The view from my couch

I am way too organized for this. My house is a mess. I am looking at three mattresses right now and I am sitting on my couch…..I am not kidding. There is one leaning against the loveseat, one leaning against the gate to our downstairs and one leaning on our front door. There is a dresser by the coffee table. And an end table in the middle of the room. This is killing me, as I am the person who can't go to bed before the house is picked up or if there are any dirty dishes in the sink. There are clothes piled on the floors in our bedrooms, so that dressers could be cleared out to be moved into storage. The toy box is emptied and toys, games and puzzles are on my living room floor. Our guest room is empty, bean is sleeping on her mattress on the floor. It is going to be hard to live with mess and disorganization for the next two weeks. The good news is, with all this mess, comes progress. The storage unit was redelivered today and is being loaded with furniture and belongings that are staying behind. My husband’s parents are here helping, fortunately, and my mother-in-law and I took the girls to Disney on Ice to give them some fun today. Nothing like Mickey Mouse to cheer up kids! Hubby did make it home last night, finally, around midnight. We were both surprised he made it home last night at all, considering all the weather delays, cancellations and diversions his flights had yesterday. It’s so good to have him home and he won’t be going back until March 17th –when we all go over. This time will be busy and stressful, but at least we are all together again.

Stress

I have always kind of downplayed stress. Not to say I am immune to it –do I get what I would call stress headaches sometimes -yes. Do I have shoulder tension when I am stressed – yes. Do I get cranky (I can hear my husband laughing at this one) – yes. But anything more than that, usually not. I have even handled what most people consider a lot of stress with relative ease. Building a house, planning a wedding, changing jobs –over a few months time. No big deal. But now, I feel that my body is failing me and I am afraid the cause is….wait for it…..stress. There is just no other reason that I can think of for all the issues I have had in the past month. And if I am going to blame stress for these issues, I can’t imagine that anyone will argue that we don't have stress in our lives right now. Moving by itself is stressful. Selling a house by itself is stressful. Finding a new school/child care provider is stressful. Moving to a new country is stressful. Finding a new house, figuring out a different money system, a different time system (they use military time), a different measuring system, a different DRIVING method. All of these things are stressful in and of themselves….now combine them. No wonder my body and my mind are giving up on me. I am forgetting everything, I have been suffering from headaches, angioedema, new allergies and now….as of today….ocular migraines. Never heard of it? Me neither. I didn't even have a headache. But today, when I saw a crescent shape of light flashing in one of my eyes and lost my vision for 20 minutes, I made an emergency appointment with an optometrist and that is the diagnosis. Main trigger for this – yes, stress. I am not saying all of these things are caused by stress but I can’t say that they aren’t either. I am a pretty healthy 37 year old, who only ever really gets an occasional cold or sinus infection. Either it is stress, or it is the health insurance plan I picked making a mockery of me. Yes people, after years of having a relatively small copay for every single appointment we had, I am the newest member in my companies HRA plan as of January 1. With a $5000 deductible and small healthfund which is now, I am sure, depleted. Not to mention three of the three family members living in my house are sick right now, hopefully with just colds. I am sure the stress will subside as soon as we are over there, settled and ready to travel around Europe and have some fun. Daddy is hopefully on the way home from Manchester –he was supposed to fly into Philly, but apparently, the weather decided to add more STRESS, and he is being diverted to Boston, and may either end up home, in Boston or in Philly for the night. Time (and this weather system), will only tell. Please hurry home daddy. We miss you!!

March is almost here

I can’t believe it is almost March –it just seemed like this elusive date in the future….we would tell people, we are moving to England “in March”. Wow – now the time is almost here. Bean has been a little sad that she is leaving her friends soon, so I arranged a going away party with the owner of her school this morning. We will take snacks in, and the kids are all making her going away cards. She will be so excited to have a party in her honor. I am also hoping that the weather cooperates in March and we don’t have any issues come up, because we have something scheduled for EVERY SINGLE DAY in March. Even if it is as simple as a final haircut before we leave –we have SOMETHING every day. My March calendar is just so full, I hope I don’t forget anything. And since we do have the flight booked now, I was able to put in a forwarding mail request and do some of those types of things that I have been putting off. When I was calling to change the address for the magazines we get, I was even able to forward some of them directly to England – who knows when we will get them, but I was surprised that was even an option! We may get an April issue in July? That would be kind of funny, but I figured with magazines, there is not much to lose by getting them late. I will keep this blog updated as much as possible in the next few weeks, I know I have not been real good at it lately. And I am sure after our adventure really begins, there will be so much to write about…..good, bad, funny and emotional. Can’t wait to get started!

