I'm now 32 weeks pregnant. The time has gone so quickly already, so I dread to think how fast the last few weeks will go! I am now this big:
And I feel like if I get any bigger, I will explode. Looking at me, I still have plenty of space to grow, but the aches are coming thick and fast now, so I wonder what I will be feeling like in another 8 weeks! I have lots of stretchmarks, but luckily the majority are on the underside of my bump, so I am in blissful ignorance of their presence!
In regards to the move, I worked up until 12th February, and we spent the weekend packing our things. I kept out all the important things until the last minute, but Hubby decided to pack everything left in unmarked boxes, "boxes of crap" he called them, resulting in me losing my underwear, maternity clothes and toiletries.
Anyway, we officially moved out of our place on Monday 15th February, and moved in with my mum for the week while we tied up loose ends, met up with family etc. Hubby's parents came up to England to meet us and help share the load in their car. Hubby's mum is a retired midwife, and it was reassuring to have her on the journey with me; just in case something happened and I went into early labour.
We left England on 20th February, and made the journey to Homeland # 2 to see my grandmother, aunts and a few cousins, before continuing our journey through Europe and down to Hubby's Homeland. However we didn't get any further than Poitiers in France before the van broke down on us. We hadn't expected it, since we had taken it for a full service and had repairs done on it before leaving England, and everything seemed to be in working order. But now it seems the engine has gone. Completely.
The garage in France quoted us £5,000 for a new engine; a cost we couldn't afford. They then offered to scrap the van for us, but they couldn't do anything without the vehicle documentation; something we didn't have. The person we bought the van from was really lazy in submitting the form to the DVLA, and therefore we hadn't received copies of the documentation before we left England. Now we were in limbo. We promised to get the documents to them, but in the meantime we couldn't wait there in France, so we all crammed into Hubby's parents' car, and continued the journey to Hubby's Homeland with only the basics:
* Travel clothes (consisting of sweats and "Guinness" T-Shirts)
* Basic toiletries
* My medical notes
* Jewellery
* One laptop
To this day we are still surviving on these things alone. The van is still in France, but now we are debating whether to get a reconditioned engine sent from England to be fitted into the van, and for it to be given a new lease of life; or to scrap it as originally intended. The paperwork still hasn't reached us, but it is in the mail as we speak. We hope to receive it tomorrow.
People are asking why we don't just scrap it and be donw with it, and I can only tell them it's because of the costs. We would have to pay to hire a van to take us back up to France, transfer all our things over, possibly pay to have the old van scrapped, drive back to Hubby's Homeland (all the time paying toll roads and hotels), only to have to give the hired van back and buy another vehicle here. Vehicles here come with a minimum price tag of £3,000. You can't seem to get an old banger over here like you can in England. It's for that reason that we're now considering paying to have the van fixed, and then at least we still have a vehicle at the end of all this.
The choice is obviously a gamble, and we're still liaising with both the seller of a reconditioned engine in England, and the garage that has our van in France, as to what the best option will be. I will keep you posted.
But on to today; we are going for our 4D scan in less than 3 hours. I need to get some lemonade to wake up the baby...
I'll update you more the next time I post.
2 comments:
Girly I have missed you!!! So glad to see your little belly bump! Update us more! :)
Thanks, I've missed you too. I have to start catching up on your blog!
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