The Big Move

Moving day is coming all too soon. No, really we're actually in pretty good shape this time. We have two days left to pack and we are almost there :) This move, being another big one, makes me think back to our move here from Iowa almost two years ago.

Duncan was just a month older than Beatrice is now. We had a really hard time packing that time because not only was Duncan a pretty needy baby, but he was also teething... everytime I would put him down to pack he would scream. All that, and I'm sure he could sense that something was going on.

That move was especially difficult because we had to get everything out and clean up afterwards... at least this time we aren't pressed to get everything out and have the place clean enough to get a deposit back :)

The move itself was quite the experience... We had reserved a U-Haul online, and were supposed to pick up a 26' truck in Iowa City the morning of loading... We got a call the day before saying that we could pick the truck up at the U-Haul in Cedar Rapids! We called the one in Iowa City and they said all they had was a 24' truck. So we decided that would probably be OK.

The 24' truck died about 3 or 4 times right after we picked it up. We took it right back. Of all things, they then said that all they had was a stick shift 26'! Which they didn't mention before.

So, Mike spent most of the day loading the U-Haul by himself. My brother came to help when he got off work. Mike's sister and my mother came to help us finish packing. We still had stuff to pack on loading day.

We finally got everything loaded and were ready to take off before noon when we discovered there was a gas line leak in the U-Haul... We called them and they said they would send someone out after lunch. The repair guy showed up at maybe 1:30-2pm. He messed around and was finally finished fixing it around 4. We finally got on the road a little after 4pm. We figured we would make it as far as we could then stay in a motel somewhere about halfway or so...

An hour into our trip we noticed that the tire on the truck was getting low, so we stopped to fill it up. It blew up! When I called U-Haul they said they would send someone in the morning! We called back and made sure they would send someone out that night so we could get going first thing in the morning... ugh = what a nightmare. Luckily we broke down right next door to a motel. That part was pretty damn fortunate.

So that was the U-Haul story... of course we're going U-Haul again this time. It's just the cheapest way to go. Hopefully it all turns out well this time. At least this time we checked at the rental place here to make sure they would have the right size truck when we needed it. And it was a good thing we did. He told us to cancel our online reservation and call him up to make one. Otherwise he wouldn't get the order until the day before and may not have time to get the right truck there. The amazing thing about that? The truck rental was actually quite a bit cheaper that way! You would think it would have been the other way around... of course the box purchases were the other way around - 1.70 online and 2.50 at the store - but I'd rather have it that way and save almost 200 on the truck rental.

Well, this will be my last blog for almost a week... back to packing.