The 20^th of July. The day is finally here: Our new place is officially ours!

This week we drove to Ikea to get a dresser and a guest bed, which will be ours until we will move our bed to the new place. We also got some storage boxes for under the bed, since we will not have a lot of storage in our place, and yet somehow already accumulated a lot of stuff. Unbelievable how fast that goes! And a kitchen Island to have at least some area where we can store some food and have a workable surface area.

2.00 PM we arrived, and it gave us 15 minutes to explore a bit ourselves before meeting the realtor. The dogs went crazy! They love the new place. Kima and Nayeli had been playing and exploring non-stop, and we would not be seeing Inti anymore until late that evening when she had to come inside for supper. She was and would be staring (probably for the rest of her life) at the squirrels. All day every day, and she hates it when we make her take a break.

At 2.15 PM we met with Carla (the realtor, not her real name) who helped us so much through the whole process. She took a nice picture and even gave us a very nice welcoming gift. A box with a lot of very nice and easily prepared recipes, which is exactly what we can use, since we will not be having a real kitchen for the next couple of months.

Unfortunately, upon arrival, we already saw that George (the previous owner, not his real name) had not moved out all his stuff. Carla told us, that his car broke down two weeks ago (which he had already told us as well when he showed us the property) but then last weekend his rental car broke down too. How much bad luck can a man have, seriously, sometimes the universe is not helping. And let’s face it, here, without a car, (like George said) is like having your legs cut off. You are just lost. He did however clean out the whole house, and one container so we could move in and store some stuff already. That was nice. He also left us some food and gas in the RV so we could cook. How nice is that! He showed up shortly too, to explain the situation himself and showed Sébastien some last important stuff, while I waited with Carla. He told us that he would get his stuff out as soon as possible.

Around four everyone left, and we had the place to ourselves to discover a bit and set up the first things. While Sébastien started unloading I swept the whole house, which took about one and a half hours. Then Sébastien could build up the bed while I continued to sweep the container. At 7 PM we called the day, ate dinner, walked the dogs, and went straight to bed.

In the morning, we set up the dresser, Sébastien could install Starlink and pretty soon we already had to make our way back to Edmonton. We did not bring the cats with us yet, since that would be too stressful, especially for a day.

The next day we drove back up to Athabasca again with, yet another trunk fully loaded, and this time we did bring the cats. It was so warm in Edmonton, and they were so happy when we came back, that we decided to take them with us. Palin did not appreciate this decision (later however she would). She was meowing so badly in the car, that I really had doubts about our decision, but it was too late to turn around. Arriving in Athabasca, first like for the 20^th time I had to pee. I am telling you, being pregnant and driving long distances is NOT a good combination. We let the cats out inside and the dogs had to stay outside so the cats could “in peace” get used to the house. Well, peace is a big word, I did have to vacuum clean the house, so Palin did not get to do a lot of exploring and was in hiding. In the evening as soon as the vacuum cleaning was done, and we started to do other stuff and settle down a bit, Palin came out and like Kitty started exploring like crazy. They got rid of all the flies in no time and every grasshopper that managed to get inside was killed onsite.  The cats love the new place!

In the evening, we enjoyed a nice and easy dinner: Tortellini with pesto. This time inside. Why well, eating outside was very nice, with the nice weather and everything, but the mosquitos… Oh my God! I was completely massacred the day before and did not have a lot of maternity clothes, and anyway very few clothes at the new place, it was better to spare me from another torturous evening. Sébastien was bitten too, but not nearly as bad as me. We can not leave things like this, and I will have to find solutions for this problem. That night we also went to bed early. The days are long, and I feel that I must be a bit careful with myself and the baby.

In the morning, we decided to first measure the house so that I could draw it on the computer so we would have a floor plan on which we will be able to plan the rest of the house. We would only manage the ground floor after having to leave back to Edmonton. We did not want to arrive too late, because I would have to work on the following days and Seb would have a lot of stuff too.

You might be interested in knowing how we solved our water problem since we do not have water at the house yet. Well, here I would like to give all credit to my grandma from my father’s side. We used to spend all our holidays with them. We loved it, twice a year with them in their house, and twice a year on their boat. They had this big motorboat, with which they would, every year, sail from the north of the Netherlands all the way down to the border of France and back up. They of course had a very big water tank, and a lot of possibilities underway to refill it, but my grandma having grown up during the war, has always had a nag for saving and preparation. So, what would they do? Besides filling up the tank, which had closable buckets, they also filled up and with a soup ladle would get the water out of the buckets to use. Who knew that this would come in handy 20 years later? We bought two buckets (20 liters each) which we filled up in Edmonton, and with a soup ladle and a drinking bottle, we would have water for drinking and cleaning.

The one thing we also managed to get done (I can’t remember whether it was the first time or second time up in Athabasca), was to clean the main door. It has this huge window in it and like all the doors and windows in the house, it is so dirty you can’t look through. Since it was the main door and we would come through it the whole time, it kept bothering me. So, we cleaned it, and jeez, the frame went from gray to white again and we can see through again, what a difference that makes! I must say we are looking back at four very successful days. Unfortunately, we could be there only for a short time. I can’t wait for next week when we have planned to be there for 4 days!