Saturday afternoon Amanda, Dan, Michelle, Katherine and Clara came over. We got pizza and had some wine, beer and champagne. What a nice relaxing day!
Last Sunday, April 1st, Jackie, Allen and Dillon came to the house in the early afternoon. They had rented a truck to pick up the couches (they decided to take all three of them) and the small patio set from the back patio. Andrew went with Allen back to their condo and storage unit to bring the couches while Jackie and I stayed at the house with Dillon. Jackie and I ended up taking a nice walk to the park with Dillon where we had a great time!
Monday we spent the day packing the rest of the house up to ready for the movers....
On Tuesday, April 3rd, we had movers (2 men from Bekins) come to the house to remove all of the furniture and move it to our storage locker. We had two other storage lockers (a 10x10 and a 10x15) on hold thinking we would need more room. The movers were amazing! We had already packed up all our "stuff" in boxes, and they packed up all the large furniture very nicely by wrapping up some of the larger pieces in blankets and plastic. They loaded everything into their truck in about 4 hours. When we got to the storage unit they restacked all of the things we already had in there neatly and used up every inch of space. By the end of the day, they were able to fit all of our belongings into the one storage unit! Yippee! Saves us over $100 a month for a 2nd unit. Needless to say, they received a very nice tip!
Tuesday evening we went out to dinner with our friend Steve in Pleasanton.
Wednesday evening we went to our friend's (Mike and Nan) house for dinner. Bill and Barbara, Janet, and Dave and Linda were there also. We had a great time!!! Great food and great friends.......We had received a nice bottle of "Markham" wine from Kevin last Christmas and decided to share it with friends! Thanks Kev! It was gooooood!
The next morning we had to prepare the pets for shipping. The Pet Travel company was to arrive for pick-up between 0700 and 0730hrs Thursday morning. Sooooo, I took Sammy for a walk...his last walk in the park in Pleasanton!!!
Before I left, I put Socrates in his crate in the entry way. He hates being in there.... While I was walking Sammy, Andrew was getting his crate ready in the garage.
Thursday morning at 0700 hrs the Pet Express people came to pick up Sammy and Socrates. The flight to Schiphol airport didn't leave till 1400hrs so we didn't have to leave the house till 1000hrs. That gave us a few hours to make sure everything was cleaned up and put away. While we were waiting I made sure all of the doors in the house were operating okay by spraying them with WD-40.....I was looking at the spray can and saw this "POINT NOZZLE TOWARD MARK": What I want to know is, who in the heck is Mark!?!?! (poor guy.....!)
When we got to the airport we checked in and gave them our luggage and we went through security. It took over an hour! Busy day at SFO! When we got to the gate we watched for the Pet Express van and we were able to see them put the crates next to the plane! The pets are always last to go on and first to come off!
The trip overseas is about 9 1/2 hours on a good day (over 10 hours coming back to the States!).... When we arrived we picked up our luggage and went to the house, which is only about 15 miles from Schiphol Airport. We had enough time that we were able to drop off our luggage and have a little lunch before we had to go pick up the pets at VCK Logistics which is located close to the airport. Around noon we left the house. When we got the pets out of their van they were so happy to see us!
We took Sammy out of his crate and had to take the crate apart to fit it in the car. Socrates stayed in the crate till we got home. When we got home we took Socrates out of his crate and showed him his food and litter box. The first thing he did when we let him go was find a place to hide (next to the water heater) and he didn't come out of there till late this morning. We took Sammy for a walk and he has adjusted pretty well.
While we were out walking we stopped by the new Gelato place downtown and got a combination of dark chocolate, Haarlem by Night and Mistero Latino.......a little bowl that came directly from heaven!
Last night I was up at around 0100 till 0330hrs.....jet lag.....Andrew was able to sleep all night. Today we took Sammy for a couple of walks downtown Haarlem, and got Socrates more comfortable in the house by letting him walk around with the dog outside in the "garden"!
This afternoon we met our neighbors, Bruce and Linda, for a drink. We went to a restaurant called "Stempels". We enjoyed some "bitterbalen", beer and wine!
