Progress Report ~ Update

I wrote this progress report the other day, and I thought I would write a progress update about the stuff I covered there :)

To begin with, having our stuff in decent storage is making life so much easier! We are now able to pack up things from the house at our convenience, and drop the stuff off in storage when we are ready. So much better than having to spend days and days trying to liaise a time when they could get our crates ready for us, only to get there and find that they hadn’t got them ready at all and there was nothing we could do!

It’s pretty amazing how much stuff we still have at my in-laws house, besides the stuff that we need and/or plan to take with us in luggage because it is too precious and irreplaceable to ship. We do need to get a move on with really being tough over that, but I find it so hard to be brutal over packing up books, DVDs, yarn stash…  I also find it really hard to be disciplined over not acquiring more of these things, and therefore undermining any work we do manage… Oops!!

Lots more forms have been filled out and sent off for the Australia thing, and there is progress! We now have a firm date for my husband signing on to his new job, which will happen at the High Commission in London at the start of October. It’s getting very real!!!!!!!!!!!  We will have to be in London the night before, but they will sort us out a hotel room for that. Then we will fly to Australia on the next available flight, which they will have booked for us. Wow. Can’t quite believe this is going to happen!

We also now have our login details for the housing website we can use to look for our first home over there. I had been really looking forward to being able to find out the type of place we will live in (after our initial period in a motel, while we wait for our shipped container of stuff to arrive!)but it wasn't to be just yet. When we logged in, it just said that there was currently no housing in our area for our eligibility! We just have to keep checking back, and if nothing becomes available in time then we can get in touch with them and they will help us sort something else out.

With regard to my husband’s current job, well, he doesn’t have one anymore! He successfully handed back all his kit and handed in his resignation, so he is a free man. This took place in York, where we also had a fun couple of days eating too much and trying lots of local ales… My husband was a student in York, so he loves to go back and reminisce about his student days. He loves the city too, so we had a lovely happy couple of days as he got to enjoy his freedom ;)

When we got back from York, he then carried on south to collect the last of his belongings from his work accommodation, so now we will be spending a lot more time together, and will potentially see each other throughout the week! A novel concept for us :)

While in York, I finished the book I had been reading:

I really enjoyed this book, I am a bit of a fan of Terry Pratchett so I would buy any book of his, and this one was no disappointment. It didn’t have the daft humour I like in Pratchett’s Discworld books, but it was great to see him being more diverse, and read this very different type of story. Unfortunately, as it is part of a trilogy (I think) it did finish pretty abruptly, with no conclusion. Something of a cliff hanger in fact! I immediately got onto the Amazon app on my phone to look up the next instalment:

This next one is now in my Amazon basket, waiting for more items to make it up to the £10 of eligible purchases required for the supersaver free delivery… (You see my weakness when it comes to getting more books!!) However, when I went back to the library today to return the first book, I discovered that they now has the second one in too! Although now they don't, as I promptly whipped it off the shelf and took it away with me :)   (Libraries are great!)

Also while in York, I was able to make some blanket progress. I discovered with the Glastonbury blanket, where I could take completed circles plus the turquoise outer yarn, and crochet away, that having a colour scheme is a good way to make a project portable. For York, I just took the two pink colours that I’m using for the flower motifs in the squares of the Walled Garden Blanket. I was then able to crochet the daisy flowers in spare moments, all ready to make into squares and then the finished panel. I got 12 daisies made all together, plus a few extra centres. (The larger centre flowers have all been finished already).

This meant that when we got back from York yesterday, it was pretty short work to add the green rounds and put panel number 12 together. Then I was also got to work on the 13^th panel, finishing almost all of the squares before reaching the end of that ball of green yarn, and deciding that this (along with the fact that it was half past midnight!) was a sign I should go to bed…  A lot of progress made though :)

The pesky yarn ball ran out on the penultimate square!

Today, I finished off those last squares and sewed them all up, and I am currently on the final round of the 13^th Panel, only TWO panels left to go!! I can't quite believe it, and I'm really hoping that I can get them all done before I head down to see my mum on Tuesday.

Also today, I headed to Boyes to stock up on some more yarn. I had learned my lesson from my recent yarn shortage (when I ran out of the lighter pink) and didn't want that to happen again. While I reckoned I had enough yarn for both remaining panels, I didn't think there would be enough for creating a border, and I had no idea where I would stock up in Pembrokeshire if I ran out while at my mum's.

So there we go, a bit more progress on everything! Hopefully there will be more progress on packing over the weekend too, that would allow us to relax a bit more and enjoy our time in Pembrokeshire :)