Neither Gordon or I had any idea what we would really need to do, as far as we were concerned all our house contents would magically materialise in Brunei. OK reality check, Team Allied, who were the removal company, phoned and made an appointment to come and see how much "stuff" we had for moving and that was the beginning of the end.
We went around the house and it was agreed that they would need 3 days to get everything packed (you would think we lived in a 3 storey, mansion) but no, we just had a lot of things, and it would seem that a lot of it was in the garage!
Gordon set to work to clear said garage and after a week of hard slog you could actually see the floor! We then had to go through a form which was loosely termed 'Inventory' this was in actual fact a method of torture and was designed to drive a sane (I use the term loosely) person totally barking.
By the time we had decluttered and taken many trips to the local civic amenities it was time to say bye bye to Mr G as he had a date with KLM and RBA. On the other hand I had to get on with my last week of work, packing for France, helping where possible with the packing and cleaning up to make sure we left nothing for the new owners to deal with. Madeleine had her last week of school and to Amelie's great annoyance her last week with Yvonne (Yvonne is/was Amelie's childminder).
It was at this stage that I turned into a jelly and had to take advice from my 7 year old who told me "not to worry as it would all be fine and we should just pretend daddy is upstairs in his office working". This said I set to work with the inventory again, but due to its fiendish layout needed re-inforcements. These came in the form of Gordons mum and dad, who I have to say were fantastic, I know that I couldn't have done any of this without them.
Gordons mum and I went through the list with a fine tooth comb and got as much as we could sorted, while Charlie (Gordon's dad) went to work on the gardens. We discovered that I had a shops worth of cake tins and various other items that I clearly had no real need for, so some of these were left with my brother-in-law, John for safe-keeping and the use thereof should he ever need to cook a 21" cake! All the food stuffs were decanted to anyone who wanted them and finally when I came home on Thursday night our house was empty.
After a discussion with the girls, it was agreed that we wanted to stay in the house until we left on the Sunday morning, however having no beds was a bit of a challenge. Lucky for us my friend Gillian said "I have a self-inflating bed you could use", so that was it sorted. We got the bed and put it up in the living room with much hilarity. You just plugged it in and it started to inflate s before us we watched a king-size bed frame appear, then we did the same for the mattress. Our first night was 'alternative' as all 3 of us were in hysterical giggles as one movement and we all bounced around, but finally we got to sleep and it served us very well for our final nights.
My last day at work was wonderful, and very sad as I didn't really want to leave. We went for coffee and bioche (Louise informed us all that they were French - this became a joke for the day) then they embarrassed me by giving me presents and a card. I carry my emergency poncho everywhere as when it rains (in Brunei), it really rains and you can be ankle deep in water within about 45 seconds. Then it was lunch at the Northern Hotel before going back to work and me then having to leave to go and pick up Maddie from school.
On the Saturday I did a quick flit into town and did some shopping and had a lovely lunch with my friend Susan then I had to return our car to the garage. My brother-in-law followed me out and after signing it back to the dealer we headed back. I think at this stage it hit me the most that we were actually going.
Sunday morning and it was madness, we were all up and running around (money, tickets, passports), final looks around what had been our home and farewells to Gordons folks and that was it. Gillian had offered to drive us all the way down to Edinburgh Airport and I am so pleased she did, we put the now deflated bed into her car and this was followed by our many suitcases (good job she has big car) and we were off.
We stopped at Glendoick Garden Centre (highly recommended, very tasty food and lots of nice stuff to look at), this was our usual haunt when we drove to or from the Scottish Police College (SPC) so Gillian and I thought it was fitting for our final coffee and piece for some time in Scotland then we headed off and in no time we were at the airport.
Gillian dropped us off so we could get a trolley and she parked the car, we all headed in and my 2 horrors thought it would be very funny to play a trick by hiding in the toilet. This was all going on s I was checking-in. However, Gillian said that it wasn't hard to find them as they were giggling so much!!!!
After lots of thank you's and hugs we said bye to Gillian and that was us at the Departure Gate away to get onto our Ryanair 99p flight to Poitiers. We landed in France and my Dad was there waiting to pick us up (lucky as I needed to Euro for the trolley) and that was us at the beginning of stage 1 of our move from the UK.
I have to say that at the end of this week I was totally and utterly drained, mentally and physically exhausted and know that if I ever find myself in that position again I would definitely allow myself time to get it all sorted and not be running around like a headless chicken....
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