Goodbye Weston, Hello West End

Whoopee!  We're in our home at last!  Now its just the big job of making it home!  The boxes are piled high in the basement and scattered throughout the house are baskets with odds and ends that haven't found their home yet, toys strewn across the floor as the kids madly dump out any box I leave unattended!   Many times over the past week the sense of panic has been high in my throat, about to explode or choke me.  It's been a little overwhelming, but with time all shall be well.  We at least managed to buy a used van on Saturday, so that ordeal is done.  And before returning our wonderful, large rental van, I managed to pick up a couch and loveseat off Kijiji (Craigslist is hardly used in Winnipeg).  Meant I drove down to a farm past Niverville, 50 minutes south of the city on Thursday at 10:00 p.m., but that was a load off my mind.  It's so wonderful to have living room furniture again!  (I'd left our hide-a-bed in Maple Ridge we had such limited space on the moving truck).

The move
We took possession of our house on Thursday, December 1st.  S was at work, so I came over with Ai and Iz, with plans to clean up.   Unfortunately, the upstairs alone needed a lot of work to make it decent.   I thought the three boxes of toys, unplayed with for 3+ months, would entertain, but was very disappointed.  Team Trouble (Ai & Iz) scrapped over everything in the boxes.  After many interruptions I went back to scrubbing down the bathroom and then soon, it was quiet.  Oh oh.

Down in the basement, I could hear squeals of glee.  A large bag of rock salt left by the previous owner was being tossed by handfuls around the basement (right into the furnace!).  A can of paint left behind was tipped sideways with the lid off.  Arg.  It didn't help that one of them had peed on the floor (and fifteen minutes later pooped in the change of clothes!).  The stern disapproval of Mommy helped them re-bond and end the scrapping, so back to the overwhelming clean-up for me.  However, more squeals soon brought me down the hall to see that they'd filled a box with shreds of paper - all ripped off of A's closest wall.  A not happy me realized that my ambition was futile.  I drove back to our rental home, fed the two lunch, put them to bed and had a 'I miss my Moms' cry (one to take care of the kids, one to help me scrub!).  Friday wasn't quite so dramatic. S and I managed to finish cleaning and get loads of boxes over before the moving truck on Saturday, helped by a new friend whose parents took care of her children so she could take care of mine!

We were delighted to have seven of S's male co-workers come over to help load all our stuff, then stay to help assemble some of the beds . . . and move the piano!  We were also blessed with our friend, Elsie, taking all three kids until 6:00 that night.  The only down part was parking in the back yard at 10:00 a.m. while the telephone/internet guy was at the front door.  I missed him by minutes (who'd have thought that a service guy would come right at the beginning of the four hour suggested time of when he'd be here!).  This led to another cry during my 40 minutes on and off hold call with MTS at a nearby pay phone in very cold weather with no gloves.  Meant I was bumped until Wednesday afternoon before I could get back on the phone and computer - a real problem, as I needed to be van shopping on Monday!   It all worked out in the end - just upped my stress level a bit.

The welcome
The lead-up and move had been exhausting, but the icing on the cake came around 1:00 a.m.  I was woken up by a man shouting in the alley behind us, "No!  Stop!  Don't do it!  No!"  Then a big BANG.  Then more yelling.  I hopped out of bed and looked out from all the upstairs windows but could see nothing.  Couldn't call 9-1-1 with no phone, but within minutes police were on the scene.   The helicopter circled around for a good while, so it took many hours to drift off to sleep.  No-one had been shot, to my knowledge, so I'm not really sure what that was about.

That was Saturday.  Monday night had me unable to fall asleep as I could hear men yelling again outside.  Peeked out and they were in our front yard area.  Impulsively, I knocked on the window and shooed them away.  Oops.  My adrenalin then had me up for awhile, so this time I wasn't woken up by the police cars and helicopters circling overhead.  Turns out there was a shooting a few streets over, sadly ending in the death of a 24 year old gang member.  (This event not related to the men in front of my house, though).

We knew we were moving into a 'transitional neighbourhood' - one that is slowly improving but with its elements of roughness.  We weren't quite expecting to experience it so close to home and so quickly.  The only humour (in a very dark form) came in reading an interview of someone from the neighbourhood reporting on Monday nights' events.  "First there was the yelling, then the gun shot, then the sirens, then the helicopters.  You know, same ol', same ol' around here."  I'm now thankful there's an alarm system in our house!  And thankful that all's been (relatively) quiet on the western front since - we hear our share of sirens down the street.  A not-so-welcome switch from the trains of Weston.

*ps - I haven't had time for many photos, but will soon post a bunch from our visit with S's parents.  Omi and Opa arrived Tuesday, December 6th and leave Wednesday.  It's been a nice bonus to have help with the chaos. They've stayed at a B&B nearby to ease our need to host them this time around.

*ps - Below are some photos from our rental house back in Weston which is just 10 minutes away.  My sister had requested some to envision where we'd been the past few months, so you don't need to look at these!  The house had character, with gables and such, but the pictures show it off much better than it actually was.  There were gashes in the floor, in the walls - not well taken care of and just very small.  The bathroom required us to stand right up with tummies to the sink or our heads would be kinked against the ceiling.  Many a time we forgot this and bashed our heads.  Already our kids are fighting less as they have room to spread out and play.  It helps that I also will not have to do any more viewing for real estate agents and potential buyers, as that house was for sale.  I had to do 34 showings - which meant I was always having to keep the house as tidy as possible.  So despite the rowdier activity in the neighbourhood, I think we'll be quite happy in our new house.