Tuesday, December 29, 2009

Lots of House Shopping

Well, we heard back on Sunday night that the sellers of 64th took another offer. Boo hoo, we didn't get another house that we wanted. Oh well, I've heard that the sale is contingent on another house sale closing, so maybe it will end up back on the market sometime in the future.

We spent lots of time this week looking at houses. We found several that were almost what I wanted. =)

There was a nice historic house on Stark, right across from Laurelhurst Park, that was the victim of an unfortunate remodel. That's too bad--because we adore Laurelhurst Park.










I think we're going to go back to California this time and just keep watching online. Hopefully something will be listed this spring that is a short walk to Laurelhurst Park. I think I may just come back up when I see something hit the market that looks interesting.

This afternoon, while finishing up the last of our house hunting, it started snowing. And it ended up snowing quite a lot, especially considering that snow didn't seem to be in the forecast. I think we had about 4" out here in Hillsboro; at least according to some of my facebook friends. There were a lot of accidents on the highway on our way home.We had been planning to drive back to California tomorrow, but given the weather, I think that plan is going to be changed.

Friday, December 25, 2009

Merry Christmas!

We hope all our friends are having a great holiday. We are dropping in at a friend's house to hang out and watch movies for the day.

I swiped these comics from one of my favorite blogs, Economicrot:

Sunday, December 20, 2009

Made Another House Offer

I wanted to write about this last night, but I was just too tired. Luckily, we went to bed fairly early, because the dogs keep getting us up before 7AM. It would have been really easy to stay up late because our hosts were having a gaming night and Jeff loves to play games.

So, we made an offer on another house. Since we've had three prior offers fall through, I'm not going to get my hopes up. Especially, considering we weren't their only offer. It's just our luck, the house has been listed on the market for six months with no apparent offers, and they get one a day or two before we can finally get up here to see the house. Oh well, we'll just have to see how it goes.

Anyway, we made an offer on the house that I just love! It's not in the neighborhood I preferred, but it's a nice neighborhood nonetheless. Lots of trees and not too much traffic. I would have liked it if there was a nice park in walking distance.

I've been looking through our stuff and somehow we have misplaced the camera. I was quite sure it got packed. I think we may have to go buy another one today, because I simply cannot go looking at houses without one! Buying another camera is not a huge problem, since we had been thinking about it for a while so we both could have our own.

Here are the some of the photos that were provided in the house's listing.



We'll know in a couple days whether the seller will reject our offer.

We also have another appt with the realtor on Wednesday to go looking at houses again.

Saturday, December 19, 2009

We're In Oregon

Yesterday was a real long day. We popped out of bed at 4:38AM and threw on our clothes and did the last few things on our list, like turn down the water heater and furnace. We settled Shasta into the back seat of the Highlander and off we went. We were on the road by 5:30AM. I had been hoping to get on the road by 4:30, but I didn't actually remember to set an alarm!

Shasta was fabulous on the trip. No complaining, no wiggling. She settled in and slept pretty much all day. We stopped at a couple roadside rests and Jeff ran her around. It took about 12.5 hours total to make the 700 mile trip. We had to stop for gas twice and we stopped at McDonalds once. Not sure why, but the trip seemed to go faster than normal. Maybe it's the new, more comfortable, vehicle. =)

We arrived at Wendy and Ross' house by 6PM. And, luckily, Shasta has been getting along with the resident dog, Jasmine. We're really relieved as that will make our trip much less complicated as we'll be able to leave the dog behind while we go visit dog-unfriendly locations.

Monday, December 14, 2009

Busy Day

I had PE class this morning and I somehow dragged myself out of bed. Jeff got up much more easily; all those naps this weekend must have helped. Once I was up, I was feeling pretty good. I decided to multi-task and I brought my class notes to PE class and study while I was riding Rex (sort of a recumbent elliptical). I got quite a bit of cardio workout this morning between studying and walking to and from class.

Since we had the dining table cleared, I decided I'd better take advantage of the space, so I also sewed the binding on the last quilt. I didn't have enough of any one fabric so I had to piece the binding with different fabrics. Hope it's not too weird! Anyway, now I've just got the last two to finish the hand sewing. I'm planning to bring at least one of them on the trip to Oregon to work on when we're hanging out visiting. It will be a relief to have all four of these quilts done.

My father also came out today and picked up his old car. So, we now have the other half of the garage! Yeah! It will be nice to have some spare space out there. It was hard to get around with how crammed it was with stuff. Though, with our vacation coming up later this week, this project will have to wait until January.

I have a final in three hours so maybe I'd better get studying again!

Sunday, December 13, 2009

Now I Know We're Oregonians

I just found this hilarious list and Jeff and I are guilty of so many of them, I know for sure we are meant to move back to Oregon. We just haven't managed to turn into Californians in our three years back. We're finally having some rain this week and we're loving it!

