To do list - revisit

I haven't updated my "to do list" for a long time.   With less than 9 weeks to go I thought it was time.

It has grown a bit, as I expected it would, but we've made excellent progress.

Buy a cheaper house - done

Sorting and packing up belongings for garage sale - done

Apply for Elly's Finnish passport- done

Sell our house - done

Arrange insurance for stored belongings - done

Open a UK bank account - done

Send remaining chickens to their new home- done

Suspend private health insurance - to be done the last couple of weeks

Arrange for our mail to be dealt with at home - done (thanks to J&J)

Arrange for mail in the UK -

Book airfares - done

Ship belongings to UK - almost done - they are going on Monday

Rent out our house - done

Arrange for someone to have the pot plants- done

Pack up our belongings and store- done

Sell Elly’s car (Mick's truck to be left at workshop) - done (my mum is buying it)

Book accomodation in UK - done

Book hire car in UK

Transfer money to UK account - done

Work out what to do with our mobile phone numbers - done (they are going onto prepaid)
Buy a caravan for temporary home - done
Set up bathroom for temporary home - done
Correspondence to arrive by email rather than post where possible - done
Return all borrowed items to their rightful owners - in progress
Type up list of stored belongings by box number
Cancel Mick's GST registration
Do our 2012 tax returns
Set up my laptop with software to work from UK - in progress
Partition off area in shed to be rented out for storage
Find tenant for shed storage area 
Make sure all our favourite recipes are on my blog - in progress
Catch up with friends and family before we go - in progress
Go to New Zealand to see Mick's mum before we go - booked
Pack away the last of the belongings we're still using
Make a list of what we need to buy on arrival in UK - in progress
Pack our suitcases!

The packing station

We worked out today that we are one third of the way through our time living in the caravan.  By the time we get everything sorted to our satisfaction it will be time to go!

In our "lockup" we've set up a little packing station - somewhere to lay out the stuff that has to go into boxes and suitcases.  It has actually turned out to be a good place to work as it is extremely well insulated.  The room was originally an apple store.  The temperature has been pretty much constant despite the extremes in temperature we've had lately.  It's also nice and quiet even when the rain is pelting on the shed roof.

Here are our 8 boxes all packed, just to be taped up, and ready to go.  Suitcases now on the packing station!

10 weeks to go....

Doesn't time just fly by.  In our case, maybe a little skip forward too!  Last week we were thinking we had 12 weeks left til we go.  According to our calendar anyway.  When we booked our tickets I marked each week back from the date we leave "1 week to go", "2 weeks to go" etc.  In my haste and enthusiasm it seems I wrote on the same date twice.  Our calendar is one of those with a month on each page and each day in a box.  When I got to the top of the page I'd written a count down on the greyed out box that filled in the week - the grey ones were the end of the month before.  I also wrote on that same date when I turned the page.  The other day I saw it and realised we actually had 11 weeks to go, not 12.  Isn't it lucky I worked it out now and not in the final couple of weeks!  I wonder how long it would have taken for it to dawn on us if I hadn't seen my error the other day.

So now there's only 10 weeks left and an awful lot to do in that time.  I've been packing boxes... yes, again.... ready for the shipping company to come and take them away to England.  We've scaled down a bit to save on shipping and only packed things we have duplicates of, plus clothing and some sewing projects.

Starting to feel like home

I never thought I'd say it but that little caravan is starting to feel like home.  We're getting used to where our clothes are stored, we have a method for the washing, we have a system for alternating power plugs for the kettle, toaster, microwave etc.  With the shed far more tidy now, it doesn't seem so bad having to walk through it to go to the bathroom.  I'm even used to saying "good morning" to the neighbour's cows when I step out of the caravan each morning.  I got the fright of my life the first morning I was by myself when one let out a loud "mooooooo" just as I came out the door.  It was right up against the fence and was quite close.  I rather like having them there now.

