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AlBlue’s Blog

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Moving house

2006
Front of the house

It's always fun moving house. This time, instead of moving several hundered miles, we moved several hundered metres, but it's not the distance that counts. In fact, moving a longer distance is probably easier because at least then you get to rest for longer between the loading and unloading stages.

View from the bedroom window

We hired a 7.5t truck (the largest you can get without needing a special driving license) and started packing on Wednesday before Easter. Fortunately, Amy had been packing for a considerable amount of time beforehand so we had many cardboard boxes to load up (well over 30 boxes of varying sizes, including 13 boxes of books and 4 boxes of DVDs). It took us most of Wednesday evening, but we got a bunch of boxes into the truck and a few bits of furniture before calling it a night.

View of the house from across the park

Thursday was (as you might expect) somewhat of a busy day. Like last time, I had sworn that I should start packing the office (including dismantling the office furniture) sometime before the move, and like last time, I didn't get around to it until the final day. There were something like 2 boxes of just cables and kit that came out from underneath the office furniture -- and that's not including the UPS or any of the computer equipment. Whilst I was getting on with that, the rest of the victims volunteers were loading and patching up holes in the walls etc.

We didn't actually get in the house until 2pm; and considering the truck was supposed to get back at 5:30pm, we had to unpack fast. In fact, most of the contents of the truck got dumped in the garage; and unfortunately, all the stuff we'd packed at the back of the truck (for easy access in the new house) got filed in the back of the garage, which took us a few days to mine through before we found it again. So we didn't get the computers back up and running for a few days.

Sam toddling

In fact, we had to do a second run with the truck to shift everything. We could have probably done it in one run if we'd tried, but there were some large garden furniture items that was easier to do in the second phase. There were also several car runs backwards and forwards which was somewhat fun, including various parents looking after dogs and Sam during the process. Of course Sam has been crawling for a couple of weeks now, but the day before we were due to move he developed the technique of standing up! He's now toddling around with the help of a walker as well as crawling all over the place.

At home with the pooches

Still, we're all settled in now. Most of the boxes have been unpacked, and the computers are back up and running (well, some of them are). We've still got a few things left on the list -- the tumble drier isn't up and running inside the house, and the networking cables have yet to be connected; and as for the office -- let's just say it looks like the returns counter of an Ikea superstore. But our new house is working out well, and most rooms are looking vaguely normal. Perhaps we'll even throw together a barbeque with blackages and blackburgers in the upcoming months.

Amy and I would just like to thank everyone who helped in the move process, including those that came back several times to help out in different days and assemble the house in various ways. We wouldn't have been able to do it without you. Needless to say, we'll probably be taking you up of your offer of chipping in for a professional remover to do the job next time, although as Amy says, there won't be a next time. I'd also like to thank my brother and father for dropping the TV to finally give me an excuse to go out and buy a plasma/lcd TV in the near future :-)