I need to type this all out or I might go more nutty than I already am...
- School
- I'm hoping we can get Anja into a Montessori school. Really, really hoping. It'd be one less thing for her to acclimate to, and I feel like it's really important in terms of influencing who she is and how she develops. I know that for a lot of schools the registration was much earlier in the year, so I'm hoping our relocation agent can help us negotiate placement, if any schools are flexible enough to do that, in June/July. Getting this settled will make me feel SO much better about the whole move. Hugely.
- Housing
- We're looking at 2-2.5 bedroom places, but there so many factors to consider. Cost is obviously one. Proximity to our work locations and to school for Anja. Proximity to a park and public transporation (that's mandatory, since we won't have a vehicle, to be near something. Ideally U-Bahn or S-Bahn, or maybe even tram. If all else was perfect except this, bus.) Desire to live in a place that doesn't just feel like a group of white boxes tacked together, and has some character. We'd love to have some lawn, and a balcony. The need to find a place that has a kitchen already built in (EBK) and doesn't cost an arm and a leg to keep... oh, and that accepts pets. Are we nuts to think we'll find this? I hope our relo agent is FANTASTIC.
- John finding a job
- Anybody reading this know anybody in Munich who's looking to hire an excellent Entwicklungsingenieur? (R&D engineer)? Once my salary is figured out and John has a job and salary figured out, we'll have a much easier time of narrowing down apartments, partially based on cost, but also locations. This piece, along with school for Anja, are the two that are on my mind the most.
There are just a million things on my mind, lately, though. Those are the big ones. Other ones include:
- finding a good endocrinologist
- making sure to have enough diabetes supplies for a month or two in the beginning
- buying other meds/vitamins/etc. ahead of time in bulk to ship over with our stuff
- how to handle the selling/rental of our house, and corresponding lack of place to live during that time
- how to handle the selling/shipping of our household goods, and corresponding lack of stuff after everything ships/sells/etc
- how to handle the selling of our cars, and renting cars after that, to minimize cost and stress
- who's going to watch our cats for the month or two until we're ready to have them shipped over?
- finding trustworthy babysitters that don't cost an arm and a leg, babysitting co-ops via school?
- when to hold our tag sale, what to do with everything that doesn't sell
- managing our household food needs after the move - my need for wheat-free, Anja's sensitivity to cow's milk, finding a place to buy good, local organic produce and goods, getting into the pattern of how to grocery shop in small batches
- getting involved with some music communities, me for banjo and dance, Anja for singing, John for bass
- figuring out how to transport all this great free or cheap furniture that we won't have a truck for?
- finding time this summer to make it to the beach as much as possible, and balancing that with all the stress mentioned above
Edited to add, I missed a few...
- Granting my dad power-of-attorney so that someone here has that
- writing official wills, just in case
- figuring out automatic bill pay for student loans via our EuroBank setup
- to keep or get rid of our local bank acct?
- letting all relevant financial institutions know our new address, once we have one, and figuring out billpay for CC, etc.
I'm sure there are still more, of course. Wheeee!