When we finally get our narrowboat it will feel enormous compared to the caravan and the cooking facilities will seem luxurious!  Being able to go to the bathroom without going outside will be fantastic.


I'm at my brothers tonight in Melbourne and his wife mentioned their plans for Christmas. It's strange to think they're planning what to do for Christmas and we won't be here.  Twelve weeks from tomorrow we'll be on a plane.  I know how fast 12 weeks goes when I have a holiday booked..... and that's a bit of a scary thing. 

I'm looking forward to tomorrow.  I'm taking my niece to see "Annie" at the theatre in Melbourne.  It was the first thing I ever saw at the theatre as a little girl and it will be Min's first time at the theatre too.  A very exciting day.

Not part of the plan

In the midst of trying to sort ourselves out at the caravan and shed we've had things turned upside down.  Mick's mum in New Zealand had a heart attack and he's rushed off to see her - on my birthday no less!  On Wednesday night, after hearing the news, we had been thinking he should go and after another phone call from his sister yesterday morning saying they feared a more major heart attack could follow we decided to book flights.  A few hours later he was on a plane.

So, last night I spent my first night alone in the caravan after going to my mum's for dinner at the last minute.  Thank goodness for mums when you are deserted on your birthday.  Tonight I had dinner with our neighbours.  I have lots to do tomorrow with sorting out the enormous pile of stuff that we dumped in the little office in the shed.  The more major jobs will have to wait until Mick gets home.

Living in a caravan

Last night was our first night sleeping in our temporary home - a caravan!  It was a bit sad because I had to take our 4 chickens to be adopted by the lovely people in the local pet supply store.  They'll be going to live with some of the chicks we've hatched over the years (now grown up of course).  I know they'll be well cared for but it was very sad to be handing over my girls.  One of them was our very first hatched chick and she's nearly 9 years old now.  I'll really miss her. 

Today we went back to the house to pack up the last bits and pieces and to clean the house from top to bottom.  We're both so absolutely exhausted and very, very glad the moving is over.  There is a lot of sorting out still to be done as the last few days we've just been dumping stuff in boxes, bags and crates and piling it up in the old office at the shed. 

So here we are on our second night in a very cosy caravan.  The bed is our own mattress so at least when we go to sleep it feels familiar.  We also have a lovely clean, newly freshened up bathroom.  Pity it's such a distance between the two! 

Tomorrow is settlement day and we'll feel we have well and truly ticked off a major item on our list.

Accomodation on arrival

We've been thinking about where we'll stay when we first arrive in the UK.  We've had a couple of kind offers from people we know to stay with them.  But, we've decided we'll book accomodation for the first two weeks and hire a car for the first 3 weeks.  It's unlikely we'll find a boat and have it ready to go within two weeks so we may need to take up the offer of staying with a friend after our two weeks accomodation is up.

We are going to spend a week in a cottage at Stoke Bruerne and a week in a farm cottage near Nantwich.  I've printed out a map of the centre of England and marked where many of the brokers are.  We chose the accomodation locations to give us good access to as many brokers as possible.

On the home front... we've had the busiest few days of our lives!  We're both complaining of sore backs and we're both so tired we can barely get out of our chairs at night. Tonight is Monday night and we're planning that tomorrow night will be our last in this house.

Mick's made up a base for our bed in the caravan, all the big furniture has been moved and today there was a huge quantity of odd bits and pieces to move.  They were all the things that are difficult to pack or that I would need again next week.  We're left with the television, a chair each, the dining table and two of the chairs, and the mattress from our bed which we've moved in front of the fire in the living room.  How nice to be sleeping in front of a crackling fire.

If you write down your goals

Mick spoke to his mum on the phone last night and she said "What a difference a month makes".  She reminded him of how just a month ago we were feeling rather down about not selling the house.  Yet here we are just a month later in the throes of packing up our household and with our tickets to the UK booked.  She's right... what a difference a month makes!

