Road trip!

Since we weren't moving in this weekend, we decided to go exploring...

On Saturday we got up and drove to the coast. We were already on the west side of town so it only took about an hour and a half. Here's a picture of the drive to the coast.



It was just amazing to drive through hills and forests to get to the beach. Unlike anything I've ever seen, but reminded me of driving to the beach in Brazil.




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We stopped on the way to take a picture of Mt. hood and Mt. St. Helen's off in the distance.




We went to Seaside first, which was one of the stops made by Lewis and Clark.


It was really beautiful. We had lunch and drove to Cannon Beach. This beach was much nicer than seaside. It looked more like a New England style beach town and was super nice. Looking forward to bringing our parents out there. Here's some pictures of the famous rocks on Cannon Beach.













After spending a few hours driving around we went back to the hotel and got ready for dinner we drove into the city and had dinner at Gruner which was amazing. We wished we could have been moving in this weekend and spending our first weekend together in the new house, but I think we're making the best of it!

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Location:Portland, Oregon

We're almost there, hopefully!

So it's been an exciting week, but not the kind of exciting we wanted. We've been delayed on closing on the house due to a mix of problems with the mortgage company and some errors from the builder. And unfortunately an error by one delays the other and vice versa. So we're in a constantly changing timeline but hopefully we will be able to close on Tuesday. I've extended my trip to stay in Oregon until Tuesday because we originally thought we could close today and could have the movers deliver on Monday. But that has been pushed back even more so now I'm basically on a week long vacation in Oregon with not much to do. Victor has been getting some work done and we've been able to pick out a refrigerator, grill and garage door opener and look at other things for the house. But other than that, we're just enjoying the Oregon weather and seeing the sights!

On Tuesday I packed up all my belongings for the movers to come pick up. It was harder than I thought to go through all this stuff and it took me forever. But it got done!














This is just the stuff I've had at my parents house for the past few months. Our furniture and housewares had already been packed up. So once I get back to Dallas I'll be living out of a suitcase for a couple weeks before the final move to Portland.

Here's a view of my flight to Seattle, flying over the mountains. Beautiful! I had a short layover in Seattle and then the quick shuttle flight to Portland. The flights this time really weren't too bad but the shuttle to Portland is always a little bumpy.




Here's Victor trying out some furniture at IKEA. We've got a little formal dining area that we thing down the road we'll put some club chairs in and make a bar area instead of formal dining. And yes, Victor is actually smiling in an IKEA store. A sight I've never seen in almost 9 years :)





So we took care of the necessities: a media stand, refrigerator, garage door opener and a grill. We also got shower curtains and some towels. Those were the things we really NEEDED right away. Everything else we either have already or can add over time. This brings us to our one and only impulse buy: a Keurig. Mind you, we already have a nice coffee maker and a Nespresso maker the we use quite a bit. We love our Nespresso, but I just can't drink espresso all the time, I drink regular coffee on a daily basis. Now I consider myself a fairly intelligent person but for some reason I just cannot figure out coffee makers. I always put in too much water or coffee grinds and it just doesn't turn out right. And with the ease of the Nespresso I have gotten really fond of the prefilled cups and how the machine takes just as much water as it needs to make a single serving. And after using my sisters Keurig while visiting her in Lubbock last weekend that pretty much sealed the deal for me. I just didn't think I'd be able to convince V to buy a Keurig since we don't NEED it.

However, while at JCPenney we stumbled across the display and fell in love. Being the part time couponer that I am, I remembered they were on sale at Target this week and we zoomed right over there and bought one. Then we took it home to the hotel, filled it up with water and made ourselves some coffee! Haha I just find this hilarious. And we were so freaking excited about it too looking through the different K cup offerings like it was Christmas! Here's a picture. V insisted on being the one to open the box!




Pretty exciting stuff! Today Victor's working and I'm just being lazy this afternoon we might go look at some other furniture stores. The last thing we really need to get are some bedside tables for our bedroom. So that's what we're up to! Tomorrow we might go to the coast :) today it's supposed to be "hot" here in Oregon. I think it might get into the mid 70's but cools off into the 40's and 50's at night. Love it!

Have a great weekend!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Location:Portland,Oregon, United States

Home, home on the range...

Home, home on the range is all I could think of while making the six hour drive back to Dallas today.

This weekend my mom and I made the drive out to Lubbock to see my sister and her husband's new house in Wolfforth, TX. It was also my mom's birthday weekend so I have a lot of pictures to share. Dad just got off a flight from Munich while we were driving so he wasn't able to make the trip. But he and my mom will probably go back out there this summer.

Here are some pictures I took while wandering around Wolfforth.


















Just one of many water towers




And you can't go to a Texas town without seeing the football stadium!





Here's a picture of the outside of the house. It was beautiful inside and they already had it all decorated!




Mom's going to kill me for posting this but here's a picture of her hanging out on their couch in their living room. It's the only picture with people in it I got the whole weekend so it's getting posted!





And here's the doggies laying around out back. They have a huge backyard!




And one last thing. A little housewarming present I brought to the new homeowners with some towels and a throw blanket I put together. Too bad they already had the house all decked out but oh well.

This week is my last week with all my possessions :) I have to get all packed up and figure out what I need here to live on for a couple weeks. The movers come one week from Tuesday and then I fly to Portland and we close on the house a week from Wednesday. Victor gets to Portland this Saturday. So excited!! Time is about to star flying and there's lots to do!

