Panic ~ 32 days

It is a panic...

In 32 days we leave cold, wet, icy Ballarat, Victoria for sunny North Bundaberg, Queensland. As Geoff (from Late Night with Craig Ferguson) would say - "oh my" "In Your Face"...

And I am on the brink of a break down! How on earth do we cull and entire house down to be a pop up caravan and rear end of the station wagon! Of course Husband (probably sensibly) wants to go through every box, drawer and make sure there are not items we should keep ~ while I just want to chuck everything and anything out. Be gone - move on.

We are going to run out of time is my big fear. Of running out of money to get petrol along the way. Mind you ~ I have prudently got a few vouchers from surveys these past few weeks and now have a tidy $250 in 'universal' (excluding Woolworths) vouchers which can get food, petrol and we'll leave one with MIL for the cats keep for a month.

Still each day sees the bin fill a little more, the garage empty further, the rooms trim down to be a little less cluttered. This weekend is THE garage sale ~ aside from a few major items, most of the things for sale will be $1-$2. If even half the stuff sells - we should get a few hundred dollars. We will be needing it because we are on the wire with all of this moving, culling and simplifying.

Once we get to the end of the garage sale it will be a heck of a lot easier. Because then things can just go straight into the dump bin. Would anyone be interested in a big box of perfectly clean, white cloth nappies? Seriously I have some beautiful kids stuff - kept in anticipation of the additional kids we tried to have. Sadly, too many just didn't stick any longer than a few months so we have our two to love and have had to leave it there.

Now it is time to move into the future and its a very exciting one. 

I could not wish or want for more...

About the debt

For all the chaos, we are down to a few big debts remaining. There is the personal loan, the credit card, the line of credit and the mortgage. We have paid the gas, the electricity, the school fees, the insurance, the fridge, the dental bill, homecare, the rates, our magazine subscriptions, phone bills - any thing which is not up to date with payments is now cancelled, paid in full. Woo Hoo!!

Sadly - the line of credit is at $19000, the credit card is almost $5000 and the loan is $3500. But the BIG picture of having a debt of $37000 back in September/October, this is now $27500 ~ almost $10000 less than it was 8-9 months ago. On a combined income of less than $30000. 

The mortgage is up to date ~ with a payment waiting. Mind you ~ the savings we had stashed for the solar panels have been used for the car's engine and repairs to get registered and back on the road, plus the pop top van and its registration. We've still got about $1000 left however its going to be for getting the house ready for tenants. 

Already the big expense will be cutting back the giant soap gum tree at the front door and the silver gum at the fence line. The beautiful big soap gum which has featured so many time in pictures is dying. It appears the roots have been cut over on the neighbours' property some time last year (we won't go there - it happens) and ants have started to create a huge nest in the trunk, weakening it to the point it will be dangerous in the coming year. 

The silver gum has been cut back so many times on one side by the power company, it is now unbalanced. If they could simply trim on both sides it would not be so lop-sided. Oh well ~ that's what you get with the bureaucracy of 'safety'.

Time to go ~ let's see who the focus of packing continues...