New home issues, teacher certification

     Anyone who has ever moved into a new home knows that working the kinks out takes a few weeks.  We get all the fun of the kinks with this one!  The dishwasher flooded the kitchen floor the first time we ran it, with no problems since and under the sink in the master bath has a drippy leak, but has been fine since the first couple of days.  Not that we think they have healed themselves or anything, we have towels out and calls into the manager requesting a plumber come and check things out.  The smoke alarm upstairs is also not connected to the main power so the backup battery died and then went off the other night.  So, the builder will be sending his guys over "sometime today" to fix them up.  Sigh.  Ian and I wanted to do another walk through the Reserve, midweek grocery shopping, and go to Parade (assembly) for Annika today.  Guess some will get done tomorrow and Parade will have to wait until next week!
     I have also started the process to get my teaching credentials for Queensland.  This will be fun!  I have to send my fingerprints back to the FBI for yet another background check, have a background check done here, get copies of all my transcripts and diplomas, have them notarized (the notary here is called a justice of the peace, our version of a JP is a magistrate), copy my identification, and finally send in with about $150 and wait 10-12 weeks for them to clear.  Looks like I will be spending lots of quality time with Ian and finding volunteer work at school that I can bring Ian in for!  I looked at preschool for him-costs between $55 and $70 PER DAY.  Australia has a great program where average wage earners qualify for child care assistance, but since we are here on temporary worker visas we don't qualify.  Ouch.  On the plus side, I can enroll him in before and after school care once he starts Prep in January.  For $35 per day for before and after.  Add in Annika, and you get the picture.
     Again, on the bright side, once I have my certification, I can look for a teaching position or sub for a while.  I was told that subs make about $300 per DAY here.  WOW!  Teaching positions are filled differently than at home.  The entire state of Queensland runs a teacher database and you go where they tell you to based on your qualifications, seniority, and what is needed where.  This means that younger teachers tend to be placed in outback schools and have to work their way into cities, or they take the less desirable inner city schools.  Since I can't see myself commuting Outback, subbing may be just fine for me!

Settling in, sort of

     So, have been in the house for a whole week now.  It's a newly constructed townhome and very nice, if small.  It has 3 bed, 2.5 bath (sort of anyway), 2 car garage where the laundry is located.  There are also 14 stairs to get to the living/dining floor and another 16 to get up to the bedrooms.  Who needs a stairmaster?  Just live here!  Sounds big, but total square footage is about 1200 sq ft.  MUCH smaller than we are used to, and with neighbors all over, trying to keep the kids at a reasonable level is difficult.   We have a nice park only 50m downhill from here, the kids love it.  Good thing too as when they need to run, it has some play equipment and plenty of open grass!  We spent an hour or so there yesterday afternoon after our hike in the Whites Hill reserve and exploring the park and running/biking paths in the area.  The wild lorikeets were chattering up a storm!  Lyle loves the bike paths here-many many kilometers of paved trails going through park areas and following Bulimba creek.  I look forward to getting our bikes and taking Ian with me on the tag along while the girls are in school for a few trips!
     We took Saturday and drove about an hour up to Australia Zoo.  It is an amazing place and glad we went.  Admission and concessions were in line with what we had expected to pay, so no big surprises there.  The crocs were just as amazing as we have seen on Animal Planet!  They had opportunities to touch many types of wildlife and talk with the keepers.  The kids loved the baby American Alligator and the Burmese Python.  We even splurged for a family pic with the snake in the studio!  It may show up on our Christmas mailing this year.
     On my list this week, apply for an Australian tax ID number, look at Kindergartens with daycare for Ian (they call 4 year old preschool Kindergarten here), and get my teacher certification application finished.  The teacher cert may take 12 weeks to process!  So, in the meantime, I will also be looking for a job doing something to keep me busy and a bit of extra money.  My working will make the difference between having to really stick to a budget and being able to be a bit looser with the cash for fun stuff.  Not only that, having to pay a ridiculous amount for rent and the house still up for sale in Wenatchee makes things pretty tight right now.  Good thing we planned for it, but will not be able to do this for the long term.
     Internet will take about 3 more weeks to get going.  We miss talking to family and friends!  You may want to bookmark this site-it is a time zone converter so when you call, you can see if we are possibly around or not!  http://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/converter.html

Miss everyone tons.  Looking forward to emails and comments-they are keeping me sane right now!

Home, finally.

We are in the house, finally!  Rental furniture was delivered today-3 twin beds for the kids, queen for us.  Couch and loveseat, dining room table and seating for 6, coffee table, linens for the beds and towels.  Kitchen place settings for 6-8 and basic cooking gear too.  I think I will make it until our stuff comes now!  The next hurdle, getting the internet hooked in permanently and figuring out what we will have to keep boxed in the garage.  This place is so tiny compared to the homes we have owned and even with downsizing our stuff, we still have waaayyy too much coming.  As much as I despise garage sales, I may just be having to have one!

