life lately: we moved to portland!

July 30, 2020

life lately: we moved to portland!

wow, i'm really not sure how it's been almost two months since we arrived in portland. this year...it's been so wild and unexpected both personally and with current events.

we arrived on june 4. i was so incredibly nervous for our road trip out to portland. driving 12 hours with a toddler in the middle of a global pandemic felt... insane (i'll eventually write up a post on how we conquered this and had amazing success). it's hard for me to describe the feeling of driving away from salt lake. we left in the middle of the night and drove through the dark. i watched the salt lake skyline zip by and drove though past the middle-of-the-night construction workers with their bright lights blasting onto the dark highways. i remember driving through winding hills in idaho. it was pitch black with no roadway lighting and the speed limit was a very fast 80 miles an hour. when the sun came up i was so relieved and thankful for daylight while driving. my sister, who so graciously volunteered to ride with me in our car while caleb drove our moving truck, woke up around 7:30am and we chatted and watched the sunrise. it just all felt so surreal that we were leaving salt lake city. i was emotional. we were leaving the first home we purchased. where we brought august home from the hospital. the home we realized our dreams of living in the PNW were coming true! it was a lot. i was full of excitement that morning as well as a heavy heart with saying goodbye to our city of almost three and a half years. thankfully, the road trip ended up being a breeze and i was so stinkin' proud of august for absolutely crushing the road trip.

because my sister stayed with us another four days, caleb and i were able to paint seven walls and replace five light fixtures in the first two days of our arrival. the next month and half was spent ordering furniture, hanging art, order more furniture, hanging sconces, putting up drapes, and making our new rental house a home. it's been a really fun process and i'm so proud of us for really moving in and making this house feel like us.

i can't even tell you how much i love living here in this rad city. it feels so right. i can't believe we get to live near the coast and mountains. the midwesterner in me is losing her mind! we've been to the coast three times and to mount hood once. we're headed back to the mountains this weekend. i bought a road bike (!!) and we got august a bike seat (!!!). this city loves bikers and it's been so easy to cruise around safely.

moving to a new city in the middle of a global pandemic is tough, though. everything is essentially still closed. portland is still in phase 1. everyone wears masks (very thankful for that) and there is plexiglass everywhere. we so desperately want to attend our new church and begin to meet people. i want to be able to walk down our neighborhood street and have it all be normal. but that's not the world we're living in. and so i am focusing on the things i'm grateful for: that our child doesn't have to navigate school in a pandemic, that i'm not pregnant/having a baby right now, that caleb still is employed by a wonderful company. and most importantly: healthy and thriving bodies.

our days are slow. we spend a lot of time on our back deck in august's kiddie pool. we grill out (we got a grill!) and caleb makes his famous cocktails (as seen on instagram stories) and we order take out on fridays. we have a lot to be thankful for. our world can feel like a mess right now. i feel as though i'm watching history unfold between COVID and social reform and an intense upcoming presidential election.

i've got my little family that brings me so much joy. we have a lot of visitors slated to visit throughout the end of summer and fall. and we have a new city / state to explore. life is good and i am a blessed mama.

here are some photos from the last two months...