Moving into our house!

Part 1: Turning on the Gas

One of the things preventing us from moving into our new house and progressing on that front was that the gas was off. Without the gas being on, FMO (the Furnishing Management Office) on base would not move our furniture in. So our first step was to make an appointment with the gas company. They emailed us (AND called us) giving us the three-hour time slot two weeks out in which they would show up. We could make little progress on our house until this appointment was completed, so we were left waiting out the two weeks carrying out other chores. The gas company said we have to be out by our meter for the appointment, and that if the gas man drives by and doesn’t see us, he will continue on to his next appointment and we will have to reschedule. (Which obviously would mean another 1-2 weeks before we’d get another try)

You don’t get to pick your time slot, they choose for you, and unfortunately the time they chose happened to be when Troy was at a mandatory briefing. So guess what lucky pregnant lady was left with the 3-hour task of waiting for the gasman? Oh, and the forecast was scheduled with an 80% chance of rain. Awesome! And despite the fact that I had the foresight to pack my raingear in my duffle, I had failed to predict that none of it would zip up at the moment…

Our meter, like most others, is right on the roadside, so it is impossible to sit under the porch and shelter of the house at the top of the driveway and wait, as the gasman would not see me as he speeds by in true Italian style driving. Fortunately Troy’s briefing ended hours early and he texted me half and hour before I left for the appointment saying he could come with me. The rain, although it had poured all morning, had stopped just in time for the appointment and would only leak a drop or two sporadically from there on out. It was much easier to have company as we waited for the gasman. We packed a lunch and had ourselves a picnic, and since there was no rain we could read and fill out forms without fear of them getting wet. We spent the beginning of our time composing a birth plan for the hospital.

Two hours out our landlords insisted I come in from the cold, so I had to abandon Troy to stand at the meter by his lonesome. However just after I brought him a cup of hot tea of the landlords only minutes later, the gas man showed up and switched on the gas. It took him about 5 minutes, he also walked through the house to make sure it was on, Troy signed some forms and was free to join me upstairs with the landlords. Every time we go over to the house the landlords insist on us visiting and on feeding us. Nearly every time we are offered tea and biscotti to dip into it. I believe this must be an Italian thing and I made note that I need to get such things to offer people when they come to visit. They also nearly always have fresh bread and cheese. The landlord said he goes out daily to get his fresh loaf of bread.

Part 2/3: Receiving FMO and Unaccompanied Baggage

The following Friday was the main day for moving in. FMO was going to bring over some furnishings as we had the gas turned on, the internet man was coming to set up the internet, and our Unaccompanied Baggage shipment was going to be released from storage and brought over. All three of those things were “all day appointments” where one has to sit around all day wondering when they will show, however since we were fortunate enough to be able to schedule them all the same day, it meant we only had to do it once and not 3 separate days. 

My DH, filling out the house condition on the inspection forms. I followed him from room to room and took pictures of the conditions we found. Paint chips, cracks on walls, etc. 

A shot of our empty living room, the left side of it with doors opening to the yard. 

The rest of the living room, possibly going to end up as a dining room. We are glad the house gets so much light naturally, less artificial lighting needed!

A shot of the kitchen before FMO came with the appliances. 

Part of our bedroom. We are quite lucky to have built-in mini closets, very few Italian homes have closets or anything embedded in the walls like you see above.

The first group that arrived was our “Unaccompanied Baggage”. When you PCS (change bases) you are allowed two shipments, the first is Unaccompanied Baggage. There is a specific list of things you are allowed to place in this shipment and you are only allowed 500 lbs tops. (At least, I believe that’s it for everyone, higher ranks might possibly have a bit more, but I don’t think so). Immediate needs are basically the things one puts in this shipment as it’s supposed to get there soonest. We put all of our kitchen supplies in there, as we knew that food is a priority and terribly expensive if you can’t cook things for yourself. We also put some baby stuff in it, like the basinet, clothes, diapers, etc. Our bikes were also in the shipment as well as a few other things we thought would be useful.

Things for future note or other air force wives: sheets, pillows, and blankets! The base lends you a spare bed until your real one arrives, but it’s a frame and a mattress, we did not think to bring a sheet set for it and refuse to buy another just for the next few weeks, but we happened to have some spare blankets to lay down in place of them. But in the future we’ll put our own spare sheet set in the expedited shipment.

I was anxious to see how our items would arrive; I’ve heard horror stories of missing and severely damaged items arriving at locations. However, I had spent the months up to our move preparing for this. Based on the advice of other wives, I had inventoried EVERYTHING we owned. A detailed inventory, as in I had the measurements, brand, cost, and pictures to accompany each item. We then purchased plastic bins from the store and packed everything ourselves. The office on base will tell you this is unnecessary, as they come with their own packing tools and supplies. However, they arrive only with brown paper, and they will wrap your stuff and crinkle the paper in an attempt to add protective padding, but it is far from fail proof. And in the chaos of packing you can’t keep track of what goes where. There will be men in every room of your house selecting and shoving random items into boxes.