It got me thinking so I read back over some of my early blog entries.  When does a dream become a goal?  I feel like we really made progress towards making our dream a reality when we, or I, started writing about it.  We made a plan and committed it to the www!  We didn't have much control over the time frame .  Firstly, we didn't know how long Coco would live and if it had been our other dog, Zac who lived to 16 1/2, we would have another 2 or 3 years to wait.  Secondly we had no control over how long it would take to sell our house.  I vividly recall thinking that the Christmas of 2010 would be our last in this house.  But still, we had a plan.  Step by step we would tick things off our list and one day we'd get there.

Just the other day we were saying how glad we are that we impulsively booked our tickets to the UK on the same evening we signed the contract selling the house.  At the time it seemed a crazy thing to do but it has given us a fixed time frame and we'll simply have to get things done by that date.  If we had waited to book the tickets until we felt we were ready to go it would almost certainly have dragged into next year.

I've learned a good lesson from all this.  If you want to make something happen - just make a plan and work towards it.  Talk about it, tell people about it, live life as though it's going to happen just as you plan and at the very least, write it down.  

Water

The issue of water has suddenly become rather more urgent.  Out at the shed there is an old water tank that has basically just been supplying water for the bathroom and the old lunchroom (since pulled down).  Now we'll be living out there for a while that tank really isn't going to be enough.  We'll leave it hooked up for the bathroom but have been making enquiries for a new one to connect the caravan to.

I've spent a lot of time on the phone lately trying to chase up a tank or two in stock that we can have soon.  Finally success.  The same company that made the existing one (many years ago) had two similar sized ones in stock and can deliver next Tuesday.  More rushing around - paying a deposit so they'll book us in for delivery, Mick working out where we want the taps and overflows and arranging for Mick to be out there to accept delivery of the tanks.

Bring on the rain!

Chores for the day

I only have Mondays off work now and they've become my busiest day.

I started out today with a list of things I needed to buy - from a shower curtain to a fan heater and a whole lot in between.  The general aim for the day was to gather everything we need to set up the bathroom out at the shed.  I spent the first couple of hours packing another round of boxes and put them in the car to take to the shed on the way home from my shopping expedition.  We don't want to waste a trip out to the highway!

I did the chores in Bendigo and had a quick lunch with my mum at my favourite Thai restaurant - Bunja Thai.  They do a great lunchtime deal with a changing daily special - a set lunch menu which is always delicious.  It's very popular with local workers because lunch appears at the table within about 5 minutes.

A passing comment from someone today turned out to be a very good idea.  We had intended to take the caravan out to the shed when Mick picks it up on Saturday.  Today someone said we should bring it to our place when we are ready to move and just pack the things we need to use over the next 3 months straight into the van and then tow it back to the shed.  We've decided we'll bring it home to begin with.  I can give it a good clean up with Mum on the weekend (thanks Mum!) and Mick is going to pull out one of the bedside tables and make a new base for the bed so we can use our queen size mattress.  All this will be easier done at home and then we can start to pack things into the cupboards.

Tomorrow we're off to Melbourne to sign up for our UK bank account.  We're impressed with the service from HSBC.  We had a phone call tonight to check that everything's going according to plan and to say to ring after we've handed in all our documents so the guy from the international department can check that it's been correctly processed.

A good days work on our plan.

Notify employers - tick!

I've been very happy at the job I started early this year.  They've been happy too after having difficulty finding the right staff.  It was difficult today to have to tell them I'll be leaving in a few months!  I didn't resign but I did tell them we had our tickets booked and we'll be going.  They were disappointed but supportive.  Lovely people.

My one day a week in Melbourne is something we're planning with that employer that I'll continue with.  We're sorting out a method at the moment.

Every dollar of income we can earn while we're away will preserve our funds to stay longer if we want.

