up sticks

phrase

British, informal

: to pack up one's belongings and move to a different place

They upped sticks and left for London.

Examples of up sticks in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

After 50 years in Scotland’s capital, the beloved Edinburgh Television Festival could well be about to up sticks and move somewhere else. — Jesse Whittock, Deadline, 21 Nov. 2025

Marsh, then 22, decided to up sticks and move to a traditional English cottage in Oxford to find solace and reset her life following the end of the relationship. — Gord Magill, Newsweek, 21 Dec. 2024

In another corner of X, however, RAC1's Marta Ramon tweeted that the real reason Gundogan had been left out was to put pressure on him to up sticks. — Tom Sanderson, Forbes, 17 Aug. 2024

As the world heats up, many species are expected to up sticks and meander many miles away from their typical habitat, bringing various pathogens along with them for the ride. — WIRED, 27 Oct. 2022

Rhymes for up sticks

• chopsticks
• picnics
• reliques
• toothpicks
• yardsticks
• biopolitics
• bolsheviks
• candlesticks
• crucifix
• intermix
• lunatics
• mensheviks