Ailsa says....

3 and a half weeks to go till move day and we are still fighting to get past every step of this journey!! Loving every minute though!
Still no sign of Passport requests unfortunately, still stalking the postie on that one!
Our house here in the UK is still "under offer" taking an age to get through the legal stage, we are both starting to get really concerned that it all falls through and goes back on the market just based on how long its taking.
Finding a house on the other side has been equally challenging, I think we have tried to rent 4 or 5 now and something has gone wrong in the last stages, our Realtor (Krista Hann) has been awesome and so helpful, feeling bad for putting her through the mill just to find a short term rental! Most rentals want you to stay for a year and don't like letting for less time. Really what we want to do is buy though so we start looking as soon as we land, have a few lined up to see but its so had to tell from pictures.
Got our bank account and a credit card set up when we were over in Dec (Scotia bank... great deal for immigrants) and now also have provisional approval for a mortgage so we know our budget which is great. Even that was traumatic though as our Canadian credit check came up with debt that wasn't ours, which we had to have unpicked and we also had to send a copy off our UK credit history to help solve that.
We have calls next week with tax experts on either side, apparently you have to complete a leaving the UK form for tax purposes... who knew?? lol
Having the relocation package really helps and is worth the 2 years of hard graft and politics to get it! Doing all this without a job lined up on the other side we were absolutely prepared to do, but would have been even more challenging, greatest of luck and respect to you guys going this route...

Camping in the house is certainly interesting... Oh to have a couch and a bed... the luxuries of life!! We have found ourselves going out for a drive just to get a comfy seat in the car - lol!! Last nights awesome Saturday entertainment was watching a little green boat shaped graphic of  the container ship destined to transport all of our life long collection of belongings, docking at Liverpool. Lol!! What did we all do before the internet provided such entertainment!! Its due to depart today... so i'm guessing the next couple of weeks will include much little green boat tracking!!


Now am off to go find a bed for the night, our air mattress has a puncture, not the best nights sleep ever, waking at 5:30am with half of you on the floor and the other half squished off the semi flat bed by a large dog isn't the best!!

 Ailsa.