My hubby and I, (well, mostly me cuz he was at work most days), packed the plastic tubs, wrapping each item in newspaper, bubble wrap, or best, our own clothes and towels, as they are soft, offer superior padding, and need to be packed anyway! I made files in my computer listing what went in each bin, copy and pasting the previously noted details and accompanying pictures. The bins were then sealed and labeled: Kitchen Bin #1, Baby Room Bin #1, etc. Now when they unpack the massive brown boxes, they simply pull out a bin, place it in the proper room, and leave. Without this system they unpack everything in one room and would pull out all the random things they packed themselves and place them in your living room and you are then left to sort and organize and haul things from room to room, also not knowing if everything made it because you have no detailed inventory.

My Hubby and I watching them unload our shipment. Notice the squished box in the middle there, yup, that's one of our bikes. It was missing pieces, but we were able to find some later in their truck. My bike's going to need some TLC before I can ride it again... 

As they unloaded, I pulled up my document/inventory and sat at the entrance to our house. I had them unpack the large brown boxes on our porch, pull out the bins, and give me the names on the labels. Once I had crossed it off of my list they were free to take it inside to the appropriate room. (they are not required to unpack personally packed bins, but that was more than fine by me!) This system work well and it was organized and systematic. When things were found missing they happened to find another box in their truck. (They had boxes for many families they were delivering to that day, so we couldn’t have assumed the whole truck was for us, but without the inventory it would have been difficult to recall how much we were supposed to receive as we had packed it two months previous)

One of our casualties, but everything inside of it was unbroken! I am quite convinced that the bins were the way to go, even if this one didn't make it, it still added extra protection and took the blow other items would have been dealt without it's presence. The bins gave a firm structure to put things in, rather than randomly shoving them in massive brown boxes which are piled any which way, squishing each other. 

After they had unpacked everything and I had approved it from my inventory they left. We had two other casualties, the Brita Filter Jug was cracked and broken and a glass jar broke. These happened to be things that they packed, as they said we were far under the weight limit and could stick in more, they grabbed some random items from the kitchen that weren’t pre-packed into my bins… and that’s what became of them. Luckily they weren’t important.

Shortly after FMO arrived. The furnishings management office loans people over seas furniture for their stay. Few homes in Italy come with refrigerators, stoves, washers, or dryers, so they will loan you all of that. By chance, we didn’t get hand me downs from previous military members, but brand new appliances! They were cutting off the shrink-wrap around the stove and placing in shiny new parts. I was so excited! All the appliances, save for the microwave, were brand new. They also loan wardrobes, at least, that’s what they call them. I didn’t take a picture because I find them hideous, but I’ll get one up here at some point. They look like massive brown lockers, but due to the fact that there are no closets in Italian homes, there is nowhere to store items or hang clothes. These items we are allowed to keep for however many years we are here, then they also have temporary loan items, such as the bed and night stand, which are only ours until our own arrive in the second shipment of goods.

We ate lunch with our landlords, who gave us bread and cheese, a bean soup, and some pasta. The landlord is really quite wonderful and was down at our place helping movers move things and translating for movers with poor English. He also provided many adaptors for us as my hubby and I are still getting accustomed to the various plugs and outlets here and were uncertain which ones we needed to buy.

                                                                    Part 4: Getting Internet!

The last item of the day was the Internet man. (NOW we can really move in! haha) He came and installed the Internet and it worked fantastically! I’ve heard from so many others that they weren’t able to get someone to set up their Internet for months, and when they did, it was dreadfully slow. We discovered this is because our landlords (who don’t even use internet or computers) had the very best installed at our house; “It’s Fiber Optica” the landlord kept telling us excitedly. We nodded and smiled, not entirely sure what the big deal was. Later we learned most every else around these parts have antenna. Since ours was already installed, it merely had to be checked and turned on, so despite only making the appointment the day before, they were able to come and turn on the Internet for us the very next day.

                                                                   Part 5: Cleaning :P

We still don’t get to move in until February 1^st, as that’s when the payment cycle and everything begins, but we’ve started! We’ve since spent nearly every day over there cleaning the place in preparation for unpacking and moving in. You may have noticed the dirty floors in the first picture. The place needs extensive cleaning, even though we took it over from another tenant, he was a guy by himself and obviously didn’t clean house…

Spiders on the ceiling in the hall... and this is just one section. They are everywhere!!!

We still have a lot of work left to do, but each day we come closer to actually living there. We can’t wait to get out of the hotel/temporary lodging and have our own place and be able to cook real meals! (We are currently eating sandwiches for 2 meals a day and cold cereal for the other meal… we’re ready for some meat and veggies!) Until then, we are counting down till February 1st!