Potato hand

This is why I love Farmer's Markets. Weird shaped veggies. That taste good.

This is a fingerling potato which had to be recorded for posterity.

Moving Day

Here's the truck.

David and I have a knee jerk reaction every time we see a UHaul truck. Too many times we've sat in the front of one of these!

Here's Bradley organising things.....

David and Bradley organising truck - with a faint impression of Christopher IN the truck.

Somebody must have made a joke! Of course, this is early in the proceedings so everyone is still full of energy and bonhomie.

Rose's office in the stages of emptying out.

The living room and kitchen in chaos....

Mind your back Christopher.....!

Okay - so you are minding......... still smiling.

David is concentrating hard - if he can levitate the cupboard everything would be so much easier for Christopher and Bradley.....

The living room being filled with furniture. Suddenly the empty space is becoming a home. Christopher, we told you.... mind your back.

And it's gone......

Never mind, a drink will help with the pain.

Finally, an empty truck. And Portland waited 'til the very last minute to rain.

At last - the moment we've been waiting for - celebrating our new home.

It's taken us 8 years to get here and with the help of family and friends we did it.

THANK YOU for all your help and support. We could not have done it without you.

Put Your Best Foot Forward

Must be my left one.

The Trim ...

We have reached the trim painting stage. Lots of blue tape, primer and paint. David has finished the studio - 3 door frames, 1 window frame and a door. Took 3 coats.

Here is is working on the bathroom door having already primed the bedroom and his office.

Long way to go.

David has done everything himself (except the floor laying). I don't even want to think how much money we've saved because of his abilities. A LOT.

The big truck move is this Friday. Oh boy........

More Hanging Baskets

Having taken a picture of our hanging baskets outside the Hillsdale apartment I thought I would have one of them hanging off the patio roof at our new place in Milwaukie - continuity you see.

Probably won't keep them there as David will bang his head on them.....

Day 3 - floors laid

3 days - that's all it took to lay luxury vinyl tiles (ha! - whoever heard of luxury vinyl, vinyl is vinyl) throughout the house. All except the bathrooms which will be ceramic tiles - a long way down the road.

The above is David's office - he chose the right hand back bedroom. That way he can look out onto the street and watch what's going on. Probably not much as it's a VERY quiet neighbourhood.

This is my studio floor done. Finally all the threads and beads which bounce onto the floor can be rescued instead of disappearing forever into the carpet and then into the guts of Robbie the Roomba.

Next up - painting the trim......

Shadow Hills in Autumn

I was sitting on my daybed in the living room of our apartment and suddenly realised there is such a beautiful fall view outside our patio. This year my hanging baskets worked a treat (might have something to do with paying attention to how much light there is???).

Behind the baskets is "our tree" which the children love to climb and swing on. It's gone into full autumn mode with orange and yellow leaves. On the ground is a carpet of colourful fallen leaves and in the background the carefully mowed green lawns.

A good memory to take with us when we move to our new home.

Day 2 of the floor installation

Not the best light to see the colours of the floor tiles but you get the idea. It's something called Tuscan Slate and has a mixture of greys, creams and browns. Very neutral. And tough.

The installer got the living room, hallway and big sections of the 3 bedrooms done. Fast worker. I think there will only be one more day and he'll be finished.

We love it. It makes the whole house open up.

Plus, now all the floors have been disinfected and sealed the horrible cat odour is gone. All we can smell now is fresh paint.

Next - painting all the door, closet and window frames. David is so excited - not!

The laying of the flooring tiles

Pantry, utility room, and kitchen already done. There was an odd section which didn't look right to me which I had redone. The boxes of tiles come in packs of 7 random colours and somehow several dark sections had lined up with light sections. The contrast was too stark so our nice floor installer redid the layout. After that it looked just fine.

You can see the contrast here with the darker section of the floor to the left of the picture. But it's all good now.

Our installer is very methodical - he's done this a few times! Each room had all the boxes of tiles laid out neatly in rows, ready to be clicked together.

Flooring Arrived

This week our new flooring is going in. I think the floor color will be a good offset to the bright white ceiling and walls. Our neighbor has almost the same flooring and it looks great.

Walls now White

Finally the Magnolia color is going. I hate Magnolia paint, just looks dirty to me.
Anyway, the ceiling and walls are now Bright White. We'll have artwork on the walls for color.