move to hawaii

Next time I write here, it will be to record the completion of this goal.

For now, it is the scene at the end of the first season, and the second season is already in the works.

We had the drama, the dog drama. Our dog will be following us later. I cried. But it is going to be good for him. He is with my very good friend and her son, and they are delighted to have him. He is thrilled because he gets to roam their land and look after them.

What happened: his papers expired and we had to start fresh. When we come back at Thanksgiving, he will be ready for Hawaii and Hawaii for him.

And the house has just a little more to go. R got very ill and it has been so tough these last two weeks. He went river rafting and came back with something wrong. Still very tired. And I dropped a bed frame on my fingers and literally lost my grip for a couple of days. But we are doing better. And we leave day after tomorrow.

It has been so tough a time I booked us into a hotel at the airport the night before we leave, so we won’t miss our flight due to a traffic episode.

Tomorrow we sever our ties here with the internet, so until we are set up in Hawaii, I will drop in via cell phone.

A hui hou!

Turns out we are not leaving Monday after all. The dog needs to go back to the vet first and get updated. And it turns out he can’t fly with us anyway as he goes on a cargo plane. And it costs big bucks. It turns out this move is expensive. Far easier to go without animals or possessions. But things are what they are, and the dog and the stuff come along.

Mr M has had the flu and that has been weird. He is on the mend and so far I seem to have avoided it. But it is a nasty one. He is usually amiable and kind, but the flu affected his personality. Made for a tough few days for both of us.

It turns out we can’t take extra baggage on the flight and can’t ship it cargo either, so now have too much stuff to bring along, and another dilemma. Sadly the stuff we are bringing is all the stuff we wanted right away, so… lots of work to figure out the shipping.

But we are moving to Hawaii before this week is over!

Tomorrow the furniture leaves. The next day we transfer the remainder of the stuff to various locations and clean, and the next day we finish cleaning and sleep somewhere, maybe the airbed.

Monday we get on the plane and Monday we will have moved to Hawaii.

I estimated we would have about 30 boxes to ship, thinking there would be the Christmas ornaments (3 boxes) and the clothes and some books and kitchen stuff.

As it happens there is not only my husband’s beloved garage with its esoteric boy stuff, but he is attached to all these blue metal (copper, that would be) pots for the orchids. He reminded me that we do keep orchids inside in Hawaii. And the pots nest for packing. Sort of.

I say this because he is similarly attached to the stack of magazines we have accumulated with beautiful photos in them (surely perfect donation material) and the garden gong. I sold off a table and chair set for half what I otherwise would have because he was beginning to spend time polishing it and talking about how wonderful it would be somewhere over there. “somewhere” is not a location when we are talking about a treehouse with the furniture built in except for a pair of bar chairs. I find myself in an odd role here. It is virtually certain that once everything arrives on the island, Mr M will pull it out of the container and exclaim “Why did we keep all this stuff?”

And still the boxes are now consuming a space the size of an elephant cage.

On the upside, we did get three file cabinets we have lugged from move to move, full of papers, emptied, and donated.

I just tell myself I do not really need to know what is in those boxes, and if it matters so much to him to keep all this stuff, so be it. There will be garage shelving there as well.

Mr M keeps deciding more stuff needs to come along. He must have a secret house over there I don’t know about.

that was yesterday’s task. My husband’s happiest pastime, removed. We were both concerned that after an incident with a hose spewing water behind the tank a few months back that the hardwood floor beneath the tank would have buckled, bubbled and turned white. But it is just like the rest of the floor, so we must have done an adequate clean up job.

The house is eerily quiet, except I notice the refrigerator noise more.

I am off work all this week, and the next task is mine. I will pack up the kitchen, except for the appliances we use and will take – juicer, espresso machine, blender, regular coffee maker. Then when we have the sell off, everything not packed will be for sale.

Oops, I forgot. Not the knives or the eating utensils. And can’t pack those either.

The living room looks eerily formal without the big gorgeous reef tank dominating the wall. I moved my other’s game table over in its place and flanked the table with our chairs from the bedroom, that now has a peculiar unfinished look.

What am I talking about? We are moving to Hawaii!!!!!!

Three contacts went out today. We are taking little, but still need a shipper. Unless we leave everything but our clothes… it could happen, but, no. Just some stuff comes along.

And the skychairs have arrived, for the treehouse.

Today, I emptied my dresser and part of my closet. Tomorrow, finish the closet and move th web site farther along.

Also, the doors sketches get faxed to Bali.

It was so hard to leave this time. Driving down the Hilo road past ti plants and bamboo, I kept thinking, We are not really going to the airport again already!

Our friends drove us, as we left behind the car at the house. That does mean we are moving there.

In the treehouse lot, we have cleared the path and the driveway, have one bid yet to come in on the garage completion and water tank installation.

Along the path, the creeping vines all cleared away, and rose ginger planted to begin to fill in. The rose ginger has pink waxy flowers that grow near the ground, with tall leaves. It’s look is a bit otherworldly, in the theme of Jurassic we are finding with the lava tube treehouse. Also put a couple of pitcher vines in the trees, and crab claw heliconia. Not sure how that will do, but we shall see. It may be light enough and clear enough for it to do better than cling to life.

Now comes sorting through things, getting rid of most of it. Packing carefully what will come with us, and know why each thing is coming. The hardest for me is the art. It is from our lives here, and there the art is already on the walls. There is one long and large wall however that I am not wild about, and perhaps … well, we shall see.

It is time

Our moving date is not firm, but this is surely happening.

just not doing it right now, so off the list it comes.