Wish I had pictures of the moving truck and the two friendly, hard-working chaps--Chris and David--that came to box up our stuff yesterday. But I was working my little tush off the entire time they were at our house. Mike was working hard, too. And Ollie was working hard--at getting into mischief! He didn't go into school until 12:45 so he was underfoot for the entire time the movers were there. Little raccoon that he is, he was opportunistically grabbing toys just as they were about to be packed, escaping out the front door left open, and other Olliesque shenanigans. I was running around, basically two steps ahead of the crew, all morning--trying to make last minute decisions about:
- What to pack in our suitcases (anything we will need to get our hands on over the next eight to nine weeks).
- What to ship (won't see it again until mid-February in Seattle, WA).
- What to donate.
- What to throw away.
Oh. my. word.
Maybe I shouldn't have spent all that time making freezer-paper stencil t-shirts and burying treasure chests! Oh well, Mike will tell you that I am notoriously overambitious about what I can realistically get done in any given time frame. It's a chronic illness for me. Makes me consistently about five minutes late to every appointment and just a little frazzled from mad multi-tasking. I am pretty good at keeping calm, but in certain moments--like yesterday when I was struggling to decide whether to pack or throw away a bag of cotton balls as I tried to go through the bathroom cabinet just moments before the workers were to come in and throw it all in a box--I just get silly. And either cry. Or laugh. Or something in between.
But then it's over. And even though you might pack different things or realize "Oh I really am going to need that"...what can you do? It's done. And that's sort of a relief. It's done!
I do suspect, though, that I've kept too much stuff for the suitcases. We'll probably end up with excess baggage fees or have to make some more charity shop donations.
The next 48 hours will be devoted to that (and some more goodbye dinners and maybe a quick down-and-back trip to Hadrian's Wall tomorrow, if the weather is nice).
Last night, after the crazy move was behind us and the after-school hours were upon us, the neighborhood hoodlums all sort of ended up in our living room. Mike rented Cars 2 from pay-per-view and we ordered cheese pizzas for the gang. Brioni, our awesome babysitter, showed up at 8pm, and Mike and I went into Newcastle for another night out with friends from Reflections. We have pics but I'll have to post them here later. Gunay, a co-worker originally from Turkey, suggested a restaurant called Red Mezze. When we got there, he ordered starters for the whole table (in Turkish--so cool) and, later, we ordered our mains individually. Almost everyone ordered the mixed grill: marinated and char-grilled lamb, chicken, and adana served with rice and salad.
Wow. It was delicious. The perfect ending to a stressful day: Great food, great atmosphere, great friends, great conversation, great wine. I hope life in Seattle feels this full.
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| Left to Right: Me, Chris, Gunay, Danish, Juan, Sam, Ike. |
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| Ike ordered the roast half chicken. |
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| Our Turkish friend, Gunay. |
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| Our mains have just arrived. Mmmm. |
We are going to miss North East England. For sure.
Must give out a mention to Bill Stevens for the perfect blog name for our new adventure. We set up a baby blog entitled "Life on the Left Coast" over the weekend; we won't be blogging there for another month or so, but go ahead and bookmark it now if you want to keep up with us after we leave England. <3
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