Our House is Empty and Our Stuff is Packed

Well, the day finally came... the movers were at our house Thursday and Friday.  Everything is packed and the house is empty (minus a few cleaning supplies they refused to pack).  Brooks and I worked diligently all week to label our belongings... thanks to my friend Stephanie, she gave me the idea to color code my labels by air, sea, and storage.  and we organized items in rooms based on if they were air, sea, or storage.  For two days, I went through our entire house and did an inventory of ALL of our belongings-- I wrote down EVERYTHING, just to be sure there was a record of it all.  The inventory is for insurance purposes if any belongings get damaged, broken, or missing in the move.  

The night before they came, we broke down Gavin's crib (he slept in our room on his mattress, which made for a fun evening teaching him to stay "in bed" while it's on the floor), and we took apart the guest bed to make room for the items we were grouping in those two rooms.  It was a lot of work, but we were thankful that we had some kind of organization going on.  

The movers showed up Thursday morning and they went to town-- there were 4 workers, each took a room so there was no way we both could have been in each room telling them where things should go.  The first few hours were a little stressful for us, because we felt like we were being pulled in many directions, and I still had to finish some of my packing that I forgot about.  However, around 11am Thursday, Brooks and I were sitting on our couches, doing nothing.  Around 2pm we were bored.  Thankfully, Gavin was at "the babysitters" so he was well entertained and out of the way.  I've never experienced a moving company packing (at least I don't think I have), but this was an amazing experience to watch.  They were fast!  

Brooks was relaxing during the day Thursday.  We kind of felt guilty for not helping.

Because of Hurricane Alex, Southeast Houston got a TON of rain for several days. Originally, our sea container was suppose to come Thursday to be loaded, so the workers focused on packing our sea stuff first.  However, due to the heavy rains, the container never came Thursday and the workers were forced to stay inside and pack the remainder of our belongings.  Friday morning, we showed up at our house and found 2 large moving trucks in our front yard.  Gavin was in heaven with the trucks! His new found obsessions are trucks, trains, and boats, so he loved having them at our house.  The big van you see was for our storage container by the end of the day, they had filled it up with our belongings... we aren't bringing any furniture with us, except the baby crib, changing table, rocker, and Brooks' recliner so our furniture took up a lot of room.  The other container, that you'll see Gavin playing on was for our sea stuff.  They will unload the "sea truck" and move our belongings onto a sea crate that will be loaded onto a ship sometime in the next few weeks (hopefully).  We aren't planning on seeing any of our sea shipment until mid September sometime.  We did get 500lbs to take in our air shipment, however, that filled up really quick.  We didn't get to take a percentage of items we want to in air, but that's okay.. we got toys, towels, and more toys-- you know, the necessities.  Our air shipment should arrive in Saudi some time by August, prayerfully, it will be there before Gavin and i arrive in Saudi.

Did I mention Gavin LOVED having the trucks there?  He climbed up and down the ramps, went into the truck and touched all the boxes, buttons, and packing supplies.  He even learned that you can put your trains at the top of the ramp and watch them roll down to the ground really fast!  It entertained him for a good 20 minutes.  

Here he watched the other truck pull up and was in awe!  it was really cute to watch.  

Overall, it has been an overwhelming last few weeks, but now, we're sitting on a friends' couch relaxing and the big stuff is done!  We still can't believe all this is happening and that our move is upon us.  I had a small breakdown Tuesday evening, okay it was a big breakdown, but I got over it.  Just the realization of this time is here hit me.  Gavin has been great throughout the last week-- he's adjusted well and has gone along for the ride.  We kept some of his favorite toys around for him to have some comfort.  We're trying to make things as normal as possible for him.  We're looking forward to the long weekend we get to spend together to make some lasting memories of our time left in Houston.  

Happy 4th of July everyone!