Back in State Forty-Eight! Part 2

If you missed the first part of the moving adventure, be sure to click here to catch up!

When last we blogged, I'd hopped a flight back to the LBC, leaving Chris alone in the Bro-partment in Northeast Scottsdale.  He spent the week reconnecting with his buddies at Gore and making himself fancy dinners with ingredients from Whole Foods; in California, I was doing my best to clean out the pantry and fridge (my meals were...interesting), while continuing to separate the things we couldn't part with from the items the movers could take and hide away in storage for a few months.

On Wednesday, I met with my non-fiction book club for the final time to say a fond adieu to everyone, and they sent me off in style; they prepared tons of good food and gifted me with all sorts of amazing presents from books (of course) to earrings to new scarves!  I was honored to be part of their family during the time we lived in Long Beach.

I also kept this little maniac entertained:

"Mom, what the actual sh*t is going on here?"

She's a blur of energy, most of the time.

The packers arrived early Thursday morning, and they swept through the house, leaving in their wake a trail of discarded tissue paper and the cores of rolls of tape.  Dad came over after his shift at West Marine to drop off his vacuum; I asked him if he wanted to stay and hang out (actually, I shouted the offer at him, to be heard over the screech of packing tape), and he veeerrrrry briefly looked around before giving clearly declining.  I didn't blame him.

Eventually, by mid-afternoon, the packing was done, and the guys headed out.  Zoe and I did some surveying of the situation:

Boxes, boxes, everywhere!

That is one worried dog face.

Friday morning dawned, and it was moving day!  Most of the same guys from the packing crew showed up to move the boxes and furniture, which was fine, as they did a great job.

The truck is here!

In the midst of the moving, I received a call from the car transport service, who'd be moving the wee car from Long Beach to Phoenix (the wee car only has a range of about 70 miles on a good day, so it surely wasn't making the drive itself).  Chris would be flying in later that evening and picking up our sweet rental minivan at the airport, so I headed across the 710 to drop the car with the trailer guy.  Everything went fine, and I caught an Uber back to the house, where the move was still in progress.

Bye, wee car!

See you in Phoenix!

By about 2pm, all of our worldly possessions (minus those already in Phoenix and those I'd squirreled away in random closets) were on the truck, and it headed out.  Zoe and I took in the scene:

Nothing but dog beds and a rug

(we'd use that as our sleeping pad for the night,

then throw it away the next morning).

She had a blast tearing around the empty house.

Dad and Risa came over a bit later, to say bye to Zoe and see the house one last time, then I caught a ride with them to Roe Seafood, for another "hail and farewell" dinner, this time with the two of them.  Chris met us there, having parked the minivan nearby, and we thoroughly enjoyed our meal (ah, super fresh seafood on every corner - we will miss that for sure).  We hugged goodbye, knowing we'd get together before too long, and Chris and I drove back to the house for our final night there.  We hung out with the kiddo a bit, and then everyone headed to bed, inside-camping-style.

It should be fun to take her

real camping someday...

As expected, no one slept amazingly well, so we were up pretty early the next day.  After eating breakfast and loading up the minivan (as well as making a few last minute repairs to the crawl space under the house), we were off, heading east!

We could have fit more in there!

Look at the face!

See the chair, fully tricked out for her use?

See how she's laying instead on top of a bunch

of wine bottles?

That's our dog.

The trip was fairly uneventful, but it did take a bit longer than normal, due to us stopping every hour or so at a new rest area to let the kiddo use the bathroom.  One thing we didn't realize was that when you raise a dog in a house with a yard, and that's pretty much the only place she goes to the bathroom, she doesn't understand that when you take her out on a leash, she's supposed to potty.  This maniac didn't go to the bathroom the entire seven hour trip from Long Beach to Phoenix; by the time we got her to the tiny, fenced-in potty yard in the apartment complex, she was about to burst.  Thankfully, we made it there before any accidents could happen in the minivan, and after unloading things, Chris dropped it back at the airport without issue.

Finally, our family was back together again!

"Hi, Snuggles!  I missed you.

Why did you try to kill Dad?"

Later!

Amy