We made it!

48 hours into our new adventure and I feel it's time to sit down and share our story so far.

Thursday morning found us up bright and early ready to say our final good byes and head to the airport. After an emotional start the rest of the morning proved quite amusing. Upon arrival at Heathrow we realized quite how much luggage we had and how small their trolleys actually are. We did eventually manage to "fit" our 6 large bags, 2 hand luggage suitcases, 2 rucksacks, a pushchair and a carseat onto 2 trolleys. Steph then promptly insisted on trying to push a trolley - quite an entertaining sight.

Thank you Dave K for helping us, not sure we'd have managed all of it on our own. Check in was straight forward enough, although we were slightly bemused by the insistence on having proof that we were coming home as the end date on our Visa's wasn't good enough!

Security came next where Andy and I had a tacit agreement that I would take Steph and sort her and me through and he would take all the electrical items through. Simple enough?! For those that know my husband you can imagine the amount of electrical stuff that "needed" to come with us, as we couldn't possibly cope without them for the first 6 weeks; kindle, Android pad, SLR camera ( my contributions to the stash), small desktop machine, 2 external hard drives, another Android pad and SLR camera and the x-box to name but a few items in the case, along with cables of all kinds. Suffice to say Andy was at security for a good 15 minutes as the staff made him empty the case out!

Our first flight took us to Reykjavik where we had a lovely overnight stop. Flight number 2 departed Friday afternoon and, for me, was where the adventure really felt it was beginning as our next stop was going to be our local airport for the foreseeable future. Following lots of advice from various people we managed to keep Steph entertained for the first half of the flight, until she fell asleep.

She was so excited every time another present appeared out of her suitcase: she particularly loved making little cardboard fairies fly around her seat, thank you Suzi.

We finally reached Denver airport very late Friday night, UK time, and consequently dealt with immigration through a haze of emotion, exhaustion and adrenaline. Next came the challenge of squeezing all our bags into the hire car - it's a good thing baby number 2 is still a bump and not a reality as there would have been no room for him /her. Then we were on our way, our end destination was in sight!
Friday night was a bit of a blur of getting in, unloading bags from the car and heading to bed. Saturday we were up bright and early - very bright and early in fact as Steph introduced us to 5:30am for the first time ever!
Saturday was a day of sleepy exploration. Andy introduced us to the delights of breakfasting out in a really good cafe that he found last time he was here. We followed this with some shopping where we were able to finally buy Steph her proper birthday present. She is now the proud owner of  a very pink balance bike and helmet - photos to follow. (She loves it all so much she is, as I type, in bed with her pink helmet!). A visit to the park was then the order of the day.
Much as I enjoyed Saturday I failed to take in our surroundings or really appreciate what an amazing place we have found ourselves to be in, I think I was viewing it all through a sleepy and emotional fug. However Sunday changed that.
We all slept very well Saturday night and were not woken until nearly 7:00am. Breakfast out again and then some more shopping for things we actually needed - well that was the excuse I used to get Andy to take me back to REI (a fantastic outdoor shop that is only round the corner from us and sells everything you didn't know that you needed). Sunday afternoon found us heading out for a walk. The bungalow we are currently staying in is right on the edge of Boulder next to the Flatirons and lots of proper walking. We only had a short bimble as bump is currently limiting my walking ability and any decent walks covered altitude. We're trying to be sensible and let my body, with bump, adjust to the altitude of Boulder before going further. Despite it being only a bimble the views and surrounding area are stunning. Nothing like the English vistas but amazing all the same, green mountains one side, flat built up but still green the other and lots of blue sky and sun :)

 Photos will be attached but we're currently on very limited internet and uploading photos takes more than we have.
When we arrived back after our walk we set too and managed to finish the unpacking which we'd been slowly working our way through. The bungalow feels more settled for us now and is really adding to the feeling relaxing into life.
Although very tired Steph has adjusted very well. She has happily played with her toys and is loving the selection of books already here in the house. She particularly loves her bed, which is a, very bouncy, mattress on the floor. She announced on Saturday night that there was ''One little monkey bouncing on the bed,'' as she bounced on the bed!
I'm sure it's novelty as much as anything else at the moment but so far we do seem to be in a truly wonderful part of the world. As I said above the area is gorgeous, there's space and green and walking and cycling, I could go on........! Boulder itself seems to be a very cosmopolitan American town, with it's run of the mill shopping centres but also a beautiful pedestrianised town centre and Boulder Creek running right through the middle of it. At the moment what I have seen is very limited but I'm hoping that I can spend most of the next couple of weeks exploring it all and really seeing how fantastic it all is. I just need to master the art of American driving now.......
This week is when real life sort of sets in. Andy started his new job properly this morning, loving the fact that is was 10 mins door to door with the car. Makes such a change to the 1 1/2 hr commute from before. I get to be a Mummy at home again for a while and the major exploration of new life begins. We need to find a house, a car, some toddler groups, shops and everything else that means we can really settle and stop pretending we're on holiday. But all in good time, we'll start with a wonder to the park this afternoon and take it from there.

t-1

We're down to the final countdown! 

