Preparing to depart for our first Foreign Service post

If adjusting to life with a baby wasn't enough, we were also preparing for the move to Kingston. Probably the biggest thing was the paperwork to get our new family member permission to go! A lot of this is boring details for my own memorykeeping and future reference for our next move in a few years, so feel free to skip this!

Getting a Newborn onto Travel Orders
In order for Olivia to get on Adam's travel orders to Kingston, we needed to have her passport/visa and she needed to be medically cleared. Since our departure was set for Jan. 29, it gave us just over a month and you can't even get the forms for medical clearance filled any earlier than 4 weeks. Good thing she wasn't born later- we would've been leaving in February!

Here is the timeline in brief for getting Olivia onto the travel orders-
12/20- Olivia is born!
1/3- Submitted passport applications (both for regular and diplomatic), but not processed since her birth certificate wasn't ready
1/8- Birth record in the system for VA
1/11- Drove to Richmond, VA to pick up copies of Olivia's birth certificate
1/13- Adam dropped off a copy of her birth certificate and requested same day printing of her passport. Adam then dropped off our passports to get the Jamaican visa.
1/17- Olivia had her 4 week appointment to get paperwork filled out for Medical Clearance (4 weeks is the earliest you can get the form filled out by the pediatrician)
1/24- Olivia got medical clearance at the end of the workday on Friday so Adam had to wait till Monday to talk to HR
1/27- Adam spent all morning trying to get in touch with someone about getting her added to the orders, which finally happened in the afternoon. Adam checks out of FSI!
1/28- We get our seats on the airplane for Kingston...just in time! ;) And luckily once we were at the airport, the American Airlines staff put us together because originally we were seated apart.

Here's a little more detail... in order to get a passport, we needed to get a birth certificate, and it takes 10 business days to get into the system in VA (with the holidays, that meant Jan. 8 for us). The Vital Records Office wouldn't confirm whether she was in the system, but luckily, the staff in the records office at the Virginia Hospital Center were wiling to look that up. Expedited mail takes up to another week and is way more expensive, so we ended up driving to Richmond that Saturday to pick up copies.

We tried to expedite the process by submitting the passport application ahead of time without the birth certificate. We tried going to the passport desk in the State Department but they only take checks (!!) when we tried to pay for her regular passport. We ended up going to the passport office around the corner, which worked out better because they print the passports right there. Once her birth certificate was in, Adam had to make a few trips to the passport office in DC and talk with a manager to get the passports printed up on the same day.

Overall, Adam had to be very proactive in order to make things happen a little faster, which meant lots of phone calls and finding out the status of things. In the end, it worked out but it made Adam super antsy.

Packing, Round 2

As I mentioned in a previous post, we are permitted a certain amount of shipped items to our post- HHE (household effects) and UAB (unaccompanied air baggage). We already shipped some things from Boulder to DC that we haven't seen in months that is already on its way to Kingston.

We were permitted another HHE and UAB (unaccompanied air baggage) shipment from DC to Kingston. So of course, despite getting rid of a lot of things prior to going to DC, living in a furnished apartment, and having moved from one apartment in DC to another, we still had a ton of stuff! Adam spent HOURS scanning and shredding our files.

Not only that, but we also spent a LOT of time deciding what kind of luggage to purchase (our last day in DC was spent running around returning the bags we decided against). I should've taken a photo of all the different bags Adam had bought to try out! In the end, we had our two large Delsey suitcases, two large duffels that I think Adam bought at Target or Marshalls, an old secondhand suitcase, and two small carry-on Samsonite suitcases. Ugh, I hate luggage!

For our HHE from DC, we shipped off Olivia's crib, mattress, Olivia's clothes that were 3 months and above,  our recliner, some kitchen supplies that we deemed not super urgent (sadly I think my cookie sheets and cupcake tins were in that batch), and books.

For our UAB, we had up to 600 lbs of stuff that we could ship. We only shipped 400 lbs (I know, how in the world did we have 400 lbs of stuff?!?!? Granted, it includes all the packaging material as well). Our UAB includes our pots/pans, KitchenAid, blender, rice cooker, my scrapbooks, Olivia's baby swing (I can't wait for that to arrive!), and our spices. It takes about three weeks to arrive so I hope it comes in the next week or so!

The things that we brought on the airplane with us- clothes & shoes, diapers, wipes, Olivia's pack n play, stroller/carseat/carseat base, Olivia's playmat, and miscellaneous things that we thought we might need in our first few days (1 knife, cutting board, nicer sheets/towels).

Since arriving in Jamaica, I think we would have packed some things a bit differently. We found out that we can order things from Amazon and Walmart.com and other places pretty easily (I ordered diaper wipes and it arrived within 5 days from Amazon), so I wouldn't have packed the wipes and laundry detergent- instead I would've just ordered them before we arrived at post. We probably also would have mailed some things off in packages ahead of time to ourselves so we didn't have so many bags to lug about. Instead, I would've brought baking and cooking supplies with me on the plane. Oh well, it'll all come soon!

Photos of our last few days

Last dinner with Nathan at Carlyle! It was delicious (YUM on mashed cauliflower and a tasty jambalaya).

Olivia sleeping right through the movers packing our stuff- we thought they would only send 2 people to pack up our small apartment, but there were 4 movers bustling about. 

Our very last night- we were able to go out to dinner with Ethan, Jason, Stacia and Grigs (and yay! They took most of our leftover food so I didn't have to feel bad about throwing things away) and then we did the last final packup while watching Dexter (and Olivia played on her playmat).