Glen, convinced we could live in the condo, felt if we renovated the bathroom and replaced the carpets, I would agree with him. As with most things in Victoria, everything is done at a slower pace. The ensuite's floor was tiled the day before Christmas. Geoff et. al. arrived just after Boxing Day and we had a great visit (see my photos here). The highlight of the visit was an exhibit about Ancient Egypt at the Royal BC Museum. We also took the family crabbing and did several beach walks.
My sister, Lynda, arrived mid-January (see my photos here). We enjoyed some seaside walks and spent time photographing the Government House and Beacon Hill Park gardens. By this time, we had decided we could live in Victoria so went back to Calgary to begin downsizing. Big job!!
At the beginning of March, we asked a realtor, Karen, to sell our Calgary townhouse. She was amazing and brought in a stager to make our home look more like a show home. Yvonne was brutal but in a good way. However, it meant getting rid of all our bookcases, the top of our china cabinet, and most of our chairs. We worked for two weeks boxing stuff up and getting a local moving company, Get a Move On, to lift the heavy furniture downstairs. Our home was now just a house. We listed it on March 20th and sold it on the 23rd. This was very unusual for the market in Calgary but we had a great team of advisors and we heeded their advice.
As we packed up the house, we took breaks and re-visited some of our favourite Calgary haunts like the downtown river walk, the zoo (with the pandas), and Canmore. We also checked out the new Calgary Central Library (see photos here)
We'd planned on returning to Victoria for an Easter holiday but this time with the intent to buy a townhouse. Even though we had done a lot of downsizing, we still had too much stuff to live comfortably in the condo. Karen had found us a great realtor, Beth, who helped us search for a townhouse. Several we liked sold before we arrived in Victoria but our favourite on-line choice was still on the market (see above photo). We looked at it and put in an offer.
Then we had to downsize the condo! With Beth's help, we changed the look of our apartment then headed back to Calgary, putting the condo on the market May 1st. Then the real work of packing up Calgary began. I've lost count of the number of times we got boxes and packing paper or made runs to Goodwill. We also moved our sectional couch to Meg's house as we knew we wouldn't need it in Victoria.
We moved out on June 4th and took possession of our townhouse on June 7th. Glen became vice-president of our strata council on the 12th so we hit the ground running. The former owners had left the place too dirty to live in so we stayed in the condo for two weeks while we cleaned and unpacked. The condo finally sold and we moved the furniture from there to the townhouse on July 26th using another great company, You Move Me.
In the meantime, we played golf, walked some beaches, checked out the cars during Deuce Days, and joined a Probus club. To see our Victoria Staycation photos, go here.
Now that fall is upon us, we can get back to settling into our 'new' place. The townhouse is 30 years old so needs some TLC. The garden is a work-in-progress and today Glen has finally begun painting the inside walls. We haven't hung any artwork as he wanted to paint first. We're also in the process of replacing the appliances and will begin renovating the ensuite bathroom after Christmas (Didn't I begin this blog with a bathroom reno?).
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