It’s really happening! Family emigration update

So, this is it! Finally, our house sale is going to complete on 22nd August and we’re about to book our flights to Australia for mid September. We debated about trying to go before E turns two in early September, but decided it would be worth the cost to get her a seat. 24hrs is a long time for grown ups to travel, let alone  if you’re under five as my three kids will be.

Soon we’ll be waving goodbye to our things for about 12 weeks!

We finally settled on Brisbane. We love Perth but as nothing has come of the job applications Husband has put in, and we have work contacts at Brisbane Airport, it feels like the most sensible choice for us. We can always decide to move across country if we don’t settle there, but I’m sure it will work for us as it’s a really family orientated city.

I’ve been banned from blogging by Husband as he’s getting super stressed about the amount of things to do during the final weeks. So like any good wife would do, I’m sneaking online when he’s not looking.  Follow me on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter as even when I’m too busy to add posts, I’ll be lurking somewhere in social media land with updates when I can.

Our shipping company is booked to come and take everything away on 18th and 19th August. We’ve sold so much stuff on Facebook pages and eBay, but we still have an unbelievable amount. We decided to get our shippers to take all of our things to their local depot and then assess the quantity so they can decide whether we can cram our lives into a 20ft container or we need to take a shared portion of a 40ft instead. The 40ft would cost us more and take longer, so we’re hoping for a 20ft – but we just have so much stuff!

This week our task is to finish selling on eBay and then get rid of our bed so we can bring everything down from the loft to go through it in the bedroom. For the last couple of weeks we’ll be sleeping on the sofa bed in the living room. We also need to start taking furniture apart everywhere, as the shippers need things dismantled. I’ve been scrubbing our shoes to get rid of every spec of dirt, and next we need to thoroughly clean any tools we’re taking, give our BBQ another good clean (we’re taking it as it cost us a small fortune) and clean the bikes and scooters that are coming with us. We’ve got to go through all of our things to remove batteries and to have a final check for things that are prohibited that may have sneaked past us, such as leaves that might have been used in the boys’ crafts or pine cones that may be hiding in the Christmas decorations (even plastic ones if they look too realistic). That’s not to mention all of the accounts we need to close and inform of our move. And organising a few leaving parties (at the last count we had four going on). And working out what things we’re going to need for at least the next three to four months so we can separate it from the things to be shipped. And finding accommodation for when we land. And arranging a hire car until we can buy one. All while having three under fives at home full-time with no childcare help as our contract with the childminder ended when the kids broke up from pre-school.

I can honestly say we’ve never been as busy or stressed out. I can’t imagine what it’s like to watch TV in the evening, or have fun at weekends. I think Christmas will be our turning point – the boys won’t have started school yet so we’ll have the summer holidays in Australia to enjoy the weather and the beach and spend some fun, quality time together. Soon I’ll be able to look back on all we’ve achieved and be proud of ourselves. In the meantime, I can only see the masses of jobs still on my ‘to do’ list and try to get through everything while simultaneously stopping the kids from getting into too much mischief (or turning feral which seems to have happened today!)

Anyway, watch this space and I’ll sign back in again when I can. Hopefully by then life will be a little calmer.  xx

PS I’m linking this post up with the lovely Seychelles Mama for her second expat linky.