Our home in San Miguel is looking a little barren as we pack and transport smaller things to our new house before the official moving date of May 24th - this Thursday. The idea is to move things that will fit into our minivan ourselves, reserving larger, bulkier, heavier things for the movers. And I think we'll be pretty busy these next three days if we manage to carry out the plan. The house is still ours through the 31st, so there is time to clear up the final things after the move.
Before we left town for Cabo, we had the house (which is new construction) thoroughly cleaned - it took 4 days - then had the steps down into the backyard tiled, and the house's tile floors (including the roof garden) all sealed and then the house cleaned again. There's still a lot of work to do to make it 'ours' but there's no big hurry. It's never been lived in before and - in true Mexican fashion - we need to install all the light fixtures, ceiling fans, drapes, etc. We're also going to add wall cabinets in the kitchen and there are already plans afoot to expand upon the landscaping. Our current house has only two bedrooms and a studio/guest suite. The new home has five bedrooms: master, guest, library, office, and gym (?). It was freshly painted, but some of the colors are not exactly what we'd prefer, so there's that, too.
The rooms all have boveda ceilings with large concrete cornices which have halogen 'up lights' installed, but the central fixtures are wiring only. How many chandeliers will be needed? Ceiling fans? Custom mirrors for the bathrooms (the frames are part of the tile work)? It looks like we may be leaving several fixtures behind at the house - which had mostly flat ceilings. Many of them won't work with the new ceilings.
The new house also has no kitchen appliances, where our first home came equipped with the basics, so we're shopping for those, too. Found a fridge that's actually larger than the one we had planned on getting that was 'nearly new' and well cared for. That saved us nearly half the price of the new one. It's to be delivered today so we'll be able to keep water and ice on hand during the move. The range may come later.
My sister Paula once produced an entire Thanksgiving dinner using only a microwave, so we may exist without the range for a while. However, we do need to connect the water heater to the gas tank and install a cut-off valve on the range connection before ordering a tankful of propane or we'll blow the house up! Pedro is going to be busy even though we didn't use him for sealing the floors.
Then we also need to have the water purification system installed and check out the wiring for the television/telephone/internet service. The electrician was supposed to have that wiring all figured out and installed, but his English is about as good as my Spanish, so we need to make sure it's going to work before moving the service from our current house to the new one. Can't be without internet service!
Luckily, our Margarita is going to follow us to the new house and we just found out that her husband is a gardener, so we may have the front/backyard care figured out. Hope he has his own lawnmower.
And on June 1st, we leave for the states for a visit that should include a stop at an IKEA on our return to SMA for 'a few things.'
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