It's time for an update

It is time for an update on what we've been up to, don't you think. Well, it's been waaaaay busy. Here's the skinny on recent events...

Exactly one month ago, April 11th to be exact, Chris and I had a huge talk and made a joint, monumental decision that we should move back to the US. Decision was based on many, many complex factors but we both agreed that it was time. Even though there are lots of great things we love about our home, the city and the country we currently live in, we felt it best for our family's long term well being to relocate again. Factors taken in consideration were certainly job and career prospects as well as future education opportunities for kids. Once the decision was confirmed and final, there seemed no good reason to delay things so we got to work. We're not very good at waiting. And that started an avalanche of events so we could insure kids find themselves in just the right school and good school system when classes start on August 11th. Actually, I can't believe that it's been only 30 days since we started this mess.

In those 30 days we did a ton of stuff to improve our home. Minor repairs and such. Lots of cleaning and still a whole lot more to go. Getting the home ready certainly is a huge task, especially when you have three gremlins (2 kids+cat) dilligently and thoroghlly undoing anything that might have been done. Any cleaned up toys promptly reappear in their original location, mirrors get toothpaste smeared on them, dirty socks and underwear miraculously appear out of nowhere right in the path of anyone that might be visiting. You know, the usual, fun stuff.

We've had meetings with 3 different moving companies and are still in negotiations about the service. The process is a bit more grueling than originally anticipated. I think it'll be worth it in the long run but is certainly stressful., I hope to have at least that off my to do list soon. I am also determined not to leave the kitty behind as I would miss her terribly. There are certainly issues with that as well. In the end, I think we'll be handling the pet transport ourselves which should save us some money and hopefully make the cat's trip back simpler. But, it will be more difficult for us. She's worth it though and she knows it. So, I am penciling in several visits to the vet and a bunch of phone calls to airlines.

We already managed to find a home that we fell in love with in the US, site unseen. But, we did see the floor plans and photos and trust me, you can tell a lot just from that. So my darling hubby is coming over on Saturday for two weeks to work on that, and look for work, and look for a car, and arrange school attendance, and all that. In the meantime I am trying to sell our home here in record time. We've had some interest but no serious buyers yet. I admit that's a lot of pressure. We're (in my opinion, anyway) being quite reasonable with the asking price and all. It's just that it's a difficult sellers market here. It's also hard to find good representation here. At least from my experience thus far. I do have quite high standards I admit but if I am going to have someone represent me, especially if I am out of the country during the process, I better be able to trust them. My meeting with a real estate agent today did not please me. Now, last time we sold a home I stubbornly insisted not to hire a real estate agent. True to my word we didn't do it then and have done all of the prep work and negotiations on our own. Miraculously, everything worked out. Well, I need another miracle, I suppose. :)

Wish us luck. There's still much to do. I have one more birthday party to organize, one special goodbye party to plan for the kids, Mia is scheduled to have her tonsils removed on the 26th (doing health care things here is a complicated, very time consuming task), Ivor has a trip to the beach with his class, Chris will be gone for two weeks, packing awaits, paperwork awaits... Arrrrgghhhhh... And yet, we'll live and everything will work out. It always does. :)

See you all mid-July.