List, shmist

OK, so didn't get everything done on my list for today, but excepting for number 5, the rest are ticked off!  We'll pay for the furniture rental tomorrow AND transfer several bags to the new house.  We will check out of here on Thursday morning and finally be in our place-with furniture!  Love, Love, Love the Nissan and feel much more confident driving as it sets me up a bit more off the road than the Lancer did.  Managed to drive right to the carpark for the rental drop off downtown!  Ka Ching!

The girls are loving school, but both saying it is too easy.  I know the first week everyone is feeling each other out, and they are technically finishing up the school year again, so I am not too worried.  They are making friends and happy.  That is all that matters right now!

Have a mobile broadband USB for the computer to tide us over from the hotel access to home access.  Wish I knew about these earlier as they would have been much cheaper AND more useful as we gear up to travel around the country a bit!  Lesson learned.  Those lessons will be a whole post, or series later on!

Car today!

On the docket for today, picking up the Nissan X-trail up north at the dealers!  Now, don't get overly excited as here's how I have to do it.
1.  Get girls to school south of town.
2.  Go downtown to the Central Business District (CBD) to drop off the car.  Think any major metro downtown-super tall buildings, lots of 1 way streets, and a GPS that gets confused amongst the tall buildings.  The carpark is on a different street than the rental office. . .
3.  Walk to the bank branch downtown to get a bank cheque for the car.  Goobye another $40 for bank cheque fees.
4.  Call dealer-someone will come downtown to pick up me and Ian.  Hurrah!  No need to get a bus up North.
5.  Drive car back to furniture rental office and put deposit on temporary furniture.  We'll be reimbursed for it.  They should deliver on Thursday!
6.  Find a mobile internet provider-may take up to 20 working days to get internet connected and working. And, just to keep it more fun, they will be sending updates via email.  Really, while I have no access to internet?
7.  Somehow set up online banking (still don't have pin numbers) and get our 1st installment for our rent paid on Friday.

Anyway it goes, it is getting better by the day.  Normal is simply a state of mind, right?

Success at last!

We signed the lease on the house this morning!  Hooray, a place to live!  It is much smaller than we have gotten used to living in, especially with 3 kids, but it is a nice place with nice neighbors.  We met the couple that live in #3 and the lady is totally in love with the kids.  Just wait until they are on the scooters in the drive at 8 am on a Saturday morning. . . we'll be having a glass of wine with them when we move in, for sure!
We also finished the school clothes shopping for the girls today.  Navy socks and black trainers (tennis shoes) for both.  Just like the states, starting school mid-year means some items are low in supply, shoes in this case.  Payless shoes saves the day today though!
Appliances have been purchased for the house-fridge, washer, dryer, and microwave are set to be delivered on Monday.  We have not heard about the rental furniture situation and are hoping that this is approved and can be delivered next week.
The car has its inspection on Monday, and if we like what we see, we'll get it on Tuesday!  Things are coming together!
Went to Dominoes to pick up pizza for dinner tonight.  Pepperoni and Hawaiian.  Yum!  The large is the size of a medium here.  Portion sizes are a bit more in line with reality here.
If you want our new mailing address, email me, or if you know my parents, they have it too.  I won't post as this is not a private site.
Tomorrow, relax and try to settle on an internet provider.  We don't have cable broadband, so will have to order a phone line dedicated to the internet connection.  Oh, for my Vonage so I can call family again!

And I spoke too soon!

In keeping with our now normal state of chaos, the lease did NOT get signed this morning.  It appears we were caught in a rental real estate management tug of war.  Bear with me, it may sound a bit confusing.  The townhome we are renting is 1 of 5 in a row.  It is popular here in town to sell your single family home lot for a tidy profit, or tear down the home you have and build townhomes/condos on it as investment property.  Nice as we don't really have to worry about owners coming back and wanting to move back into their own home!  I digress though.  The units were sold to a new owner this week and they have their own rental property manager.  The property managers we were working with were supposed to close the lease today, but the new managers came and got the papers yesterday.  Somewhere in there, someone did not call to let us know about all this, so we showed up promptly at 9am expecting to get paperwork and keys.  Egg on several faces so say the least.  So, now tomorrow at 9 am we will sign and get the keys.  Then commence to do the appliance shopping, shoes and socks for the girls for school Monday, and get everyone where they need to be when they are supposed to be there!

The car we bought will have an inspection on Monday, and if we like what we see, we can take possession as soon as I can get back downtown to the bank and draw another bank cheque to get the car.  That will be another adventure for Tuesday's entry.  It will involve dropping off the rental car downtown (my gut wrenches every time I think of that trip!), catching a bus or train north of town to the dealer and then getting it back either to the temporary apartment, or if we are super lucky, to the house with temporary furniture!

Wish us luck. . . it is coming together.  Sort of.