I suggest letting someone else do the motor swap if you arent able to pull the axles. But to be the nice guy i am, ill tell you. Leaving the wheels on, you need to break the hub nut off. You may need to unstake the nut. Part of the top of the nut will be bent into the nut to prevent it from spinning off. You will need to use a punch or something to bend it back out so you can get it off. Now take off your wheels. Then you need to undo the strut fork nuts so you can swing the strut assembly and pull the axle from the hub. Then you can pull/pry the axle from the transmission. They are usually hard to pull from the transmission and that might be the reason why you heard they were hard to do.