Last night we had an early dinner at Ilonka's house before going up to Chris' place to look at our house plans. We picked Dad up on the way. Paul and I were both really happy with how the plans have come out. Chris uses a computer programme that enables you to rotate a 3D drawing of the house and see it from all angles. It makes it easy to visualise what our house will look like once it's finished. He's put the house on a twenty degree angle so that we get more sun in our dining/living rooms, kitchen and master bedroom. We can make a final decision on how much we want to rotate the house on the section, once it's been all levelled out.

Chris said the plans he has drawn are ready to go into the council, but he still needs a truss plan and a copy of our sale and purchase agreement. Paul dropped our sale and purchase agreement into his letter box this morning and also took a copy of our materials list into Carters. Hans is going to see if Carters will give us the same discount on materials that they would give Fowler Homes. We've had ITM do a quote for us already, but thought we might as well see what Carters would quote as well. We wanted to do this before we got ITM to do the truss plan because if we choose not to get our materials off them then they'll charge us $150 for the plan. If it takes Carters too long to do a quote for us we'll just pay the $150 so we can get our plans into the council quicker. We're estimating that they'll be in at the council for roughly a month.

This morning our storage container got delivered to Dad's house. Paul and Hans met the delivery guy there. It ended up costing us $120 instead of $150 for delivery through someone that Jos knows. We've put the container at the end of the older shed, opposite the tilter door. Dad had wanted the caravan or cabin to go there, but then realised that the power cable wouldn't extend that far from the shed. It looks like we will have to run the cabin parallel to the shed instead.

Paul also had his bank appointment at Westpac in Kamo, around lunch time. All he did today was set up his individual bank account, as he is currently banking at ANZ. We've got another bank appointment with Karla next Wednesday afternoon to open our joint account and to sign paper work before it goes off to our solicitor. We've decided to fix the land at a rate of 5.84% for the first year and then will re-evaluate everything once the house is completed. We also need to sort out life insurance. I think for now we're going to select the option where if one of us were to pass away their half of the mortgage would be paid out. There are lots of other scenarios to think about, but I think that will be enough to cover us for now.

Dad has been doing a lot of ringing around for us regarding hiring a cabin. He also managed to get our deposit back from North City Caravans. We were so lucky to get that back! Cabins to Go never replied to my email, but Dad contacted them and it doesn't look like they're going to have anything suitable available. They thought they were going to have one coming back that is slightly larger than what we had requested, but it isn't coming back anymore. I've completed a form on their website, in case anything does become available.

Poppa suggested Highlander Accommodation. They have to be delivered from Auckland too and work out at roughly the same price as Cabins to Go. We're still waiting to hear back from them, but the guy seemed to think that they would have something available. One week until we move out and still no accommodation, but I'm sure it will all work out in the end.

Paul and Hans priced out a Duracrete water tank. A 25,000 L tank is going to cost us $2950, as well as $275 for delivery + GST. Dad contacted a place in Kaiwaka that does tanks too, as he had heard they did good quality ones. They only worked out being $3.00 cheaper though so will probably stick with a Duracrete one.

It seems like a lot has happened this week. Last Sunday afternoon Paul and I spent a couple of hours sorting out the garage. It's going to be a big trip to the dump on Saturday morning! We also found a couple of little field mice amongst our boxes. I was at home sick Tuesday and Wednesday so spent some time sorting the kitchen and packing things into banana boxes. I've got six stacked up so far, with only kitchen items in them. It's really hard to work out what to put in storage for 6-8 months and what you will want in your cabin. I think I might put our kitchen boxes at the front of the storage container so I can easily access them.

The goal this weekend is to take our rubbish to the dump Saturday morning, after the markets. Then to move a lot of our furniture e.g. lounge suite, dining table and spare beds to the storage container at Dad's block. I'm not sure if we're going to do that Saturday afternoon or on Sunday. Saturday night we have Gran's 80th dinner and Sunday is Father's Day so it's going to be a busy weekend. We still have to finish packing and work out how we're going to move our chicken house and what to do with the raised vegetable garden. I'm hoping I'll be able to transplant some of the vegetables, especially the broccoli as they've started to get broccoli heads on them. Excited to be starting our new adventure, but I will miss this little house that's been our home for the last two years too.