Weekend fun

We had a busy, but good weekend. Bean had some playdates and played in the snow for awhile –building a snowman in our yard while I had a great visit with my college roommate, and sledding at a good friend’s house. Some of the moments were caught on camera, and turned out great. I guess I liked the snow a little this week, since my children had so much fun in it, but I stand by my last post about hating snow aside from that. When we weren’t having fun, we were packing. My mom was visiting and our closets have been cleaned and sorted. I think I have a general idea in each area of our house now, what is going into storage and what is going with us. It is very hard to decide what to do with some of our more personal things, like pictures. Do I put them in storage or take them? I don’t want anything to happen to them, and to be honest there are risks for whatever I do with them. Getting lost at sea? Let’s hope not. Pod storage facility burning down? Again, let’s hope not. Did I mention that I usually look for “what could go wrong in this scenario?” but ultimately, I think I stay optimistic…..even if a little worried. We are leaving in less than a month, and I am feeling the stress. Right when I feel like I have a handle on the calendar, the things that are booked and the things that need to be done, I think of more. It is really hard to pack up a house and move to a new country….not that I thought it would be easy, I am just saying. But there is good news –this weekend, while we were having fun in Ohio, my husband was having fun in England, buying much needed necessities like car seats and TV’s. The best news….he has a lead on where to find Mac and Cheese. Yes, this really IS a big deal for my kids, I have not been joking. However, still no word on Ranch Dressing.

Snow

This weather is killing me. I am so tired of snow. I am tired of snow days and shoveling snow. I am even tired of the word snow. Snow is my new dreaded enemy. The picture above is the table on my patio –the icky white stuff is up to the bottom of the chairs. I have run out of room to put it on the side of my driveway, and more is apparently coming. The picture at the bottom of this post, is what I came home to after taking the kids to school this morning, a truck that went out of control and ended up in a snow bank in my yard. I feel like we are living in that movie –Day After Tomorrow. Meanwhile, in England, my husband is missing all the fun. I guess the good thing is, in the area of England we are moving to, snow is very rare. It does happen, but not much or often. In fact, on my husband’s first trip in January, they had one of those rare moments and had a few inches and it shut down the whole country. He was joking that the one snow plow in England couldn’t keep up, but it is apparently not that far from the truth. The newspapers in England were calling it Snowmaggeden. And seriously, we were talking about 2 or 3 inches. I will be glad to move away from the snow. However, the weather where we are moving is not much to be joyful about either. The summers only get in the 70’s, and it rains a lot. I am still wearing a sweater when the temperature is in the 70’s. And while I like rain more than snow, I don’t like it every day. Right now, I want to move to Hawaii where the weather is sunny and warm. Why, oh why, can't he be transferred there? :)

Once upon a time....

Once upon a time…..my family decided it was time for an adventure. (Or my husband’s company did, but same difference). We have embraced it. The time is coming near and our emotions are all over the place. While we are excited about our new adventure, we are very sad about the people we are leaving. Bean is sad about Kraft Ranch Dressing and Macaroni and Cheese. No, Kraft does not pay me to say this, but I did realize just how many products they make that we use, and won’t be able to find over there. Our flights were booked today for March 17th. It makes things feel….final. We are ready to go, but at the same time, we are not ready at all. We will have a lot to learn, we will have new people come into our lives, but we will not forget our friends back home. We are going to extremely miss our family and our friends and I am sure we will be homesick. But we are also optimistic -that this adventure we are going to be on for the next two years will be a once in a lifetime experience. We will live in and explore a new country, we will travel all over Europe, and we will learn to appreciate other cultures. As we try to make our last moments before we leave as special as we can, I pray that God will lead us down the right path for the next few years.