The first weekend

It's been a huge weekend of passing cars tooting their horns in acknowledgement of our "Sold" sign, neighbours calling in unexpectedly to offer congratulations (and ending up staying for dinner), and us just trying to get our heads around the huge task ahead.

2 weeks to have the house up the road ready for the tenants.
5 weeks to have all our stuff packed up and moved out.
20 weeks to be ready to get on that plane.

It's all rather daunting really.  Telling people we've booked a one way ticket to the UK seems to be getting the appropriate response.  Mostly stunned silence!  We have been very selective with who we have told of our plans over the last couple of years.  We still had to continue working and living in a relative small community and decided to avoid the gossip and only share our plans with close friends.  So now... the locals know the tenants that are moving into the other house, and are asking where we are going to live!  This week will bring a flurry of gossip around town I'm sure.

Meanwhile, I've started on the boxes again.

One way tickets

The last month or so we had a surge of people looking at the house.  I've been watching the flights available for September on frequent flyers with trepidation.  Every day there was less and less of them available.  I had enough points for two one-way fares and really wanted to save the money and use the points.  This last week the available flights were dropping off like flies and last night when we looked there was only 2 days in September that we could get the usual 2 leg flight to London.  There were a few other dates available but all via somewhere else first making the trip well over 24 hours.  We looked at each other and said "just do it!".  We booked our flights for Tuesday 18th September.  Wooohoooo!!!!

All systems go

Well, it's over... we did it... the house is sold.  It's been a long time in the making!  It's like a huge weight lifted off our shoulders and now we can throw ourselves into making our dream a reality.

We have a rather short settlement with less than 6 weeks now.  There is a lot to do in that time but it will keep us busy and focused.  There's very little left to do up the road before the tenants move in.  Mick's fixed up the fences, I have to hem all the curtains we bought and the heater/air conditioner has to be installed.

The next focus will be our temporary living arrangements.  Mick will set up a shower and we have to buy a caravan.  He also wants to paint and set up our living room in one of the offices but that doesn't have to be finished before we move there.

And finally the packing.  Again.  I've already packed so many boxes but that was a year ago and now it will start all over.  How did we accumulate so much stuff?  I'm starting this weekend!

There will be some negotiating with the new owner of our house - they want to buy some of the things we have on display in the yard and also some items in the house.  We're happy to do that as it will be less for us to move.  In fact when we were discussing this with the real estate agent late yesterday she said as she walked out the door "Would you sell me your kitchen dresser?". 

House rented out - tick!

We're very happy to have ticked off another big item from our "to do" list.  Today we have a confirmed tenant for the house up the road.

The carpet went in on Friday, the shower screen today, the septic tank's been pumped out and next week the split system heater/air conditioner will be installed.  Mick's got the fencing to finish off and it will all be done.  The tenants will move in the last week of May.  Perfect!

As for our house... tomorrow's the day we'll be sure.  It feels like the stars are aligning.....

Help please - online canal info

I've been looking for some sort of online version of a Nicholsons guide.  Does such a thing exist? I found this http://www.waterexplorer.co.uk as suggested by someone on a previous blog entry of mine but it doesn't seem to tell you the winding holes, water points etc... or have I not looked in the right place.

Where is the best place to get up to date information about the necessary facilities we'll need?

Help will be much appreciated!

Memories of living in a caravan

With only a couple of days until we know for certain our house deal is done, we've started planning for our next living arrangements.  We won't have long to finish up the other house, move out of our house, and have temporary living arrangements set up out at Mick's shed.  Phew!

At first we had intended to turn a small office at the shed into a bathroom but it is a fair way from the existing basic toilet facilities.  The water pipes and waste would have to be moved a long way away.  At present there are very basic mens and ladies toilets from the days of the shed being used as a factory.  Now we're thinking we'll put a shower in the ladies toilet area and put our caravan on that side of the shed instead.  We'll only be there for 3 months.  If our house had sold much earlier we could have been living out there for a year so had thought we should have more permanent arrangements.

