The end is near

It looks like our homeless adventure may be coming to an end in a few short days. You will recall that we found a house we really liked...well, that one ended up NOT working out, and we don't want to talk about it. But out of our sadness/failure came a really cool place that we like just as much, if not more. We will now be living in the northwest corner of town, up situated in the hills bordering the town. It's in a neighborhood with lots of dead ends and lots of winding roads where the houses are a good distance from each other.

Our apartment is basically a good chunk of our landlords' house, situated downstairs with nearly 1100 square feet, two bedrooms, a really nice kitchen (although without a dishwasher..that's ok, it was low on our list of necessities), and a gigantic living room. It has lots of storage space, a wood burning stove, a yard, a covered patio (because apparently it does rain here) and an amazing washer and dryer. The lot is very quiet. Our landlords have three huge outdoor dogs, two of which are always behind a fence and are there for "intimidation factor", and one of which is a very sweet old lab who was apparently sprayed by a skunk yesterday. Luckily, from our interactions today we have determined that these are the types of dogs that make you feel safe but will not be annoying and barking all the time. They also have a couple of outdoor cats and a bunch of chickens ("help yourself to the eggs"). They have a garden, and said we are welcome to plant some things if we want to (we have no experience with this, but it could be fun). The landlords are cool. We drove up, and the wife was covered head to toe in dirt because she was messing around in the garden; the husband was probably the most "chill" human being we have ever met.

It's about 4 miles from campus, but an easy bike ride through farmer's fields (no vehicles allowed, but the farmer built a bike path for just this purpose) and a city bike path through an old covered bridge. It's going to be quiet..rural/forested, but very close to town. It should be awesome. We are hoping to move in on Tuesday or Wednesday. We are going up to Portland to pick up Kirby and Mr. Plant from Ashley tomorrow, then we are spending the night in a hotel so Robbie has access to a good night's sleep and an iron before his interview Tuesday. Hopefully, we can start moving in (at least with our car stuff) Tuesday night!