Cool on two continents

As a cocky twenty-something, I remember stating –I will NEVER drive a minivan - if I have kids, I will just get a bigger SUV. This worked well for me until I had my second child and the lease was up on my mid-size SUV, and gas prices were at their all time high. So my husband and I reluctantly dragged ourselves to a Toyota dealership to reluctantly test drive a Toyota Sienna. Convenient when you have kids, better gas mileage than an SUV, we figured we better at least check it out. We drove it and I loved it immediately. My husband loved it after the sales guy told us you could take the seats out and fit a whole sheet of plywood in the back –SOLD! We were the proud and uncool owners of a minivan. I felt my former twenty something self wanting to forward through time to kick my thirty something self in the butt. However, I never regretted our choice and I love my minivan. We are keeping it in the US. We will have it for trips back and when we return in two years. Now forward to the present -my husband gets a company car to use in England and gets to pick it out and customize it as one of his perks. He asked me –what should we get? I, of course, said a minivan! It only makes sense, we loved ours here, we still have two kids last time I checked and we will have visitors coming over who will not want to rent a car and try their hand at driving on the wrong, I mean different, side of the car on the other side of the street. So more room = convenience. We were not even sure they had minivans, but dear hubby checked. They do! However, they call them People Carriers. This makes me laugh for some reason. So just today, he ordered our brand new People Carrier –a Volkswagon Sharan. The kicker is – it is a manual transmission. That is what they have in England. One of my old college friends would tell you that I drove her stick shift into the back of another car because I got confused about when to step on the clutch. Oops. I do know how to drive one, but it has been YEARS since I have done it. Anyone who read my post about driving awhile back will remember –I said the thing I am most nervous about is driving –on a different side of the car, on a different side of the road –and now I have to add driving a stick shift, with my left hand on top of that! But if you are reading this and you plan to visit –have no fear, I will have it all figured out before you have to ride with me! And how (un)cool are we to have two minivans on two different continents?

Daddy is NOT in the Atlantic Ocean

Bean was showing Gerbie the globe two days ago and explaining where daddy was –she was pointing and saying “daddy is here, in Manchester, England”. I looked to see where she was pointing….it was the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. I am glad to say –daddy is NOT there. But I think that while Bean is getting excited to go, she is also getting nervous. She was practicing her British accent last night –it was really cute. I think one of her teachers has been “helping” her with it at school. She told me she does not want to sound different than her new school mates. I told her it was ok to sound different, she is an American and we do sound different than people in England. I also told her, she might pick up their accent over time anyway. But kids....do not want to sound or look different than other kids. I think there will definitly be a transition period, but I think she will be just fine. Luckily, 5 year olds are still pretty accepting of each other. Bean, I know the feeling, I hope it is easy for us all to find some new friends while we are there; I think it will make things go much smoother.

Come on sweetie, we are moving to England

My husband and I were sitting in our family room this weekend while the kids were playing in another room. We heard our oldest, Bean, saying to the little one …come on sweetie, we are moving to England, take my hand and we will go to Manchester. Hubby and I just looked at each other and started cracking up. A few minutes ago, I heard Bean talking to her Barbie doll about her new house, new school and her new friends. Mind you, we have not moved yet, so these are all pretend things right now, but I am glad that she seems happy about them in the conversation. I think of Bean as a very social and friendly little girl, but I have noticed she can be intimidated in group situations, especially when she does not know everyone in the group. This weekend we went to a birthday party for a neighbor friend and before we left she was very concerned –what if I don’t know anyone else and what if my friend is playing with other girls and not me? I reassured her that she would be fine and would find new friends to play with if the birthday girl was busy. We walked in, she looked around and then ran and jumped right into the fray. I am hoping she will do this after we move –look around and then jump right in. On another note, we are all a little sad. After some weather delays, daddy is finally getting on his airplane to head back to Manchester. We pray he has a safe flight. Three more weeks and we will finally be together and getting ready to go.

Updates

Planning is going on in full force, but right now, that is all it amounts to. No action yet.
--We have confirmed the dates for our storage containers to be redelivered to our home and then picked up and sent back to the storage facility...two containers, staggered over two weeks.
--We have the air freight and sea freight moving dates scheduled. We opted for two separate dates to time the shipping correctly for the air freight, which will hopefully reach us shortly after we get there.
--We have the date confirmed that we can take possession of our new house, and we are finalizing the flights for the family.
--The realtor is scheduling an open house for the weekend after we move. We have had three showings so far but nothing much has come from them yet.
The first part of my March calendar is very full! On another note, hubby is snow bound again this weekend in the US (I am seeing a pattern every time he tries to leave the country without us), and he moved his flight to Monday when hopefully the weather on the East coast will be better. We have another three week separation to get through, but this will be the last one before we all go together. Again, I am not anxious to leave our family and friends, but I am anxious to get out of this list making, crazy planning, limbo that we are in. Bean and I have been talking every day about the move and she is asking lots of questions. Gerbie is saying - "Gerbie moving to England". I have been asking her if she will be good on the airplane and she looks at me with her sweet smile and says "nooooo". I think we may be in trouble. I am grateful that so far, all of the things that need to be scheduled are being scheduled without issues and for the dates we are picking. As long as everything goes smoothly, it should work like a well oiled machine....but a lot could go wrong. We are in Ohio.....and it will be March. One snow storm like what we had yesterday could throw everything off. So I am crossing my fingers, praying for the best and trying to be optimistic.

