Canada Day/Moving Day

It has been a long and busy week. Moving days always are I guess. Wednesday the packers came to box up all of our remaining stuff. They couldn't move us out and into the storage unit until Monday. Thursday my parents came down to Whidbey on their motorbike and stayed in our trailer for the night and they, the kids and myself took off early in the morning for Spokane, WA to attend the Northwest Bible Conference. Mark stayed behind to clean the house a bit so it was just the kiddos and myself and Nan and Poppy. Looking back it was not the best time to go out of town, too much going on, too much stress and as I had hoped the time away would help me relax it did the opposite, I couldn't stop worrying about all I had to do when I got back.

This is what I get when I ask him to smile.

The kids had a blast at the conference, Finny was feeling the strain a bit, too much upheaval in his little life right now and a seven hour trip didn't help much, but he rallied and all in all it was nice to spend time together with my parents as a family.

Long conference days, equals tuckered kids.

We arrived back from the conference on Sunday afternoon, the movers showed up on Monday morning. Thankfully through some prodding and many calls to Washington, DC and Ottawa, ON we managed to convince the government to move us out of the house and into the storage unit in the same day, since the next day Tuesday was July 1st, Canada Day and we had plans.

It was a long moving day, only two movers showed up instead of the usual three or four, but they got it all emptied out and all in the unit, I was afraid when I saw how full the truck was that we wouldn't have enough room, but it all fit with plenty to spare. When we moved here from Nova Scotia a year and a half ago we dragged almost 20,000 lbs of stuff across the country, this move we weighed in at 5000lbs. We downsized a lot.

The first official night on the boat was last night, Tuesday June 30. So far the kids have been excited and upbeat, taken to it like pros.

The only one who isn't happy about boat living is the dog. Poor Penelope is stressed out. She refuses to use the ridiculously expensive potty patch we bought her, we bought real sod to go on it when she wouldn't use the fake turf, but to no avail. We tried scenting it, we tried bribing, cajoling... Our patience is wearing thin already, I had hoped she would take to it quickly but it seems we have to retrain her, but she isn't eating or drinking or doing her business and I tend to fret. So we shall see who gives in first, the dog or me.

Our first night on board we had a special meal, nothing like plank salmon, BBQ asparagus, corn and quinoa with apple pie for dessert. We love the Weber Q, by the way.

We have had some trouble with the people who run the marina, nothing major just annoyances that I could frankly do with out. This morning when I went to pay this months bill was shocked when it was $200 more than I had anticipated. It took half an hour to finally sort it out and I had to fight to get them to reimburse us the $50 live aboard fee that they charged us for last month, I am not paying for it of I wasn't living aboard then, they begrudgingly agreed to like we were trying to pull a fast one. Unfortunately this gets my back up, I am paying for ten extra feet of slip than what we need because they don't have a space big enough for our boat, as well as paying them for a storage unit and now a liveaboard fee, which I am not sure what it actually gives us? We pay for our own electricity, we don't use their pump out service with a composting head, their crappy internet doesn't reach down to our slip and come to find out they charge you for the showers! 0.50 for a 4 minute shower, what crusts!

We have to find a place to store our travel trailer as well, but the military base storage is full at the moment so we had to break down and pay for the month to store it at the marina until a spot opens up, frankly it makes me sick to pay them another cent more than I have to but we waited too long to call the base for a spot and now we pay for it, literally. 

Thankfully the weather has been great throughout the moving process, we cleaned out the last of the house today and made our final garbage run before heading to the Canada Day party with all the other Canadians stationed here on Whidbey. It was a nice hot day, the kids had a blast in the bounce house and slip slide, good food and good company to celebrate Canada's birthday. 

So far boat living seems to agree with us, mostly. Once we get the hot water running in our boat the shower problem will be taken care of, we still have so many projects to pick away at, but the big move is over, we are here now, enjoying the sun, the salt air and the stars at night, time to slow down and enjoy.