In which I’ve moved to Oregon, a state I haven’t lived in since the early 90’s!

We found a house in Milton (or is it Freewater?) and have moved into it. It’s an eight-block walk from the cheese shop for me, and I’m grateful that it cuts his commute in half.

Big old tree in the yard! Brick flower boxes along the whole front (in which I will probably plant food — tomatoes and herbs)! Tons of parking (there’s more around the far side you can’t see in this picture), in case we have, I don’t know, a small concert?

Our neighbor to the north is a creek and an apple orchard.

Our street is adorable:

Six houses on a dead end! No through traffic! Cute and quiet, and we’ll never see another fender bender! So far, the loudest sounds we’ve heard are dogs (this town is rife with canine Americans; there are at least a dozen who woof at me on my walk to and from work) and the engines of our neighbors’ vehicles.

Guys, THIS HOUSE IS SO GREAT. It’s so great. It’s positively lovely and I guarantee you I don’t deserve it. It has every amenity we could want, from two bedrooms to a garage to a second bathroom. There’s a dishwasher, tons of cupboards, a coat closet and a linen closet, and a built-in curio cabinet!

(The owner told me she’d kept Precious Moments in it, back in the day, and isn’t clear now why she ever did, but there it is: a place for my teapots and other random ephemera.)

Look at the light in this, the main bathroom! I love it! (And the fan actually works. It’s like a hotel bathroom, with a high shower head and plenty of room and shelves for products.)

The second bathroom is full-sized, and has a window and a shower with a sitting bench in it. I don’t know that we’ll ever use it much ourselves, but it’ll be handy if we have guest.

There’s also an enormous back yard surrounded by a privacy fence.

There’s no exit from the house to the back yard (you have to go outside and through a fence gate to enter it), and when I look at it all I think is “YARD WORK,” but my aunt let us take an abandoned lawn mower from the shed in the yard of a house she owns and my better half seems to be fine with the idea of keeping it up, so I intend to mostly ignore the entire space since there’s so much front yard and porch and concrete apron to enjoy. We’ve already discussed getting a BBQ, which I expect we’d never bother dragging into the back yard unless we were having a large gathering.

If there are any flaws, they are these: there are very few grounded outlets, the stove is electric (I’ve already burnt three dishes), and the glorious kitchen sink window looks into the garage rather than at the orchard.

The garage has a window, thankfully, but still, I’m sure the view was much better before the garage was built.

We don’t have any furniture except for the desk he bought for his computer, but the family is going to give us some chairs and a dresser!

The bedrooms have lovely wood floors, and built-in heating.

The LR has a heat exchanger in the wall and two windows. The place came with curtains, lace in the kitchen and living room and neutral panels in both bedrooms. So much storage. So well laid-out.

It’s so nice to be reunited with our stuff after nearly four months; I’m particularly happy to have my dishes and pots and pans, and the rest of my wardrobe. We’re 75% unpacked and very comfortable.

Yay amazing new house!