Home, sweet home?
So, here we are in Killeen in our temporary home. It is an OK place, clean and with all of the essentials. It is decorated in what I like to call "dollar store chic" and has a color-scheme right of the 80's, but it is do-able. I swear the place is shrinking every day, though. It is a 2-bedroom unit, with a small living room, kitchen, half-bath and laundry room downstairs, and 2 bedrooms and a bathroom upstairs. We're talking about 900 square feet of living space, with 2 very rambunctious kids and NO TOYS! Well, as of a couple of days ago, we have a few toys that I bought to tide us over, but due to a complication with our moving shipment, we have hardly anything to keep these kids occupied.
"Complication" seems to be the common theme of this move. I have never had a move go so badly. It seems that every bit of planning, forethought, and preparation I put into this move has gone right out the window. It started with the packing itself. The movers broke stuff (including my Waterford crystal champagne flutes that Brad and I used on our honeymoon and at every anniversary and at the birth of both of our children) before they even packed it, so I can't imagine how much stuff will be broken when we arrive!
While on our trip, I called the corporate housing company to confirm (again) our rental, and I was informed that, oops, we can't accommodate you after all. I had reserved the place and signed a rental agreement almost a month before, but 10 days before our move-in, when I called to confirm "just in case" they tell me that we didn't have a place, after all. Thank goodness I called, or else we wouldn't have discovered that we had no place to live until we arrived!
I also checked our wait list position with the on-post housing office while we were traveling and got more disappointing news. When we got onto the list, we were #32 out of 40 and were told our wait would be 2-3 months. After a month of traveling and waiting on the list, I discovered that we were now #44 out of 60, and our wait was now 3-4 months. Yep, that's right, after a month of waiting, we were now father DOWN on the list, and our wait had doubled, instead of decreasing. AUGH! After a mini-meltdown, I called the housing office to get an explanation. Without boring you with a bunch of procedural details, let's just say that we were told before going on the list that we had to do things a certain way, so we changed all of our plans to fit this, but now we were told that the previous info we were given was incorrect, and a whole bunch of people were doing exactly what we were told we couldn't do, and we jumping in line ahead of us. As of today, we are at #36 and are looking at still another 2-3 months of waiting. Grrrrr....
Prior to our move, we elected for a partial delivery of goods, and when the movers packed up our stuff, we set aside a bunch of stuff that we wanted delivered to our temporary home, before we got the remainder of our goods at our final home. Things like clothing, toys, the Wii, Aubrey's crib, etc. Well, when we arrived, we called for the partial delivery--but it turns out the movers didn't designate the partial delivery items on our inventory, so we have to actually go out to the storage facility on Wednesday and help them figure out which items we need. That will be fun!
So, here I am, in a tiny condo with the bare essentials, nothing more, living in limbo until we get our house on-post, which I am hoping is before Christmas. The good news is that we have a few people that we know in this town with kids that we can spend time with. Our condo is just down the street from a city-owned water park that is very nice and cheap. And Brad is home for another week to help me get things somewhat settled. The bad news: it looks like I'll be unpacking and setting up house by myself, after Brad leaves for school in Kansas in late August. I'll have to drive Aiden across town to his school on-post for a month or two, until we get our house. And I will have to spend the next couple of months trying to keep these kids happy and occupied in this tiny house, without losing my sanity. Wish me luck--I'm definitely going to need it!
"Complication" seems to be the common theme of this move. I have never had a move go so badly. It seems that every bit of planning, forethought, and preparation I put into this move has gone right out the window. It started with the packing itself. The movers broke stuff (including my Waterford crystal champagne flutes that Brad and I used on our honeymoon and at every anniversary and at the birth of both of our children) before they even packed it, so I can't imagine how much stuff will be broken when we arrive!
While on our trip, I called the corporate housing company to confirm (again) our rental, and I was informed that, oops, we can't accommodate you after all. I had reserved the place and signed a rental agreement almost a month before, but 10 days before our move-in, when I called to confirm "just in case" they tell me that we didn't have a place, after all. Thank goodness I called, or else we wouldn't have discovered that we had no place to live until we arrived!
I also checked our wait list position with the on-post housing office while we were traveling and got more disappointing news. When we got onto the list, we were #32 out of 40 and were told our wait would be 2-3 months. After a month of traveling and waiting on the list, I discovered that we were now #44 out of 60, and our wait was now 3-4 months. Yep, that's right, after a month of waiting, we were now father DOWN on the list, and our wait had doubled, instead of decreasing. AUGH! After a mini-meltdown, I called the housing office to get an explanation. Without boring you with a bunch of procedural details, let's just say that we were told before going on the list that we had to do things a certain way, so we changed all of our plans to fit this, but now we were told that the previous info we were given was incorrect, and a whole bunch of people were doing exactly what we were told we couldn't do, and we jumping in line ahead of us. As of today, we are at #36 and are looking at still another 2-3 months of waiting. Grrrrr....
Prior to our move, we elected for a partial delivery of goods, and when the movers packed up our stuff, we set aside a bunch of stuff that we wanted delivered to our temporary home, before we got the remainder of our goods at our final home. Things like clothing, toys, the Wii, Aubrey's crib, etc. Well, when we arrived, we called for the partial delivery--but it turns out the movers didn't designate the partial delivery items on our inventory, so we have to actually go out to the storage facility on Wednesday and help them figure out which items we need. That will be fun!
So, here I am, in a tiny condo with the bare essentials, nothing more, living in limbo until we get our house on-post, which I am hoping is before Christmas. The good news is that we have a few people that we know in this town with kids that we can spend time with. Our condo is just down the street from a city-owned water park that is very nice and cheap. And Brad is home for another week to help me get things somewhat settled. The bad news: it looks like I'll be unpacking and setting up house by myself, after Brad leaves for school in Kansas in late August. I'll have to drive Aiden across town to his school on-post for a month or two, until we get our house. And I will have to spend the next couple of months trying to keep these kids happy and occupied in this tiny house, without losing my sanity. Wish me luck--I'm definitely going to need it!
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