Moving in

Here's how we did it...

Step 1: We beat the moving truck to Virginia.

 

That means the driver who picked up our stuff in San Diego is also the guy who dropped it off at our new house, eliminating the need for our stuff to go into storage, which could have delayed our delivery by weeks.

As soon as we arrived, we surveyed the scene and quickly assess the work involved in making this house a home.

 

We spent our first night plotting out who will sleep where, what furniture would be required to fill in new spaces and started a list for Home Depot: window treatments, rugs and paint.

Step 2: We got to work.

We had three days to get all of the painting, cleaning and carpet installation finished before the movers arrived with our stuff.

 

It was grueling, sweaty, all-hands-on-deck kind of work, but we got it done.

 

Well, it was grueling for some of us. Others impeded the process.

 

Step 3: We embraced all forms of safe, unsupervised and time-eating entertainment for the children.

The more sandbox play and tea-party throwing they did, the more work Nick and I could get done around the house.

 

Basically we neglected our children for the better part of three days and they capitalized on the opportunity to run amok.

 

Step 4: We worked every bit as hard as the movers did.

On moving day, our tactic was to unpack as many boxes as we could possibly tackle in the time it took for the movers to unload our shipment.

That meant we had a completely stocked kitchen and the kids rooms were loosely organized with clothes and toys stored by the time the truck left.

It also meant the movers removed dozens of boxes and mounds of packing paper by day's end, thus helping us bypass the "cardboard jungle" phase of unpacking.

 

Okay, we weren't totally rid of cardboard. There was plenty left for monkeying around.

Step 5: We hosted company.

Even though Nick's dad happened to be in town for a business trip the very day the movers came, we threw together a feast for him that night anyway.

While my father-in-law would have been perfectly happy with a box of pizza, if I had been forced to eat another paper-plate dinner of pizza, take-out noodles or rotisserie chicken, I would have lost my mind.

So I proceeded to cook our first dinner in our new kitchen.

It was glorious. I've never appreciated boiling my own spaghetti so much in my life.

 

Our outdoor table seemed like a nice place to eat since the backyard looked so lovely.

 

And because our indoor dining table looked like this.

 

But the summer heat, humidity and insect infestation made for a more hostile dining environment than I'd planned.

The nagging flies and biting mosquitoes sent us back inside with our plates still half full.

 

And all of our legs wound up looking like this.

 

They still look like this, in fact, only scabbier.

A few days later we hosted our first overnight guests. Their visit was terrific motivation for us to hang pictures and find homes for all of the remaining clutter.

They didn't even mind our furniture-free sitting room or shadeless lamps. They're good friends indeed.



Like magic, the act of sharing our house with family and dear friends started to make this place feel like our home in just under two weeks time.