Wednesday, June 27, 2012

Moving Madness (A Long and Untold Story)

I've started and stopped this post so many times in the past week it's ridiculous. Suffice it to say, we moved yesterday.

Kind of.

We moved all of our stuff into the garage of our new house and then promptly went to a hotel to sleep for the night. And we'll be back there again tonight, and the night after, and the night after that.
It's where I sit right now, listening to Brandon in the shower and the little girls watching Umi Zoomi. (Kate and Will have their own pad next door--they of course think that's pretty cool.)

Today we'll go back to our old house and wrap up a *little* more packing that the local moving guys couldn't fit in their medium size truck after two trips. (Honestly, I'm starting to wonder if I'm not a hoarder! Where did all that stuff come from???) Tomorrow my parents, sister, and her son fly into town and Brandon goes back to work. (We were supposed to be in our house yesterday, so he took Monday-Wednesday off.) So on Friday I have to figure out how to move all that stuff in the garage into the actual house now that all the moving companies are booked for the weekend. (We need some serious muscle for things like the washer and dryer.) Then on Friday evening Brandon's mom flies into town, and on Saturday? Elizabeth gets baptized. Sa-WEET!!

How often do moves go smoothly, as planned? To protect the innocent (and the not so innocent) I will refrain from sharing the details that explain why we are in this predicament in the first place because as the saying goes: It is what it is.

Did I mention I hate moving?

I'm trying so hard to keep my eye on the prize. I've decided that moving is like having a baby. First there's the idea of getting a new house (a baby), then you finally find one (conceive), then all the paperwork and planning begins (gestation period), and finally you start packing up (hard labor). Moving day is delivery day, and some people have to work much harder than others for the coveted end result. Unfortunately, I think this last baby of ours is going to take more than a few pushes. It's looking like some sort of convoluted c-section actually. (I'll stop the analogy right about there.) 

In any case, once we're all settled down with our new baby, I plan to promptly forget about all this painful labor:

(Ours is the house on the right. The people currently renting it are building the one on the left. It's not finished yet, which is only one of a variety of totally unexpected reasons why we are residents of the Holiday Inn this week when our family is flying in town for our daughter's baptism. Original move in date was the 1st of June, then the 15th, then the 30th, then the 26th, now the ??? But those back windows look at the mountains and those trees are our backyard. I can do this!!)
When Rachael woke up around 4am with growing pains and we realized we had no pain relief in the hotel and Brandon headed out for the nearest 24 hour place (so many lovely little details of these past few weeks I should have recorded, like Rachael drawing with permanent marker on the walls we've kept pristine for the last 2 years and other special things like that . . .), Elizabeth was already asking about going to the breakfast room in the morning. She fully expected there to be belgian waffles, pancakes, bacon--the works. I told her some hotels only have a cold breakfast--we didn't know--and encouraged her to just expect and look forward to Froot Loops or some other forbidden cereal. I explained the concept of low expectations = pleasant surprises and how this applies to everything in life to which Brandon responded in a sweet, sing songy voice, "Which is why we should expect that our new house is going to burn down today!"

That would be about the only thing left to go wrong. Again, must protect the innocent (and the not so innocent).  

In the end, there can be no complaints about moving into a beautiful new home in this lovely location. Maybe we'll even start celebrating our home's "delivery day" every year with a house birthday party. 

Yes. I think we'll do that. I'll let you know when she's born. 

9 comments:

  1. great analogy! I can totally hear Brandon saying that in my head. I'm so excited for you, since this baby is long overdue.

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    1. This baby IS overdue! Love your stretching of the analogy, Jen . . .

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  2. Allyson, I absolutely love your writing. You are so wonderful at it. Sorry to hear the move isn't going as well as it could. I do love the analogy. I can commiserate with ya. Although, our house buying experience went flawless the baby delivery did not, very difficult delivery. And guess what? In the end she came out, and I thought she was flawless and beautiful. The end will come!

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    1. Yes! The end is near! Thanks for the encouragement, Julie!!

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  3. Hilarious analogy - I love it. We just moved too and yeah, it is hard work. You can do it!

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    1. It wouldn't be so hard if we weren't HOARDERS!! (Half kidding--I seriously feel like one right now.) I got myself into this mess so I guess I'll have to take my lumps--but thanks for the empathy. :D

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  4. p.s. you're not a hoarder, you're just very well established. i, on the other hand, am not, and had way too many clothes, ones i'm hanging onto in the hopes that they'll come back in style or that goal to modestify it someday cuz it's really cute. to make matters worse, when i went to the DI bin at Church to drop off stuff, I saw two things I really liked there... and .... yeah. You know, what you would do too.

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  5. Moves are never fun. Unfortunately, as soon as your parents get back, we have to move them. At least we will still get to see them at Stake Conference. I hope all goes with your new house. Please say hello to Brandon for me.

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  6. Hope you guys haven't been affected by any of the wildfires! May your post-partum moving experience be wonderful!

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