Packing, Unpacking, Re-Packing

My life has been consumed by boxes, neatly numbered with red stickers and vague descriptions of the contents. Most of those boxes are labeled “books” which is not helpful at all when you realize some of the contents include clothes, my jewelry box, stuffed animals, and random bits of this and that. It took me 5 days to find my shoes, which were very much needed as all of the flip flops and sandals I’d packed in my suitcases were no good to me here on chilly, rainy days.

Despite our best efforts, we didn’t clear out our house pre-move as well as we had thought. Witness Exhibit A:

Lo, the Well-Traveled Straw

If that isn’t compelling enough evidence to the disorganized, discombobulated and just downright desperate-to-finish-getting-ready state of our minds, I present you with Exhibit B:

The Used-Up Roll of Packing Tape

Yes, that’s as it came out of the box. Insanity, I tell you.

And just in case you were wondering (and don’t tell me you weren’t! I know how fascinating this is), our inventory of boxes/bikes/chairs/tables, etc. numbered 206. As of right now, 2 weeks after all of our things arrived, we have unpacked, er, approximately 12. Maybe 13. Witness Exhibit C:

Boxes, Boxes, Did I Mention Boxes?

All right, so maybe it was a tiny exaggeration. I’m sure we’ve gotten through more than 12 boxes, but even so: Stuff. Everywhere.

And I want to get back to this, right now:

Sunshine, Open Air, The Ocean

Already Falling Behind

I’m managed to fall behind on my posting already–can I put it down to too much to do, not enough time? Writer’s block? Jet lag?

Ok, it’s not jet lag, because our passage over was by boat, and we moved our clocks ahead by one hour per night. (More on the voyage later.) It’s not writer’s block either, because I have so many things I want to share. Let’s put it down to adjustment time, shall we? We arrived in England on August 3rd, after a marvelous week at sea, and moved into the house next to my in-laws on the 9th. So far we’ve been car shopping once (no purchase yet), bought a very small slow cooker (Crock Pot) and coffeemaker, cleaned, done lots of laundry, and been off to London to visit the Tower. My husband is job hunting, I am working on school places for our children and learning to live with a teeny, tiny fridge whose two settings seems to be “frozen” or “near frozen.” (Mmm, yummy icy cucumber! Frozen lettuce leaves!) We don’t have a toaster, rather, we have a “grill” setting on the oven, and we slide out the grill pan, place the bread on it, and hope we don’t forget the bread is there and remember to flip it over before it burns.

A toaster is definitely in our future.

My husband has managed to turn 40 since we’ve been here, joining me in a decade I hit, er, well, a bit before he did. (Though I like to believe I don’t look a day over 31.) I think we’ve nearly managed to convince our 10-year-old to unpack her things before our container arrives from America this Tuesday; there has been an unpacking rebellion on her end: “It’s not my house and I’m not going to unpack!”

This is what we expect to see on Tuesday, though we don’t expect as much sun, nor will it be 104 degrees like it was the day the movers came to pack us up. And then it’s back to unpacking (sigh).