Moving Sale

Last week, preparing for our moving sale, was one of the most insane ever in my life.  Lots of late nights, including one all nighter.  Working working working, only to uncover more and more work.  Each task completed lead to another five to be done, and it seemed impossible.  On Friday night I was meantally planning a teary eyed blogpost about how completly crazy it was getting ready for this moving sale.  But then it passed.  Our friends rallied around us and amazingly enough at noon on Saturday we had a well organized display of nearly everything we own, meatly labeld and cleaned and sorted and priced.  Every single closet, cubby, drawer, box, shelf, bookcase, compartment of our house was sorted last week.  We made keep piles and sell piles, and managed to keep them seperate.  It was a crazy amount of work.  And as I said, I was near tears more than once.  Sitting in Gemma's room, with a mountain of toys around me.  And no end in sight. 

BUT now that it is done, it feels so good!!!  It is amazingly theraputic to go through all your stuff and clean it out.  We took more than 8 bags of garbage out of here, as well as 3 or 4 of recycling.  We have a better idea of how much we need to take.  Kids toys are cleaned out and sorted.  And although the sale ended up being not as well attended as I hoped it would be, everything just got tucked away and can be pulled out for out next sale relatively easily.  So I'm glad we worked hard and got it done.

Our friends were more than amazing.  Thursday night a handful of people dropped by and donated a half hour or so, Friday night all of our regular Friday night group came for 3 hours or so, and then a fe wfriends came by again on Saturday for the duration of the sale.  And our neighbor took the kids for the WHOLE DAY as a birthday present for me, which was such a relief.  They've been pretty great about 'We're going to sell your toys' but do do it in front of their face probably would not have gone so well. 

Speaking of, we didn't just callously tell them 'We're going to sell all your toys'.  We carefully explained many many times that they could take their favorite toys with them to Canada, that we would put them in a box and they would come with us, and we would sell their other toys so they could pick NEW toys in Canada.  They've travelled enough that they do have a concept of 'that's too big for our suitcase' and also I kept a whole bunch of junk toys around the house so even though there are a lot of things missing, there isn't a just a big empty space where toys used to be.  We'll keep all the cheap McDonalds things we have, cardboard house, etc, because the day before we leave it can go in the garbage but they'll have something to play with in the interim.  And all their favorite toys are safe in a box.  So far they haven't missed anything.  We actually spend a lot of time out at the park or downstairs riding bikes and playing swords that they don't play with their toys that often.  It's only another month, then we'll be gone.

Wow.

Walking the halls of my school a few more times.
A few more meals from the staff store.
A few more casual chats with my co-workers.

It is really hard to wrap my brain around not coming back.  One way tickets are frightening things. Will we ever be back here?  When?  And as a person who has lived overseas for more than a few years, I know the truth about good byes; it is very likely that I will never see most of these people again.  Is it any wonder this has been the most weepy birthday that I remember :)

My students threw a surprise party for me on Thursday, with the help of the orchestra/choir teacher.  Friday night was our last Friday with friends and they spent the time working at my house.  Saturday I got taken out for lunch during the moving sale.  Saturday night married Bible study someone made cupcakes for me.  It was an all around amazing birthday, and I am so thankful for the love and support.

And so.... time for report cards, as they are due in 10 hours or so.  And when that is done, then I can focus on cleaning up my classroom.  Which I like doing.