The Move

Well, it was one week ago that we actually moved into the new house - and what a week it's been.  The movers showed up early in the morning to bring in all of our boxes.  The kids stayed at the old house with Suchona so they wouldn't get in the way.  Most of my movers spoke "some" English, so most of the boxes ended up close to where I wanted them.  They were a bit disappointed that I didn't want them to unpack everything into my cabinets, but who has time to sit around and watch someone else unpack everything??  Well, maybe some people do, but I had kiddos waiting to come over and another appointment in the afternoon for GSO to come and help me move the items from my temporary apartment to the house.  So, there was no time to waste.  I had them assemble the crib (which required a bit of intervention to explain how exactly it was supposed to go together) and the piano.  They tried to put together K's high chair, but I stopped them as they had most of the pieces on backwards.  I thought about taking a photo, but they were working so hard, I didn't want them to think I was making fun of them ;)

After getting all the boxes in the house, I went back to the old house and once the kids woke up from their naps, we loaded up the car with suitcases and boxes and made our first trip of stuff over here.  While unpacking from that trip, GSO showed up with their truck, so I went back and cleaned out the apartment.  They also hung our bed nets so we'd be mosquito free (or at least we couldn't use bed nets as our excuse for the bites that always seem to crop up).  For those who want to know, out of everything we shipped, we lost only a single wineglass to breakage.  And honestly, I think we lose at least one wineglass every time we move, so that's not too big a deal.

There are of course a growing list of issues we'll need GSO to come take a look at, but on the whole, we have no major complaints.  The rooms are clearly spacious, so plenty of room to spread out.  The kids could really use some outdoor space.  The gardener took B up to the roof to play tennis yesterday.  Can anyone else guess how that game ended??  Right, so we're minus a few tennis balls right now (and my neighbor will probably make a profit selling them to someone).  The lot directly behind our house is empty (awaiting funding for a high rise I'm sure), so we get quite a bit of street noise.  With the A/C, fans, and air purifier going though, we've got quite a bit of ambient noise in the house that really drowns all that out.  A few times a day (5 for those of my friends who have hung out in Muslim countries before) we hear what K affectionately refers to as the "singing man" from the nearby mosque.  She routinely tells me to turn him off.  Like it's that easy...

My new bedroom is much brighter than the old one.  I generally slept late at the apartment because we were on the ground floor and light never came into my room.  Here, I'm up most mornings slightly after 6 because it's as bright as midday in my bedroom.  I kind of like it though.  At least I'm not waking up tired (which is what always happens when it's dark in my room).

No pictures up on the wall yet (maybe next week??) and still a few boxes to unpack, but we've made pretty good progress.  Josh is now wearing a brace on his arm from irritating a tendon (who knew moving boxes was considered a repetitive movement), but should heal soon enough - probably after all the boxes are gone.

I'm looking forward to settling back into my old routine.  I baked my first loaf of bread today in the new house and sent my ayah out searching for some local spices so I can start cooking really yummy stuff :)  Recipes courtesy of Madhur Jaffrey's cookbook.

Khuda hafiz!