Where to Start?

As the title of this post suggests, I don’t quite know where to start with catching up!

I have Poland to talk about, and Cornwall, and a bit of crochet, and a few books, and some random bits and pieces I’d just wanted to chat about, plus little updates on progress with various stuff, and some looking-ahead stuff about Australia… Phew!!

After a bit of a think, I have decided to make this post just a quick progress update, and then I will do my utmost to do a proper post very very soon! (Hopefully tomorrow)

So, we are now a mere 3 months (that’s right, just 3 short months!) from our expected removal date to Australia!! How scary is that??

Artwork by Michael Tompsett

For those who aren’t in the know with this, my husband has a sponsored job offer in Australia, so we now both have visas approved for emigrating to Australia. We will be moving to Northern Queensland, which is tropical – so hot all the time and prone to cyclones, but very interesting and very different to the UK!

We know a little bit more about what will happen with us now, and the next big thing to occur will be that a company comes to take all our stuff, to load it into a container, and to ship it half way around the world to the land down under…

As we have already moved out of our previous home, the vast majority of our stuff is already packed and in storage. We just have the rest of our stuff that we brought with us to Adam’s parents’ house to sort through. Some of this is stuff we won’t need in Australia, such as extension leads for British plug sockets and so on. Some is stuff we ran out of time to sort properly, like piles of paperwork that won’t all be needed, but does require sorting and maybe shredding. Some is stuff that will travel with us – like certain clothes, very precious things that we don’t want to trust to a ship, etc etc. And other stuff is stuff we have been using – like some of my crochet projects, and a few books…

This feels like a right pain to sort through, and while some is easy (putting all the remaining books into a box as I have now joined the library and Adam uses his Kindle) some felt a bit sad. I was surprised at just how sad I felt packing away some crochet WiPs, it was like accepting defeat that I would not be able to finish these projects in time before we leave. I know I can pick them back up once we are reunited with our stuff in Australia, but it still felt odd to me…  Some things are just plain awkward: We need to keep back clothes to wear from now all the way up to a British Autumn, but then have clothes to suit us arriving in Australia and the massive heat we will encounter there!

We have been trying to work out a few other things too about what kind of lifestyle we can work towards over there. Adam has been searching for cars and practical man things like that, we’ve both been poring over pictures of houses to try and decide what sort of style we would prefer (more about the houses in a moment) and I have been looking up various clubs for things like rock climbing, stand up paddleboarding (they don’t have surf where we’re going due to the Great Barrier Reef – I think I can live with that though!) and of course any crochet groups that might be there… ;)   Most exciting for me at the moment has been looking for potential university courses I can do over there to build a new career for myself, and seeking out jobs and internships and things that compliment my hoped-for plans. There is so much available that really appeals to me and makes me very excited, and while I don’t want to jinx it by saying lots now, I am very hopeful that it will be possible.

As for housing once we get there, this is another thing that is proving somewhat frustrating for us right now. Assistance with housing is all part of the job that Adam will have, and he is supposed to get a special code given to him, with which he can log into a website and we can search for the properties that are available to us. Unfortunately, there is a delay in him getting this code – we should have it already, but it hasn’t been signed off yet hence the delay – so we can’t look at available houses at all. I’d love to be able to pick an area of town to live in and know what sort of house we will have when we arrive, but for now that is all a big mystery. It’s not helping my feelings of displacement that I can’t even visualise my new home! All part of the adventure I guess ;)