So, after just over 2 months, things are settling and we’re falling comfortably into place.
And NOW … we have our stuff!! Our shipment showed up at our house last Thursday, the 14th at roughly 6:00 that evening. It was sketchy, and for a while there we weren’t sure it was going to make it that day, but they pulled through. What took them 2 days to pack up and haul onto a truck, took 2 hours to unload and unpack. Amazing! Of course, they didn’t actually unpack all the boxes … just unpacked all the furniture and stuff that had been wrapped up in their special moving paper. But, they did a fantastic job!
When our container arrived at the port, it went through customs (which we only had one item that was confiscated … a cheap dagger that Van had with his RenFest costume … with all the big, sharp kitchen knives, that ornamental dagger was their safety concern) and then loaded everything on two trucks and brought it out.
It was nice to see our familiar comfys … the couch ...
... CERTAINLY the bed …
... and I was once again reunited with my dirty clothes basket ...
... my fruit bowl ...
...and my towel rack.
But now we have a lot of stuff that we’re not sure what to do with. Boxes and boxes of stuff that we opened and wondered “why did we pack THIS?”. For example, the rain gauge my dad got us for Christmas. Or the not one, but TWO axes that were in the garage (yeah … I’ve heard of an axe murderer, but never a costume dagger murderer … that may be something that happens here that we didn’t know about). We have bits and pieces of stuff, like part of the leaf blower (that wouldn’t work here anyway, even if there were a leaf to blow) and assorted kitchen appliance pieces, like the blender pitcher with no base (which, again, wouldn’t work here, even if we had it).
Then there is the random collection of stuff, that isn’t really related to anything, that had just gotten wrapped up in packing paper. We affectionately call these treasures “crap wads”. One had a couple of pens, a penny, a spoon, a receipt from Home Depot, and a block of silver that I didn’t even know we had … all wrapped together in the packing paper. That was a particularly fun crap wad. Yesterday I found one with an audio tape, a thermometer, an egg timer, and an eraser.
The kitchen was FULL of boxes and fortunately Van got up Friday morning and handled that, because I wouldn’t have known were to start.
The house was a bit of a mess, but now we’ve got everything unpacked with the exception of 8 boxes in our bedroom.
Right now, mainly, it’s just about organizing and arranging. There are still a couple of pieces of big furniture we want to buy and some pictures and things we want to frame before we start putting stuff on the walls and arranging the furniture. It’s funny … our stuff seems so small in this house.
Van’s office and my craft cupboard are scary (although, my scrapping table is organized really nice), but those are things we can spend an afternoon and handle. And the kids’ rooms, although are unpacked, aren’t arranged in a manner that works well, so I’ll deal with that once school starts and I can get in there uninterrupted.
So, there it is. It’s officially “home”. And you guys will be so proud of me, I made it here with only a box and a half of books (fortunately, there are a couple of decent books stores here and I always have Amazon).
