By the end of day 2 all of the rest of the gubbins was downstairs in a massive pile. Everything that had ever come into contact with the outside world had been scrubbed to within and inch of it’s life (boots, shoes, garden furniture, camping stuff, flag poles ) and the cats had been relocated to me Ma’s. I was absolutely knackered and wasn’t too impressed by the cats enthusiasm to purr and walk all over me all night ;(

day three was a little easier as men arrived and did it all for us! Ace. I did insist on taking my Dyson (Do you know how much they cost!!) and so had to spend 2 hours scrubbing it’s various tubes with a toothbrush. Then steam cleaning the bits that I couldn’t reach -MADNESS. There really isn’t a chance that that contains anything living(spider or micro organism) so I’m hoping they won’t take it off me the other end!

It was kind of exciting to see everything leaving. It had all been wrapped in brown paper. I even saw them tip out some plastic tags (the ones you put on the tops of suspension files) and wrap them up! They were in the bottom of a box containing SMART board stuff. It might me laugh seeing them do that. If it had been me packing they would have gone in the bin! Pss are great at what they do though and they unpack it all for me at the other end!! woo hoo! More sitting around

The remit says that they pack everything… that’s what they did! We made sure our documentation was at Mum’s before they arrived! :- ) But.. it’s done now. My stuff is close to Span in South London and will be bunged onto a ship before we know it. A friend in Adelaide has kindly offered to be Customs’ point of contact over there and then it will sit in storage until we arrive. It’s all very exciting.

There are still lot of bits and bobs in the house. Stuff for ebay and car boot sales etc. I’ve also got to empty the fridge and the garage. I have until Friday. We should complete on the 31st so today (Saturday) I’m having a bit of a rest. ZZZZzzzzz

Day one of the BIG move has ended.
Knackered!

We’ve moved everything we’re keeping here to mum’s and flat packed all of the wooden furniture downstairs. The bedrooms are empty of their contents (which are now in boxes downstairs) and the “Bed man” is coming in the morning to take them apart ready for the lorry on Friday. The cats have brought us a dead bird a day this week and today we’ve recieved a bird’s leg in the morning, a mouse at lunchtime and another half eaten bird this evening. I think they’re a little anxious. Unfortunately they don’t understand that, being vegetarian, their hunting skills are not likely to persuade me to keep them!

Of course I am keeping them and they will be parcelled over to mothers by the end of tomorrow. There’s still sooo much stuff everywhere though! We haven’t even looked in the garage yet. Mum’s coming over to clean the garden furniture to within an inch of it’s life tomorrow and we’ll have to put to one side, anything from the garage which needs to be shipped. That will include my SMART board! (lol)

I’m feeling ok at the moment. Which is good; i’m not always fantastic in these situations. Having been ill last weekend I’m really only getting back into my normal “nom” routine now. Just in time to finish eating the contents of the fridge

I’ll put up some piccies tomorrow. For now, i’m off to spend the last night i’ll have in my comfy bed until I’m in Aus. I’ll miss it!

Next Friday.

That’s when a large container will pull up and we will empty the contents of the house into it. Then a week later I won’t live here anymore. I won’t own a house anymore and i’ll be able to save to get to the land of the sane!

I continue to allow myself to be wound up by ICT things… I know I shouldn’t but I do get insulted by the ignorance of certain individuals. Which is silly because i’m sure it IS ignorance rather than anything personal. However, if I am expected to attend a session on trouble shooting a “VLE” for my subject, delivered by someone who has no idea what that actually means, I will need to be bound and gagged. Can I request now that I am NOT the person that gets sent by the director???!!! LMAO.

Ah well. Lots of stressful events to come….. Watch how I hold myself together!

I’ve been really poorly this weekend I must have eaten something very dodgy because I couldn’t even keep down the medicine I was trying to take to make it all go faster! I’m a bit better today and determind not to miss my last day with my form tomorrow.

Span is moving in to her new flat this weekend (Yay!) and will be launching a fully fledged London love nest. There will be discussions about the “shoe cupboard” and the new wardrobes that must be ordered. I am not there, professionals were hired, but i hope to visit soon enough

We’re still packing. Although it feels more like mooching whilst waiting to get going . We should, in my opinion, be leaving this week but everyone’s seems to have a slightly more laid back approach to the completion date than I’d hoped. It’ll be my job to stick a rocket up their proverbial tomorrow I guess.

The cats seems a little unsettled and are clearly finding the whole process rather exhausting but we’re muddling on through. We have lots of bits which will need new home though. Including: christmas decorations, halloween decorations, a TV and various bits of gardening paraphenalia. Let us know if you are in need of any such items.

The study doesn’t contain any study materials. The books and the cds are all gathered, boxed and stacked in the spare bedroom and the shelves are downstairs ready to be relocated. It’s happening. It really is. The contents of our home are being sorted, sifted and packed. It’s been fun. I’ve found loads of old cassettes with singing teens on and Vids with various gigs and shows which I am vowed to digitise before i throw them out.