It will be interesting living in a caravan over the Winter.  I'm thinking it will be good practice for the cold in the UK and also for living in a confined space.  Next weekend, once we know for certain the house is sold, we'll go looking at caravans.  We have lived in a caravan for 6 months before.  We hired one and lived in it onsite while building our little house in Melbourne.  We had bought my parents' backyard so had to go outside and up their back stairs to use the toilet and bathroom.

I do have vague recollections of swearing that never again in my life would I live in a caravan.  Funny how time fades your memories because here we go again!  It was such a difficult time for us back then.  We had very little money, two large dogs, a vast quantity of paperwork to do with the building of the house, I was unwell, and to top it all off I had surgery twice while we were living in caravan.  Poor Mick was relegated to the dinette for a few nights each time because the bed was so narrow and he kept bumping into me and causing me pain in the night.  At least this time we'll have one of the offices at the shed to use as a living room and we won't be sharing the toilet and bathroom with 3 other adults.

We were in that caravan heading into the heat of the Summer of 1995 so moved into the house well before it was habitable - to escape the heat and to save the rent of the van.  By then we had only a couple of rooms in the house with plaster on the walls, not a single door in the house (including the front door or bathroom door), no running water except a hose connected to my parents' garden tap, and the only electricity being an extension cord from my parents' house with a multiboard on the end of it.  We could use only 4 electrical items at once.  The fridge used one of the four permanently and at night a light used a second one.  Add to that the tv (there wasn't much else we could do in an empty house at night with only one light) and that left one spot for a kettle, microwave or whatever else we needed.

We had a lockable gate across the driveway that ran down the side of my parents house so the front door wasn't such a security hazard.  We hardly had anything in the house except our bed, fridge, tv, sofa and a few other bits and pieces so there wasn't much to steal anyway.  I wasn't working so between the five of us - my parents, my sister, Mick and I - there was pretty much someone home in one of the houses at all times.

Mick rushed to get the toilet connected to the sewer once we decided to get rid of the caravan but we had to flush it by hand with a bucket of water.  We still had to used Mum and Dad's shower.  Our cooking facilities comprised a microwave and an electric frying pan.  With it being a sloping block and no landscaping or steps yet we had a plank from the level where we'd had the caravan (eventually becoming a carport) down to the front door of the house.  It was a balancing act to get into the house and we were living in the midst of a building site.  But..... somehow I recall finding this preferable to living in the caravan!

To do list update

With our plans starting to come together I thought I should review our "to do" list.  We've made some progress but also added extras.

Buy a cheaper house - done

Sorting and packing up belongings for garage sale - done

Apply for Elly's Finnish passport- done

Sell our house - almost done!

Arrange insurance for stored belongings - hmm... better do this one now

Move to new house - remove from list

Open a UK bank account - in progress

Send remaining chickens to their new home

Cancel private health insurance

Arrange for our mail to be dealt with at home

Arrange for mail in the UK

Book airfares

Ship belongings to UK

Rent out our house - in progress

Arrange for someone to have the pot plants

Pack up remainder of our belongings and store

Sell Elly’s car (Mick's truck to be left at workshop)

Book hire car in UK

Transfer money to UK account

Work out what to do with our mobile phone numbers
Buy a caravan for temporary home
Set up bathroom for temporary home
Correspondence to arrive by email rather than post where possible - in progress

Passports.... tick!

One more item on our list has now been ticked off.  We now both have appropriate passports to fulfill our dream.

Next?

Map of the canal system

A couple of years ago we bought a map of the UK canal system.  We bought it online and we were happy with our purchase.  The problem is that it's so enormous we don't often get it out.  We'd love to have one about half the size but I just can't find something suitable.  We want to pore over it and dream about where we'll go and what we'll see.

Anyone have a suggestion?

The one we already have is Nicholsons - Inland Waterways map of Great Britain (2009).