So this move was a different adventure than the last move. Last time we drove one of our cars out to Colorado and left it there a month before our official move. Then Brandon and my brother Ian drove the moving truck with all of our stuff and I drove the van with the four kids. Well this time a moving company was packing us up and we had the two vehicles to contend with.
It was quite the experience having someone else doing the packing. On the one hand it was relaxing, I don't actually like to pack. I don't really like to move either. So it was nice not having to worry about putting everything into boxes. We did a lot of purging, the kids didn't necessarily enjoy participating in that part of the move. I did start to feel anxious as the moving day got closer because I wasn't putting things in boxes. On the other hand, when a company packs you up you don't know exactly when your stuff is going to be there. We were given a range of four days as to when it could show up, of course it ended up being the last day of the range. So since you don't know when your stuff will show up and we had them pack us up a couple days before we had to be out of our rental, we had to pack our own bags with enough stuff to live for a week out of our bags. And then after the boxers finished we had to fill up some boxes with the things they wouldn't pack. We ended up with enough stuff to fill the back of the van and Brandon's car.
Brandon actually had to work at the station in Colorado Springs until the 30th of July. Five days before he started his new job. And the day before our lease was up. To try and not be completely crazy about the moving process we managed to have everything out of the house and the carpet cleaners show up on the 30th. So Brandon went to work and the kids and I headed to Brent's so we didn't have to sleep on wet carpets. Brandon was left to fend for himself in the bed department and decided to make the two hour drive after work. So a late night before we officially left. We "attempted" to leave early the next morning, it didn't work, but figured we were two hours closer to our destination from the get go.
To try and make driving two vehicles with five kids work we did a little rearranging before we left. We unloaded the backseat of the car and took two booster seats out of the van. Then we put seats down in the van and put all of the stuff from the car in the back. It fit better there so we put three of the kids in the back of the car. William and Caitlyn switched places halfway through the drive, so one of them was with me in the van to help keep Grant entertained, run the DVD player and hand out snacks. We did manage to have two DVD players, three screens, so kids were entertained during the whole drive, and we kept in contact with hand radios. The first half of the drive wasn't too bad, but after lunch we had to stop at every available bathroom, once at the side of the road, just for one child. All the rest of the kids told me that they used the bathroom when we stopped not because they had to but because they figured they might as well try. Since we had to stop so often the ten hour drive turned into twelve, so that two hour head start was negated.
But we made it and there wasn't a lot of whiny, complaining or fighting so I'm going to call it a win. We got to town too late to get the keys to our new place but my parents were nice enough to let us crash at their house, for a couple of days because we didn't want to sleep on the floor for more than a night and our stuff didn't show up til four days after us. Now that this post is forever long, enjoy some pictures Brandon took on our drive, I would love to say he was stationary when he took all of these but he probably wasn't.
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