Moving notes

We moved on August 31. We were pretty well organized as you can see in the picture. We didn't get a ton of sleep or do much else other than get ready to move for the days before the move, but it was worth it since we had no idea of the havoc that would rain down from the sky on moving day.
A picture of our supreme moving organizational skilz...
Mike asked to be kept off the flight schedule and even though we have had to cancel many many many things because of his relentlessly unaccommodating schedule they were very good to us and Mike was pretty much OFF in the days before we moved. It was really nice and without that the picture above would not look quite so organized. We didn't have to buy 1 box. Craigslist and freecycle supplied us with all of our boxes, moving paper and even 6 rolls of tape. All we bought was a couple more rolls of tape and some cellophane to wrap all our furniture in. Our truck cost uf only about $50 (story on that coming) so we spent less than $75 to move. Not too shabby. Of course I think all the physical labor took a couple years off Mike's life....but what can you do?

Moving day came and it was raining. Great....always a good day to move when it's raining. We went to pick up the moving truck. We had reserved a 24 (or 26 I can't remember) foot truck. Well, Mike stood in the office for over an hour and then was told they gave the last 20-something foot truck to the guy in front of him. The lady told him it was "first come first served." Well, what the heck is the point of the reservation???!!?? I believe Jerry Seinfeld had a whole bit on situations like this...though there was nothing comical about it at the time. While Mike was waiting for the truck and I was putting last minute things together and taking care of 3 kiddos (I had to babysit the little baby I watch that morning) my dear friend texted me asking if she could watch my kids. She had no idea how helpful this was since our loading help called and said they could only help for about an hour instead of until the stuff was loaded. I graciously accepted her offer since she is the only person Andrew will stay with happily- then she said she would come get them. She showed up wearing normal clothes I'm sure but she appeared to have a sweet golden halo above her head. She kept them until after nap time which is the longest I've ever not been with my kids when they were with someone other than Mike. Except for one time when Emma was 8 months old we went to the NYC temple and left her with my mom and Hillary for the afternoon/evening. (and being in the hospital doesn't count since I did not choose such an absence).

Our friend Rob also proved to be a saint when he decided he was into helping us move for the long haul. He and Mike (minus the one hour of other help) carried everything we own out of our old house and into our new one. With a smaller truck there were 2 1/2 trips and they finally finished, at about 9 p.m. It was a rainy, muddy, busy and unbelievably sweaty day. Robs wife joined us after they were done and we all ate Chinese food on the kitchen floor. Rob and Mike both looked like they had been beat by a very big mean man. They kind of were and his name was moving day. The next day Mike and I moved the upstairs furniture upstairs and MY back was sore and I couldn't believe how much more lifting Mike had done the previous day. I'm so glad I don't have to make a living moving furniture and boxes around. Seriously glad.

I need to take some pictures of the rooms now that they're all done....but I have just taken a couple pictures of our favorite walls so far. We put words up on our walls which is a serious labor of love and test to our marriage when putting the bigger one on. Especially because to put it on we were both on the mantle and in moments of absolute frustration it would be so easy just to tip the other person off the mantle. Okay, we'd never do that. They're so beautiful when they're done but I wouldn't call them a quick and easy decorating solution. I'd call them beautiful and patience increasing.


Easily my favorite wall in the house. We put this up in the family room and it looks pretty nice. How can you go wrong with pictures like those? Sweet little faces....

The words we put above our mantle. It's about three feet long and came in two separate parts which meant a LOT of making sure everything was lined up perfectly and standing on the mantle.

Here's how it looks from far away. Mike would like a big family picture above the mantle. And, even though I would like to see a giant picture of myself on the wall about as much as I'd like to see a cockroach in my kitchen it does need SOMETHING.


We were done with boxes by Saturday which made moving in on Monday a great idea. We're still hanging pictures but that takes some time because we like to "feel" where things should go.

The best things we did in this move:
-Get our boxes for free
-Bought drop cloths to put on the carpet as to not muddy them up on moving day
-Let Tiffany watch our kids while we physically labored. I'm sure they had a better time and had more attention than they would have with us anyhow.
-Wrapping our stuff in cellophane not only protected it from scratches but also from the rain.
-Not having to be out of our apartment at a certain time took a lot of pressure off. In fact, it's still sitting empty waiting to be cleaned. (our lease doesn't end until 10/31)


Next time:
Hopefully we don't have to do this again. We both said even if we had triplets and Mike woke up tomorrow an O5 (both things which would cause us to have a different house since more kids= more bedrooms and senior officers live in a different neighborhood) if we had to move ourselves we probably wouldn't.

BUT, if we do have to move ourselves:

We won't use Budget. We chose them because their quote was $30 less than uhaul and even though we ended up getting lots of discounts they were still a big pain and we shall not use them again.

We'll have a little more help for the loading/unloading part since even though we got it all done it's a lot of work for 2 guys and 1 girl (and I didn't even help that much- I had other jobs).

Hopefully we never have to overlap a lease again....because paying double rent (we live in base housing now so we don't get a housing allowance, but we still have had to pay rent for September and will have to pay again 10/1) is absolutely NO fun.