Staying Home - part 2

Just when I think I have everything figured out, something comes along and throws my head into a spin. I had decided I was going to quit and be a stay at home mom (in fact, I wrote a whole post about this just last week). I wanted to do this for several reasons. The first being, I did not want Gerbie to go into daycare in a strange country. Secondly, I knew how much of an adjustment this move would be for all of us, and how long it would take to make our new home a “home”. And finally, I decided I wanted to take this opportunity to try out being a stay at home mom. And then, today, my boss tells me she thinks it will work out for me to keep my job and work from England, in fact, they are excited about the opportunity. Apparently, they need an HR presence in England, they can use me for comp, benefits and project work and possibly even interviewing candidates for our European companies (we have offices in the UK, France and Germany). Yep –head spinning. Do I want to keep working? I thought no, now I am not sure. I think after talking to hubby about it, we are game for trying it, but would really like it to be part time, not full time. I have some time (about a month) to figure out what this looks like. I still don’t want Gerbie in daycare, so I will try to do it with her home, understanding she comes first no matter what. I still have a lot to consider for this, but it might turn out to be a really good experience. Honestly, if I am going to have a job, I would rather it be the one I already know and with a company I have worked with for 7 years. Sigh…more decisions.

Moving equals excel spreadsheets?

I have always thought I am fairly good at organization, until this move came along and blew that theory out of the water. Apparently, I am not very good at this, as I am struggling with how to make the best decisions regarding when and how our stuff should go across the pond. Because my husband’s company is flying us over via business class, we will be able to take three suitcases a piece for checked luggage, our pack and play for Gerbie to sleep in until her crib arrives, and two carry-on items each. I have had to start an excel spreadsheet to map this out (yes, this requires deep thought and if I don’t write it down, I will keep confusing myself). Since the only personal things that will be there when we get there, are the things we physically take with us--assuming our luggage does not get lost on the way –it is important to get as much as we can on this flight. So with that in mind, we paid a visit to Target on our date night on Saturday and bought two new carry-on size suitcases for the kids. These will be filled with their clothes and personal items, such as blankets and stuffed animals that they cannot live without. And how cute will they look pulling these through the airport –my little travelers going on an overseas flight at the tender ages of 5 and 2. They will also each have their own backpack on the plane that will have books, coloring supplies, snacks, suckers, ipods and pillows/blankets for the flight. This is a long flight and while I think Bean will be just fine, Gerbie will be difficult –that is just her style. And to be honest, I think it is a long flight for ME to sit still that long, so I don’t expect them to be perfect angels. I am also going to have my computer/laptop bag and personal items, plus a diaper bag and stroller. The pack mule, better known as my husband, will have his computer/laptop bag and personal items, including all of our personal documents that need to go with us. For our checked luggage, I am going to squeeze as many clothes, towels, sheets and blankets in that I can. We do have rent-a-sheets available at our fully furnished house –but this feels icky to me. I know it is not much different from a hotel but still…..I prefer my own. On the air freight, we will put all the other personal things we can’t live without, but will have to TRY to carry on without for a couple of weeks (more clothes, shoes, towels, whatever else we could not fit in our suitcases). And then the rest of the items that are making this move, will be coming much later –as it will take up to 6-8 weeks to arrive. Since most of the toys and stuffed animals are coming over this way, I hope it gets there much faster than the 6-8 weeks as predicted. I am fairly good at making up games and songs, but that is a long time to be without dress up princess clothes and play kitchen sets. We are hoping that hubby will find out about his company car within the next few days and when he goes back will be able to take possession of it and get car seats purchased and installed before we arrive. The first few days I am there, I will have a lot to buy. Such as, all of the things we use that plug in, since their outlets are different. On the list so far –a toaster, vacuum cleaner, hair dryer, curling iron, coffee maker (oh, how I will need the caffeine with the 5 hour time adjustment). I will also have to get cleaning supplies, as we can’t take these with us, and also figure out this grocery shopping thing. New foods, new stores, and paying in pounds…..wish me luck. One of the first things on the list –getting Bean enrolled into her new school and getting set up on our new bank accounts. Thank God my mom is coming with us for the first two weeks to assist. Her help with the girls and with the cleaning and shopping will be invaluable. Now back to my excel spreadsheet…..I just thought of a few more things we need to take with us.