Things I've learned preparing for an international move:
1. I will never own so much stuff again.
That's about it. All the rest I already knew (or at least anticipated).
If we were moving to somewhere else in the US, sure we'd be cleaning out and organizing. But being given very firm limits on what can ship via air and sea is a whole other ball game. I am fairly confident the garbage men hate us. For weeks they've been greeted by an army of black trash bags. We really need to make them cookies or something. Let me be clear, my house is always clean an tidy. But really, when was the last time you combed over every craft and sewing item you own? Completely cleared out both of your attics? Inventoried every kitchen utensil? Sorted out all your various ratchet sets? See?
We will be holding a garage sale, or more appropriately, a pop up super center, this weekend.
TOO. MUCH. STUFF.
Our house sold in record time- 36 hours! WooHoo!
Papers signed, price agreed, awaiting inspection... and then it fell through.
The kids took it a little personally. They're better now. Good opportunities for patience and prayer.
We're bummed but clearly that was not meant to be. Worse comes to worse, we take a buy-out offer from Robert's company. I'm not going to pretend that we're anything but spoiled when it comes to the relocation package we get. Don't get me wrong, it's still a gigantic pain in the neck, but we know how good we've got it!
So now, 3 weeks from being on the other side of the world I find myself with the mother of all to-do lists that just got a little more complicated since the house is now back on the market. I'm pretty sure that 4 out of 5 Ricker children would agree that having the house show ready at any given time is the worst part of this whole thing. We're pretty good when it comes to crunch time though. Here's how it works:
*Ring* Hi, so and so would like to go by in about 45 minutes.
Okay, thanks *click*
Jack, you get to watch a little show on daddy's chair! (side note- nervous energy does not contain itself well in the body of a 4 year old. He has to be quarantined in his own little world while the house turns into a busy beehive)
And then the rest of us all proceed to make our house "show ready". It's a science.
So Monday it's back to work. Serenity now. Serenity now.
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