We have arrived!
We were blessed to connect/re-connect with so many Wisconsin friends during our final trip to the UK…it was joyful and overwhelming and the well wishes continue to propel us on what is now day 7 of our official arrival to England. I hope you all felt our gratitude for the big hugs, endless laughs, the hospitality and sacrifices made to visit with us. We might need to find a way to relocate again so that we can create a great excuse to get together. It was a perfect send off in every way.
Our friends and family were all very interested in the specifics about this move. “Are you bringing everything with you"?”, “How long does it take to get there?”, “Do they have bathrooms?” (Ok, no one asked that). Without completely boring you with the nitty gritty details, what I can tell you is that the most stressful part of this move was trying to separate our lives into 4 buckets before the movers arrived (the answers, now in hindsight, are in blue)
1. What gets put in storage (not enough)
2. What gets shipped in a 40ft ocean container (too much)
3. What gets shipped via plane (the wrong things)
4. What comes with us in our checked baggage (11 bags of mostly useless crap)
Our checked baggage is unpacked and my little closet is almost full. The air shipment that arrives this week contains the rest of our clothes and shoes along with our favorite kitchen essentials and odds and ends. I honestly don’t know where I’m going to put it all! Stay tuned for future photos. Our garage will not be housing our cars.
The sea shipment which is comprised of our furniture, linens, dishes and beloved TempurPedic takes 4-6 weeks so my patience is being tested. We are in our own home but sleeping in rented beds, eating with rented utensils and sitting on rented couches. Nothing is comfortable nor familiar but on the flip side we are laughing every day whether it’s at each other for being jet lagged and tired, at driving on the wrong side of the road, or our inability to figure out how to use our stove and oven. (The oven is of course in Celsius but to make things interesting, most of the numbers are worn off so we just turn it on and hope for the best).
We stored pretty much anything with a plug because although converters will work for computers and laptops and a few other smaller electrics, most of our US appliances and electronics would blow up from the high voltage (this happened to me with a flat iron on a business trip once and was enough to keep me conservative). We spent the first couple of days shopping for a coffee maker, hair dryer, BluRay player and other essentials. Yes, we have to buy a TV at some point as well.
We celebrated Easter yesterday by lazing in the morning with the boys and their little baskets and then had dinner last night with colleagues/friends who hosted a wonderful Easter dinner with gammon, twice baked potatoes, mac n cheese, green beans, deviled eggs, salads, a cheese board and cake pops! We are thankful to have friends here who welcomed us with baskets of goodies and necessities, treats and toys for the kids, internet access and answers to questions we didn’t even know we had.
So, before we left I posted what we will miss and 1 week here tells me that there is plenty more to add to that list. But in the spirit of counting our blessings this Easter, here is a start to what we’re already enjoying:
- Deliveries. Anything and everything we want/need can be delivered to our door with one day (or less) notice. There’s a store called Next that can deliver curtains, a vacuum cleaner, a fruit bowl and clothing for our entire family in a day. We used Amazon Fresh in Seattle for food but the UK has this concept perfected and it’s reasonably priced.
- The gym. We joined The Thames Club and it’s fantastic
- Travel. We booked 10 days in Italy for the cost of a weekend in the US. We’ll hit France and Ireland as a family before summer’s end as well.
- Service. Whether setting up satellite TV or simply making an enquiry, it’s friendly, quite sophisticated and very fast via a telephone call or visit to the internet.
So, all you needed to know and more? We are almost over the jet lag (we had cereal and oatmeal at 2:30am our first night here and have slowly crept out of that pattern) and I report to my new office first thing tomorrow. If you did not receive a “We’ve Moved” card, please let me know. I have extras and would be happy to send.
Love,
Mike, Jess & the boys
FACT: Did you know that a box of Lucky Charms in the UK costs over $10 USD? No, we did not buy it!
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