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Location:Plano, Texas

Tuesday

Nothing new here, just thought I'd share a picture of my little bubba PBR. I'm sure she's thinking deep thoughts right now. Possibly daydreaming of Oregon? I know I am...




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Location:Plano, Texas

And we have cabinets!

Well we have made it past tax season, thank God! Now comes that eery part after a deadline where you look around and think "so what do i do now?". And there is so much to do over the next month! After a few days of sulking I'm now giving myself mini deadlines with things I want to get done. This weekend Mom and I are making the trip out to Lubbock to see my baby sister's new house. It is also my mom's birthday so I've got a few things I need to finish by this weekend :)

In Portland news: I have a few more pictures to share, and you'll notice we now have cabinets which is very exciting!

Here's the front of the house. Still no paint but at least they are making progress to pouring concrete.





Here's some progress on the lower deck in the back. Still no landscaping so disregard the bushes.



And here is the master bath with our new cabinets!




And half of the kitchen. No appliances yet but it's starting to look like a real kitchen!




And here's the fireplace and mantle.




So we're seeing some cosmetic progress which is what we were really eager to see! Can't wait until there's floors and tile and everything! It'll be done in less than three weeks!

And here's one of the things I was working on this weekend.




Have a great week everyone! Victor's in Erie this week and they might get snow! It'll be in the 90's in Dallas. Crazy!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Location:Plano, Texas

Change is good

Look at this amazing meal ALepp made on Monday night! I'm going to miss this!


The past week has been really rough for me. Don't get me wrong, Victor & I are so blessed and thankful for all those blessings; we count them every day. And we are super excited about the house, the opportunity to live in such a great area and the new experience (oh and did I mention living in the same state for the first time in months?). But this week it has really hit me what the following weeks mean and what this whole transition entails.

It may just be the tax season stress and lack of sleep, but I'm mildly freaking out about the relo and shipping off from the place I grew up in and love. I have my family and friends here and a job I love. I'm excited to start something new but the fear of the unknown and starting over is hard to swallow when I've gotten so comfortable. I'm basically wishing every day to speed up the time until the tax deadline, and until we're settled in our new home, but also hoping the passing of days slows down so I can put off all the hard goodbyes that loom on the horizon. Wow! That sounds dramatic! Enough with the self pity...

Here are some updated house pictures:




The house all covered in siding. No, it's not going to stay yellow. It's getting a coat of brownish grayish paint soon and there will be stone in the gaps where there isn't siding now.




And we have drywall! Yay! This makes me very excited because after drywall comes floors, cabinets, tile, etc.!

And what we are probably most proud of and excited about :



The deck has been started! This is the main reason we bought this house in my opinion. This upper deck will be 11x13 and the lower deck will be about 10x10. So excited to sit out there this summer!

In other exciting news I got my brand new shiny iPad this week. So, of course I am LOVING that! Another reason why I'm going to miss my firm so much, they take such good care of us!

That's all for now! Hopefully I'll have more exciting interior pics later this week. Happy tax week everyone ;)

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Location:Plano, Texas, United States

March is Almost Over!

Well I don't have much to report on the move besides our closing date has been moved back two weeks to May 9th due to some rainy Oregon weather (those of you who have been reminding us daily about the dreary Oregon weather are giggling, i'm sure). So our tentative moving plans are pushed back a couple weeks. The close is still a few weeks before I'm planning on moving out there over Memorial Day weekend, but Victor is disappointed since he wanted to hit the ground running in April. But we're making the best of it. A lot of behind the scenes work has been going on with picking out some exciting things like refrigerators, lawn mowers and grills, but to first-time homebuyers these things really are quite exciting! I've also been perusing some Martha Stewart Craft Room furniture from the homedecorators.com website and getting very excited!

Speaking of crafts, I thought I'd post some status updates on some projects since there isn't any exciting news on the home or social life front (it's tax season).

This week I finished a "baby" quilt that had been sitting in my closet for a while. Don't ask me why I made a baby quilt, there is no baby. I repeat, there is NO BABY. It's just some zoo fabric I found on clearance and thought I could do something simple with it. I had started quilting it an inch apart on my old machine, and then gotten so frustrated I put it in the closet. Well, with my shiny new Viking machine, I breezed through finishing it up.

As I was finishing up the binding tonight, Jelly went ahead and made herself comfortable. If there's no baby to make use of this blanket for the near future, at least I have a dog that will snuggle with it!

This is her face when she thinks she might have been caught doing something wrong.

Here's a somewhat dark picture of the log cabin crosses quilt I'm trying to get quilted at the moment. It's turning out to be more frustrating than I thought it would be, but this time of year I'm running low on patience for just about anything. I'm chipping away at it little by little.

And here's one more I'm still chipping away at. I started it out a little more ambitiously than I should have with the quilting pattern. It takes a lot of time and motivation, but I am determined to finish both of these before the move! Working on them after I come home from a long day at work for just an hour or so really helps me feel like I've accomplished something and I find it easier to sleep :)

I also made my own fusible tags this weekend from supplies I ALREADY HAD (simple wins!). I was super excited about these, and didn't even follow a tutorial! When it seems like everything I've done lately is from an idea I got off Pinterest, it's nice to know I can still do something myself :)

Last bit of exciting family news - Peanut Butter got her summer cut this week so she is looking ready for pool season! She's not too excited to be having her picture taken mid-nap.

That's all we've got for right now! Have a great week!

tasha