It feels like just yesterday when my husband and I were loading our tiny 10x10 UHAUL truck, and driving to 29 Palms. Looking back then, we hardly had anything! Our whole lives fit into that tiny little truck. Over the year and 2 months that we've lived in 29 Palms, we added furniture, memories, four furry paws and 20 tiny toes to our home. So much has changed since then.
I remember thinking, "THIS is 29 Palms? We're going to be living HERE?!" But, over the months it almost grows on you. You start to appreciate the beautiful sunsets and sunrises over the desert. You start to love the fact that there is NEVER traffic anywhere. You enjoy the smell of the down pouring rains. And of course, you love the friends you make that become family.
So maybe I'm just writing this feeling sentimental, but it's almost bittersweet to be leaving 29 Palms. I never thought I'd ever say, or write, that sentence. But on the other hand, I'm so excited to be going to Florida and starting a new chapter in this journey we call life.
Since this is our first real PCS move I and by I, I mean WE, had no idea what to expect. I guess I just assumed it would be a little easier than it's turning out to be. We spent weeks just trying to get the right information and even trying to set up a date for the movers was a headache. Finally, once we thought we figured it out we were wrong.
The government makes the military members use a charge card when moving. This sounds great because hey, who wants to pay for a trip across country? But in reality, there are SO many rules and stupid things we have to follow. I can't book hotels in advance because it's not active until 10 days before we actually leave. I also can't book them because we were told there's a cap per night of what we can spend. Then we were told there isn't. So really we're just winging it at this point. It also didn't help when we had trouble with the packers.
We were told that the packers would be at our house on Thursday between 8am-9am. So of course, with having twins and so much going on, I tried to get everything ready before hand. I had been working on the house for a few weeks but was up until 4am the night before finishing things up before they came in the morning. I went to bed and got up around 6am with the boys and was all ready to go by 7:45am. I call the company to ask when they would arrive and if they could call me before. Well, the lady at the front desk said she wasn't sure. They didn't show up until 1pm. I was SO mad. I got about 2 hours of sleep for NO reason?! I could have killed someone. Then of course, they send only two people to pack our 3 bed 2.5 bath place. It was taking them forever and a day. So thankfully, three more came to help finish it up.
The truck was originally supposed to be coming on Monday to pack all our boxes but that got changed too. Now they're coming tomorrow instead. I hope this all goes smoothly and I'm praying nothing of ours gets broken. Wish us luck with this new adventure. I'll keep y'all updated!
This is what our house looks like right now. I can't believe it's actually happening! So surreal. We're really going to miss the friends that have become family here.
UPDATE:
My husband and father-in-law were at the house today while the movers packed the semi truck. They didn't get to the house until 2pm and there were only two of them. It took them until 8:30pm to finish. Not to mention my glass vase got broken!
The driver also told my husband that he had another job in Las Vegas fall through so the company had to find him something to do. If we hadn't agreed to move up the date to today, we wouldn't even have a driver to pack our things on Monday...So messed up! I'm so glad it got done today.