We've had a very busy few weeks since I last wrote. We've had the fullest social calendar that we've had in a long time as we have tried to say goodbye to as many people as possible. Thank you to all of you that have managed to squeeze us in. It's been so hard to say goodbye, it's made us realize how many lovely friends we have.
As well as this we have both been winding down at work and finally finished last Friday. Having both spent the last 6 years in our jobs I think Friday was a day of very mixed emotions. I know I was caught very much between excitement at moving forward, and onto something very different, and sadness. I was leaving a job that I have loved, in all it's different forms, and some wonderful colleagues, some who have become very dear friends and I shall miss so much.
Our two final weekends have been spent with family, making the most of our precious last moments and gathering as many photographs as I can manage.`

And now we find ourselves in our final week, very much looking forward. The 'magic men' arrived bright and early on Monday morning and very rapidly began boxing up our lives. In the meantime we, very optimistically, threw everything we hadn't yet packed, that we didn't want in the container, onto the bed. By the end of the day we had a huge mountain of stuff on the bed and decided we'd wave the magic wand the following day. Unbelievably it did all go into our bags with room to spare. I think at least one of the bags has the same properties as Mary Poppins' carpet bag!
It's actually been a rather relaxing few days. Steph has been staying at my Mum's since Sunday, thank you Mum, which has given Andy and I the chance to get organized. We've finally sorted the utilities, which proved more challenging than we thought. It seems most web sites for these things don't have 'I want to cancel my.........' buttons. We've also managed to loose several (important!) things and find them again, which does leave us in a quandary as to who should be in charge of the important documents when we fly tomorrow, not sure either of us can be trusted! (It seems what organizational abilities I had seem to have disappeared along with my one remaining brain cell, I blame 'the bump'.)
The grand cleaning mission has also started but in a very relaxed way as we can't do much until the men disappear. I've also finally had time to sit down long enough to write this, albeit sitting in the car :-) 
We took advantage of a child free evening yesterday and lack of anything to cook with in the kitchen and had an evening at Nirvana Spa. Highly unusual for us to do something like that and sit still long enough to enjoy it but it was lovely and so relaxing. Just what we needed. :)
Our container arrived just before lunch today, that really is like a tardis! Everything is just disappearing into it. Once it's packed we shall do a quick final clean and then head to the estate agents with the keys. Goodbye house, it's hard to believe we've been here 11 years.

Our final part of the day is to go to Mum's and enjoy a relaxing evening with her and Becks.

Then it really is goodbye as we head to Heathrow first thing in the morning...........

And so the adventure began back in November when hubby came home from work and happened to mention, oh so casually, that his company had an office in Boulder, Colorado and that it would be quite nice to work out there!
Now, 7 months later we find ourselves rapidly trying to get organised and ready for the 'big move' - 18 days to go!
Surprisingly there hasn't been as much to do as either of us thought (either that or there is lots we should be doing that neither of us has realised - entirely possible). We've had a fairly gentle few months of sorting through all our 'stuff' and giving away / selling various things, which has culminated in a grand final sort this weekend. We have been through everything again and now feel that everything we have is ready to be packed by the 'magic men' in a couple of weeks time. We're just left with a large pile of things to deal with, which basically means that anyone visiting over the next week or two will not be leaving empty handed!!!! Be warned!
The busiest part of moving has been the socialising and trying to see everyone or as many people as possible before we go and organising Little Miss's Birthday Party. It has been lovely to catch up with so many people, long overdue in many cases. We have two more weekends left, which mainly involve said birthday party, seeing and saying goodbye to family and marking dates in the diaries for those threatened visits. Such a nice thing, to go away knowing we already have visits from family booked in.
Last two weeks at work for both of us starting tomorrow, what I suspect are going to be two very busy weeks, again trying to fit in everything before we go - but also hopefully fun weeks that will leave us with some great final memories to take away with us.
Moving emotions are finally starting to kick in, great excitement, along with a mixture of everything else at the thought of leaving everything we know and love behind. But, no-one said adventure was easy, I know we'll have some very emotional moments over the next few weeks, but at the same time I know we shall have some great moments as we start our 'Family Adventure'.