Here at MK with "The Doctor"

Steve and his keyboards and electric guitars 
that are ours to play with while we are here. 

We arrived safe and sound at Gatwick airport early this morning (England time), and took a two hour cab ride (which would have been about the same price as three of us by train) to Milton Keynes, a town outside of London. Steve, our home exchange host, met us at the front door. Our home away from home is a tidy bachelor pad; a smallish but comfortable two level home on a leafy street. Steve took us for a drive around to get some groceries at a nearby supermarket  (with moving sidewalks!) and to see some local sites. Then he finished up some work at his home office and set off for our house, purple suitcase in hand. The three of us all keep dozing off due to jet lag but it is almost 9:00 pm now and we are heading to bed so will probably be much better in the morning. We are assimilating to the culture quickly. By the end of Steve's tour I was no longer walking to the driver's side door thinking it was the passenger side and amazingly I have lived the day with no coffee. Steve has instant decafe only and he doesn`t even own a coffee maker. So I had some very strong tea instead.  I made us some dinner, and then lo and behold look what was found on TV. You must admit that there is no better way to end our first day in England than to watch an episode of Dr. Who on the BBC. The brand new season starts tomorrow at 7:00 so like all good aspiring young Brits Leif and Kendra will certainly be watching it.

 "The Doctor"

At the airport

What a beautiful airport we have. We arrived here early for our flight, chauffeured by my friend Cheryl, so didn't even have to call a cab. We have an hour or so to wait before boarding so we have parked ourselves outside of Starbucks.

 Last night was spent doing the last minute cleaning that never got done before. Slow but sure, the house was buffed up to the point that I could leave it happily. Powered by ample amounts of loud music from "Mom's Fave's" playlist and the energetic welcome presence of Kendra's boyfriend Erik (Leif and he team scrubbed the kitchen floor around midnight) we danced our way into tidiness. I had to save the final vacuuming for the morning. Cheryl was here at 7:30 am, and there was a last minute scramble to wipe down the counters and take out the garbage but pretty much everything was done.

House Cleaning for House Swapping : The Towel Lesson

According to experienced house swappers, when problems do occur in home exchanges it is usually because the two parties have very different definitions of the words "clean and tidy".  This fact can be a little intimidating. You know what it is like when you have someone pop over and suddenly you realize how dirty the kitchen floor is? Before they set foot in your house it was perfectly clean, but once they arrive, the floor immediately transforms and is suddenly covered with bits of toast crumbs, dirt, and coffee splashes. Hosting a home exchange feels like that, except multiplied by forty. You have to add in the complete viewing of your bedroom,  garage,  linen closet and the insides of all your cupboards too. And unless you put a lock on it, that one room in your house you designate as "the messy room" where you stash all your piles of stuff will be available for everyone to see. You won't even be around to make up an excuse. In a home exchange, there IS no excuse. You brought this one  on yourself entirely, from start to finish. 

I discovered something while getting the place ready for guests here. You need to start big and then go down to the details. Sounds obvious, doesn't it? The kitchen needed painting -that's big. Buying a new carpet for the master bedroom is another big one too. Ditto for getting the back garden organized and replacing the old lawn chairs that were falling apart. Solve the big problems early and leave all the details for the end.  Details are just too easily disrupted by your family's normal day to day routine.  For example, last week I spent way too much time folding all our towels  into a lovely, absolutely perfect pile on the linen closet shelf. I congratulated myself on the Martha Stewart-ish way they all lined up and thought how nice it would be for our guest to help himself to a towel from such a handsome assortment.  Today I peeked in there and discovered they were all missing. Every single one had been used  and were now all in the laundry hamper, damp and waiting to be washed and folded once again.  I had forgotten that our normal day to day routine includes using up the clean towels in the house. So tomorrow is our last day before we go and it will be detail day: vacuuming, dusting, bathroom cleaning, and of course, towel folding. 

Glass Doors

"Are you going to lock your valuables away while you are gone?" I have been asked this on a number of occasions. My answer is always pretty much the same "Valuables? What valuables?" Aside from a few minor antiques that would be hard to haul away, most of my treasured items only have sentimental value and would be of little use or interest to others. I could always toss them in a box and lock them in the bike shed if need be, but the feedback from everyone who regularly does home exchanges is that the incidence of damage and theft is so low that it is practically nonexistent. Nevertheless I thought I should prepare myself for the worse if we were going to go through with this. As I looked around my home, I wondered, what really was the most valuable thing I had? I did find something;  the beautiful glass doors in the front room that were originally from my parent's 1928 Vancouver home. The beloved old house was torn down years go so these doors were pretty special. If I returned and they were broken or even smashed beyond repair how would I feel?  Was I ready for that? I consoled myself by remembering that in truth, everything, no matter how important we think it is, eventually breaks. Objects can be replaced or repaired, even these doors.

Anyways, I thought to myself, I certainly could try to find people to house swap with who would not be  the types interested into swinging on the doors like crazy gorillas or have wild parties where people would be banishing hammers. Finding a home exchange is not like putting your name down for a lottery and having to take whatever person you won, right?  (oh -- how little did I know,  more details on that point in a later posting).

The home exchange experience involves lots of communication including emails, photos, skype and maybe even a youtube video tour of your home. Both parties get a sense of what each are like. Trust builds and hopefully all will be well at the end of your trips and you both return to a tidy house with everything intact. Our guy, Stephen from Milton Keynes in England,  has had quite a bit of home exchanging experience, and he certainly seems like a very nice fellow.  He will be renting his own car while staying at our house, and will meet us when we arrive in England to exchange house keys, before he heads off to catch his flight to Canada.

Leaving soon with fingers crossed, deep breaths, and hammers tucked safely away.

T minus two weeks and counting

This journey started way back in February, 
when I was causally looking at home exchange websites. I had recently watched the movie The Holiday which is a story about two women who exchange houses, and I suppose that it was a bit of an inspiration for me. I had been thinking of taking my two teenagers to England, but it seemed like it would be very expensive. Our last big trip together was five years ago - a month in Europe,  but we were able to stay with my cousin in Germany and managed to keep the costs low. It seemed to me the only way we would be able to afford a trip to England was to try a "house swap".  

I happened upon one of the bigger home exchange sites:  HomeExchange.com  and while playing around with their search features I found a listing (from Wales) that actually mentioned my city as their preferred destination. Somehow seeing that made everything crystal clear; this was a very real possibility.

In retrospect I was pretty naive, thinking that the people on the other side of the listing would definitely want to exchange with us. There are plenty of steps between seeing a listing and doing a home exchange,  I wasn't even a member the site.  Nevertheless, I ran in to my son's bedroom and asked what he thought. Not surprisingly, he had no objections.  My very next action was to grab my cell phone and send a text my daughter who was at a party.  "How would you like to go to Wales?".  When she received my text she was baffled. Going to Wales? What was her crazy mother up to?

Fast forward six months, and here we are. In exactly two  weeks we will be on a plane to England. There is still lots to do; prepping  the house, organizing pet care, shopping for decent shoes. We will, in fact, be visiting Wales, but not the same little house I saw on the website half a year ago. In fact the Wales part of the trip will not be a home exchange at all, we have ended up renting a cottage for a week in order to join up two separate house exchanges.

 In total we will be in England (and Wales!) for six weeks.