Well..... We are finally in the last days of getting ready for our big adventure!The last 5 months have been pretty busy getting the house ready for our house-sitters, as well as jumping through all the hoops to get our Italian visas so that we can reside in Florence for year.
We finally got these visas in October after Lyn had spent the best part of a year making sure that all our paperwork was in order!
The first interview was not a good start, but after we had convinced the Italian Consulate that we had done our homework, it got a lot easier and the second interview was almost a pleasure - a really nice guy with sense of humour and who understood what we were doing.
The house is now in pristine condition (decluttered to the max) and the small cottage is now full of stuff. It was an excellent opportunity to go through the house and sort a lot of stuff out.
We have rendered, painted, repaired and modified, so the house is in pretty good shape for when we return in December next year!
The "world of sheds" is complete, an extension added to the side and the front apron covered in so that we can get the vehicles under cover for the year.
The sad part was that we had to take Jenny (our 13yr old border collie) to the vet for the last time as she was not well and the summer heat was already taking a toll on her.
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| And Her Italian Was Going So Well! |
It was a sad day, but we felt better in knowing that it was the right decision.
We leave on Wednesday, 17th December at 1:30pm and we will then have Christmas with Lyn's son Liam, his wife Jo and the two grand-kids Alba and Yarran, before heading to Italy on 5th January.
We decided to take the train through Europe (because we can and thought it would be a great experience), so we will have 2 nights in Paris and 1 night in Zurich before getting to Florence via Milan.
The next post will be from cold and wintery Europe!
Merry Christmas and a Happy new Year To Everyone!