Anyway, here is the list:

THIS IS WHAT JEFF FOXWORTHY HAS TO SAY ABOUT 'LIVING IN OREGON!'
  • If someone in a Home Depot store offers you assistance and they don't work there, you live in Oregon.
  • If you've worn shorts, sandals and a parka at the same time, you live in Oregon.
  • If you've had a lengthy telephone conversation with someone who dialed the wrong number, you live in Oregon.
  • If you measure distance in hours, you live in Oregon.
  • If you know several people who have hit a deer more than once, you live in Oregon.
  • If you have switched from 'heat' to 'A/C' and back again in the same day, you live in Oregon.
  • If you install security lights on your house and garage but leave both doors unlocked, you live in Oregon.
  • If you can drive 75 mph through 2 feet of snow during a raging blizzard without flinching, you live in Central, Southern or Eastern Oregon.
  • If you design your kid's Halloween costume to fit over a 2 layers of clothes or under a raincoat, you live in Oregon.
  • If driving is better in the winter because the potholes are filled with snow and ice, you live in Oregon.
  • If you know all 4 seasons: almost winter, winter, still winter, and road construction, you live in Oregon.
  • If you feel guilty throwing aluminum cans or paper in the trash, you live in Oregon.
  • If you know more than 10 ways to order coffee, you live in Oregon.
  • If you know more people who own boats than air conditioners, you live in Oregon.
  • If you stand on a deserted corner in the rain waiting for the "Walk" signal, you live in Oregon.
  • If you consider that if it has no snow or has not recently erupted, it is not a real mountain, you live in Oregon.
  • If you can taste the difference between Starbucks, Seattle's Best, and Dutch Bros, you live in Oregon.
  • If you know the difference between Chinook, Coho and Sockeye salmon, you live in Oregon.
  • If you know how to pronounce Sequim, Puyallup, Abiqua, Issaquah, Oregon, Umpqua, Yakima and Willamette, you live in Oregon.
  • If you consider swimming an indoor sport, you live in Oregon.
  • If you know that Boring is a city and not just a feeling, you live in Oregon.
  • If you can tell the difference between Japanese, Chinese and Thai food, you live in Oregon.
  • If you never go camping without waterproof matches and a poncho, you live in Oregon.
  • If you have actually used your mountain bike on a mountain, you live in Oregon.
  • If you think people who use umbrellas are either wimps or tourists, you live in Oregon.
  • If you buy new sunglasses every year, because you cannot find the old ones after such a long time, you live in Oregon.
  • If you actually understand these jokes and forward them to all your OREGON friends, you live or have lived in Oregon.

Saturday, December 12, 2009

Lazy Saturday

My father had been planning to come today and work on his antique car in preparation for moving it out of the garage, but we've had a lot of rain the last few days and today so he had to reschedule. Bummer. So, instead of spending the day shuffling stuff from house to garage, we had a bit of a lazy day to enjoy.

We went on three walks during brief "sun breaks" today and the last one, while we walked to the grocery store for oranges, the clouds opened up on us and we got pretty wet. But we have been enjoying the rain because we lived with it so long in Oregon that we just got used to having rain. It also helps if you have good rain gear, like our rain jackets.

Jeff gave Shasta a bath when we got home because she was so wet already. Now she smells good and is cuddly and we're looking forward to curling up with her tonight.

This evening, I finally talked myself into cutting out and sewing the binding for our lightning bolt quilt. Now, I just need to find a space big enough to lay out the quilt so I can sew on the binding. Maybe I'll finally be able to motivate myself to get the kitchen table cleared off. I'd like to bring the quilt with us to Oregon for handwork while we're hanging out visiting or watching TV.

Last night we got our Toyota back from the body shop, so that little bump is now fixed up. I still need to get reimbursed by the attorney who hit me, so I hope that goes OK. My boss vouched for him so I trusted him to pay after I got the vehicle repaired.

I guess I should probably spend some time this weekend studying for my two finals, but I am so not motivated. My brain is seriously done with this semester. I probably won't be able to motivate myself until the day of each final: Monday and Thursday.

I'm planning to spend the rest of the week getting "ready" for our trip. There's lots to do....

Update later in the evening: Thanks to Jeff, we finally have the dining table clear enough to use to finish sewing the binding on the lightning quilt. And, luckily, I was able to talk myself into finishing that project. I am eager to bring that quilt to Oregon so I'll have handwork for the too long trip and during the visit.

Thursday, December 10, 2009

Jeff's Fractal Quilt Nearly Done

My friend, Karen, in Washington has nearly finished machine quilting Jeff's Fractal Quilt. I'm very excited to get it back soon!

She quilted it with the mathematical Moore Curve, like shown here.

Thanks Karen, it looks great!



Here is a picture she posted on Facebook showing her progress:Here is a picture of the full quilt, before I sent it off to Karen for quilting.Earlier this week I finished hand sewing the binding on the second of the kids' quilts. Two down, one to go. I'll post pictures once I can find a place to lay them out. There isn't much space here, but we might be able to hang them for photos.

Wednesday, December 2, 2009

Evening Walk

Shasta and I wandered around the neighborhood to see our neighbor's Winter lighting efforts. Most of them are pretty simple like this one:

But three of my neighbors were more elaborate in their displays:
















And then there's this house!