Not much to report… our expat lives on-the-go continue to move according to plan.
We’re, although, entering the countdown mode: family pack-out scheduled for May 22nd; pre-packing, sorting, desperation mode should likely kick in about now 🙂
So much to do, and yet, not enough time, very common complaint from our fellow Foreign Service friends – it doesn’t matter how many times you’ve done. How many HHEs and UABs your family has separated for packing and shipping; how many pieces of advice other families with school-aged children have been shared with you. Really. You may have moved a dozen times, lived under not-so-easily-adjustable conditions, and yet, you’ll find yourself questioning your life/career decisions – exactly the same way you did during the very first move!
The Stress is Real!
Unfortunately, there’s not much that can be done to avoid it. The moment the pre-packing survey takes place, we [always!] come to the realization:
“Why do we keep doing this?” or “Why did I buy this gigantic piece of furniture/decoration/local artistic whatever??”
“Why?”
And the worst part, is the look of disbelieve the movers give you hat very moment:
“WOW! We’ve encountered some strange people in this line of work”… followed by their words of ‘comfort’:
“Don’t worry Sir, we’ve seen worse” 🙂
All that said, The Mirandas have decided to begin our ‘pre-moving entertaining mode’, a proven strategy to safeguard our healthy intra-family relationships, and our sanity! 🙂
Here are a few examples of our recent weekend activities [links will take you to the images]:
And… cooking, hosting and sharing our challenges and lessons learned with friends…
Or, taking a break from work! 🙂
Or even, enjoying uniquely strange moments with like-minded, equally stressed expat folks! 🙂
3rdculturechildren 