Our Colorado to North Carolina Move in Pictures (and a Video!)

I have SO fallen down on the job of staying in touch! I seriously thought I'd be able to pack the ranch, move across the country, unpack, and keep blogging and YouTubing, hahahahahahaaaaaaaa! Lord. What was I thinking?

So, to catch up, here is the roundup in pictures! (and a video of the herd's arrival!)

June 16th: The movers came and went. After their typical, "There is no way all this is going to fit." and me telling them it better, then calling their boss and telling him that it was packed horribly and they better repack it—this guy hopped in and repacked a bunch of it to the ceiling toward the front so everything did fit! Whew! We had already packed two 8x16' PODS and we had downsized considerably, so we knew it was going to work if packed correctly.

Luckily, we sold the tractor to the new owners so Brad was able to use the forks and get my slice of Cottonwood tree trunk into the truck! Won't that make an amazing coffee table someday? Something special from our Colorado ranch :-)

June 19th: Brad, older son Josh (who flew in to drive with Brad), Lucy, and Tessa in the truck pulling the horse trailer with personal effects. They drove straight across the country in 27 hours. They arrived on Sunday the 20th.

Michael and I were still staying at the Colorado house, waiting for the 22nd when the animals would be picked up. We went to our favorite restaurants a lot :-)

The movers unexpectedly arrived on Monday the 21st. They opened the door to find the whole back end of the truck in a jumble. Looks like the truck had rolled! Other than a few broken items and some taco shaped bike wheels, the items were for the most part ok.

My last sunset pic at our Colorado ranch...there were some feelings about that one...

June 22nd: My family all came to start unpacking and get the basics set up! Wow!

June 22nd: Our horses Rayn and Wynter, mini donkey Sweetness, and 10 goats were loaded into the horse transport bright and early to beat the heat. They also drove straight through, it took about 35 hours.

The goats were separated into 3 stalls, the bucks (above) and two sets of girls.

I had been explaining this to all of the animals for months and teaching them to load. They all got onto the truck pretty easily and settled in. Sweetness had his own stall but unfortunately, like the goats, he couldn't see outside. I think Sweetness had the hardest time with the move. The two horses could see each other and the goats all had buddies but Sweetness was in a stall by himself and couldn't see anyone! With our previous option he would have been in the same stall as Rayn but that didn't seem too safe for him.

Wynter

Rayn

Our flight was that evening. Michael and I were scrambling to get the last things packed into our 6 suitcases (that was fun to get into the airport with) and get to the airport on time. We arrived at the gate with 10 minutes to spare before boarding! Ack! Mikey and I are leisurely airport goers so this was super stressful for us!

We arrived in NC at midnight and Brad was there to greet us—back together again! It was so great to drive up to our new home and see everything lit up.

June 23rd dawned bright and beautiful. My family came over to continue to help unpack and wait for the arrival of the herd.

You can see the video of their arrival here!  All the preparation for loading paid off and they did great on their trip across the country!

Surrounded by flattened boxes and piles of packing paper, that evening we all had dinner together: Brad, Michael, Mom, Dad, Katy, Chris and me. What a joy to have family so close that we can get together anytime. It's been 18 years since we moved to Colorado. We've been back all of 2 months and it still feels surreal.

It's a gift. That's all I can say. An absolute gift.

Love to all from the Mother Ranch NC,

Julia