WOW! So if you or someone you know is going through this all at once - moving, the holidays and a big life change - we welcome the chance to make at least one area of your or their life less stressful: the move!

Five ways to make packing not so SCARY

Where to start? Boxes? Packing materials? What if I pack it wrong and something breaks? What goes in which boxes? Yikes!

Packing can be a scary thing but as one of the most important components of the move, it is a critical part of a smooth move to your new place.

The Stronger crew was talking it over this weekend and came up with these five important tips for people getting ready to pack for a local move:

1. Make clean-out a priority and donate unwanted items to charity. This way you don't have to pay more to move your stuff than it would cost to replace them. Think canned goods for example or books.

2. Pack boxes full and seal them so they can be stacked. In any move using hired professionals, time is money. The more time spent carrying out unsealed boxes one-by-one because they can't be stacked, the more money the move will cost you. You may have a lot of boxes, but stacking them three or four per dolly and wheeling them out goes very quickly. Movers can only do that if they are properly packed and sealed.

3. As the stuff gets heavier, the box should get smaller. Book boxes, for example, are small because the contents are heavy. Large boxes full of books are practically un-lift-able, even for the pros.

4. Save lots of work, use wardrobe boxes. Stronger Moving rents large boxes with metal rods in them called wardrobe boxes for $5 a piece (or you can buy them for $15 each). You can squeeze together about 2 linear feet of hanging clothes to save the trouble of un-hanging and re-hanging. As a bonus, the space in the bottom of these boxes is great of non-breakable items like pillows or shoes.

5. Write the room name and contents on the SIDES of the boxes, not just the tops. This eliminates the need for movers to stop and ask "where do you want this?" If they can see right on the side of their stack of boxes which room they need to take them to, the job goes faster, saving you money.

Watch this short video on packing the items in your kitchen. It shows you how to pack those breakable items so they won't break and it explains the right way to open a box before packing it (most people get it wrong!).