[Artwork done by our lovely daughter, Princess Cate!]

One of the biggest challenges we have faced in our move thus far is finding the time to prepare for the move, while continuing to live our lives as normal.  We have been fortunate as we have allotted ourselves six months for the move.  Incredibly, four months have already passed us by, so we expect to step up the packing progress as our time here in Wisconsin comes to a close.

We originally set goals of packing areas by a certain date.  That didn’t seem to work so well, so we moved to setting a goal of one packed box per day.  This method seemed to flow until last week, when life got busy with prom, concerts, soccer, doctor appointments and rehearsals.  The thing with setting goals, is that you need to allow for the unexpected to occur.  One wouldn’t think this would apply with packing boxes.  Unless one has a son who has to play with every toy for two minutes before it gets packed.  🙂  It’s all good, though.

We are stepping away from setting specific goals and just trying to concentrate on getting it either packed or moved out.  The current area we are focusing on is the sunroom.

The desk area is unusable.

As this room seems to be the dumping ground for all miscellaneous paper piles, the challenge is to pack what is not needed.

Our oldest son Nick has already secured his apartment here, and will slowly be moving his belongings out in July.   He was fortunate enough to be able to take advantage of an offer that gave him his first month’s rent free, so this saved on needing to rent a storage unit and stay in a hotel for a week, as his original plan was to find an apartment for August 1.  He will be taking our couch, a chair and other pieces of furniture, which will allow us to use our furniture (and more importantly our beds) until the very end.  He will also be on the receiving end of most of the kitchen appliances and supplies, as well as whatever food is left.

In other news, we have paid our security deposit on our apartment, and will be setting up an account with Progress Energy so that it is all set to go when we arrive in Florida.  Our goal is to spend our first night in Florida in our new apartment 🙂  We may need to purchase air mattresses to accomplish this goal, as we won’t be able to shop for our beds until we arrive.  We will be setting up an account with Bright House for our cable and internet, but will wait until we arrive to make this appointment.

We have found a wonderful Yahoo Group, Clermont Connection Cafe, which has already given us a wealth of information, from lovebugs to wholesale clubs to doctor referrals. Everyone we’ve had the opportunity to talk to who lives in Clermont is very friendly and welcoming to us, something we’ve appreciated immensely.  We look forward to being a part of this wonderful community.