An envelope arrived this morning with a set of questions from the buyers solicitors along with the contract of sale for us to sign. It really won’t be long now. I kept telling my self that it was ok. I hadn’t signed anything and so when that contract appeared this morning it was a little scary. Not as scary as it could be though and I am sure we’re doing the right thing.

I can’t help but think that when the guy we bought this off said “ah well, I’ve got time to wait and if I can’t sell I can always rent” we should have replied with “excellent how much a month do you want a month?”. We could have demanded a turfed lawn and saved ourselves a fortune. We’d be leaving for Oz in a couple of months rather than 6 and I’d be able to see where this was all going at a much faster rate.

If I were the family about to move into this lovely home I’d be so excited. It seems just long enough away that I can’t really get excited yet. I’m walking back to age 16 again lol. Ah well it’ll be fun. I even have my ol’ bessie mate back in residence in a simliar fashion; although she’ll be in her new home before I can say “HI!!!” and flash my desk lamp out of the window. Lucky lady

Dreams are funny ol’ things. I’ve always had ‘em but I’ve not always been brave enough to see them through (Especially the hard ones). I don’t have any regrets and I don’t want any now.

I’ve been checking flight prices and cancelling TV subscriptions. Onwards and Upwards! Well in 6 months anyway – in the meantime… onwards a bit and then PAUSE!

Well, the couple that were buying the house messed around and then pulled out. NICE! Annoying. We decided to go back to the plan of adding extra agents to the house. We had Oulsnams and Vizors around to see what they could offer and decided that we’d go with Oulsnams. Before we could make the call to them to let them know our choice one of the sales people from Vizors called to tell us that they had a viewing for us. We hadn’t even signed a contract at this point and she managed to persuade me to have 3 agents on the go. I wasn’t too happy about this but didn’t want to miss out on the opportunity of that viewing. I’m very glad I did agree because 24hrs after we signed up with VIZORS they sold the house!!! YAY! We can now breathe and make plans… We won’t book flights… not until the contracts are exchanged but at last things are falling into place.

I didn’t hand in my notice at work because, at that point, we hadn’t sold and I didn’t want to be without work. That means that we’re hear until the end of the Autumn term but that’s ok. We’ll end up leaving exactly 2 years after we came back and it will give us an opportunity to recoup the vast amount of money we have lost. If you count our original deposit (which sunk when the recession raised its head) then we’ve lost about 40,000 (GULP) but C’est la vie! and we’ll soon recoup what we need in savings. We’re moving back in with mum until we do and then we’ll be off around Xmas (Just got to work out when the flights are cheapest).

We’ll be packing for the next few weeks and giving away all sorts of things. So vultures… start circling for your bargains!

WOooohoooooo!!!!

Come on people! ALl we need is a yes or no!

It’s 3:56 and I’m supposed to be completing my lesson planning for the OW MTP (Oh teacher speak -don’t you just love it) but I can’t be bothered!! (LMAO)It’s HALF TERM and in a few hours some my lovely friends will descend upon my home and the holiday will begin. We’re planning to camp and climb Snowdon this weekend (weather permitting) so by Monday I am sure I will have a whole host of piccies and tales to report upon.

We;re stil waiting for news on the house. It might have sold ( with a £30,000 deficit…) we’ll have to see. It might be onwards and upwards lol

(That title’ll attract some people from google looking for thrill rides. Sorry to disappoint!)

It’ s been another funny ol’ week. We contacted some estate agents so we could decide whether we would add another agent onto the house; we’d had no viewings from the remaining agent. As soon as the appointments drew nearer we ended up with an appointment to view.

A lovely couple, who were young, had two cats etc came around and seemed to really like the house. They were here for 40 mins strolling and asking questions. Then they made a second appointment! That created mixed feelings in the house. I actually felt a little sick! I’d talked myself into believing that we weren’t going had made extra efforts to get involved in England things again and try and lump it here. It came as a bit of a shock that there may be a chance I could go and I wasn’t sure how I felt about it. We also had a call to say another couple were interested and would like to view on Thursday. At the beginning of the week we were mentally ordering the shipping, requesting tubs back from SPAN, setting up cat flights and walking down the beach to a coffee house in Henley.

BUT

It’s all gone quiet :S. i Refuse to use sad faces however as we still dont’ know the outcome and in pure “The Secret” manner I’m going to continue to visualise the next few hectic weeks as packing and organising.

The second couple didn’t come on Thursday and the other couple who really did love the place are having the weekend to consider whether they want our house or one that they’ve seen in Churchhill North. Considering they wanted to be closer to work in Stratford i’m hoping they’ll pick us! lol

Can everyone keep everything crossed and imagine their free accomodation in Adelaide. Positive thoughts make the world go round

Anyone got the answer?