Moving from No California to Calgary...NEXT MONTH NEED ADVICE (house, schools)

[desimom]

Hello,
We are moving from warm Sacramento to cold Calgary next month (feb 2010) and I am looking for advice and a heads up on what to expect! Hubby's work in Calgary and he has been commuting up & down for 2 yrs, and we are finally ready to make the move. I know to expect COLD weather... and lots and lots of SNOW. How are the people there? I have heard Calgarians are friendly (atleast better than Californians).

I have a 5 yr old so I am assuming he will start K there? How are schools there?

I also have a 18 month old, so would love to join some mommy & me group (where shall I look for information)?

How is the move itself (if anyone drove from California to Canada)? What items are we allowed to bring in with us? Dad is a Canadian, so it will be moving back to stay. We have been out of Canada for 5 yrs, but he has been traveling up and down almost every week, is that considered living in Canada or US? We pay US taxes and file US returns. He is also paid in US. we are driving our car and using U-Pack for the rest of the house stuff. What items are we allowed to bring in the car vs what we must pack? am I allowed to bring in food items (instead of throwing all the stuff from my pantry!!)

Thanks....

[spaceman_matt]

Im sorry I cant answer most of your questions, but I can say Calgarians are friendly if somewhat gruff people.

For food items, be careful. Cans and boxed goods like cereal are probably ok, but any piece of fruit without a sticker on it will be thrown out. And I mean...if you have a bunch of banana's and two are missing stickers, they will take those two and throw them out. I had an entire box of mandarin oranges searched once, and they picked out any that the stickers had fallen off.

Not sure if you were aware of that, but it came as a surprise for me!