2 Firsts

Most mornings I am the first one up feeding the dogs & getting breakfast ready. I usually look out our front window to see what kind of day it will be and to check and see if any mountians are in view. This morning was a 1st. - Mt Bachelor AND the moon setting! It was spectacular! Our little camera "sort of" did it justice. This picture is from the guest room window - see what you could experience if you came for a visit!?!

Another 1st this morning had to do with Snowboarding. It was Amy's 2nd lesson and she GOT IT! The third time down the mountain and she was a Pro ;-) Last week she came home bruised in body and spirit but it was a complete turn around today. She thinks she's ready for her own board. We'll wait on that one.

Amy from NY to OR

This is MY story about the trip. My favorite part was that I got to relax all day long. Very hard work you know. NY was a really long drive and kind of boring on the highway. It all looked like road that went on forever and ever. Oh yeah, it was Boring. The first night we stayed in Sandusky (Something like that) Ohio. Ohio might have been the worst day since it was the first day. You should have seen Charlie and Bella when we first got to the hotel. They were maniacs. I'm just glad I could sleep with Bella snoring. Charlie barked every time another guest opened their door. At about 8am we were back on the road. Great! After that Indiana came. The roads were so snowy we could barely drive. We saw an over turned truck on the highway. Cars were lined up for miles behind. Lucky us, it happened to us, too. On the Upside, I did get to walk on the highway. I know, awesome. Then Illinois came we were gonna meet my cousin Jen but our " Schedule was to tight" What I remember was my mom groaning when our hotel was 300 miles away. Also it was the only state Where I could find Radio Disney. We finally made it to Des Moins Iowa at about 9 pm. Bella was pulling me so hard that by mistake I dropped my fish, Azul, on the ground and he hadn't had any food in about a week, he lived though. In the morning my aunt, uncle, cousin and my cousins husband came to our hotel. My aunt gave me a Swedish Coloring book and an awesome Swedish necklace. We left after that. Nebraska was next. That state was pretty cool. When we first got into Omaha, there was this huge glassy dome. I said it looked like the Epcot golf ball. It turned out to be an I-max Theater and a zoo. How cool would that be to live in? The rest of Nebraska was really flat with tumble weeds, and GIANT windmills. My dad said the generator was bigger than my room! When we got to Wyoming it was SO pretty with lots of hills and stuff. We stayed in Cheyenne that night. In the morning my mom slammed my hand in the car door by mistake. OW!! That day was really short. We just had to get to Ogden, Utah. I remember taking the dogs out for a run, up and down a big hill. They loved it!! Once we got to our hotel we went to Cracker Barrel. I wanted to buy a webkinz there, but I didn't have enough money$$$$. At about 8 my dad and I went to the pool. I didn't get to go in because I didn't have a suit. We headed for Oregon next and made it at about 9 pm. I was glad I didn't have to help reload the car the next day!! That's MY version of our trip!

Recent Pics

We are taking a New Years Day hike along the Deschutes River Trail which we can access about a block from our house. A fellow hiker volunteered to take the pic of all of us.







Amy and Bella showing off one of Amy's favorite Christmas gifts.









Here is our new home a few days after we arrived. We continue to be thankful for our safe trip and the arrival of all our "stuff".

Dan Speaks

The moving truck came 8 days ago and we are mostly unpacked and that means we are ready for company. Yesterday there was a huge victory when someone came and picked up our moving boxes and packing material - paper and styrofoam peanuts. Craigslist came to our rescue because it looked like it would take months to get rid of all that stuff, but there were actually a few people who wanted boxes so I think we gave the person who wanted them around 75 boxes.
Getting here was a challenge, especially in eastern Oregon. I had forgotten that there are mountains to cross. It didn't feel very good when we were between two mountain passes and the closest civilization was 50-75 miles away. There was just nothing between the two passes, and the thought of not being able to get over the next one or go back over the last one because of accumulating snow wasn't too cheery. Anyway, we got behind a snow plow to go over the second pass and then we followed the plow for maybe 20-30 miles on flat ground after we got down off the mountain. It felt good to get to Bend that night.
We joined some home schoolers on Christmas Day to go caroling at an assisted living facility in Bend. Met some nice people there. After that we went to Amy's pen pal's family for just some get together time. They are a very nice family. Nancy is going to join the mother at a Tuesday Bible study at one of the churches beginning this week.
We have been getting quite a bit of snow here with all the storms hitting the west coast. Today it snowed most of the day, but the accumulation was only 2-3 inches. Most of it will go away as soon as the sun comes out and it warms up a little bit. It doesn't seem to survive very long in the dry climate here.Yesterday we were going to go sledding at a sliding hill on the way to Mt Bachelor, but the driver (me) chickened out when we got most of the way there because the road was covered with icy packed snow and we didn't have chains or traction tires. It might have been ok to continue up the mountain road, but there was a lot of traffic coming back from the ski area and they were going kind of fast so it felt unsafe to me. Young Dan is flying to Redmond from Albany in 8 days. WE only got to see him for a few hours on the day that we closed on our house so this will be sort of like a late Christmas visit. He was in Boston today visiting Wheaton friends.
We have been to 2 different churches here and have another one that we want to try out. First Baptist in downtown Bend was solid and the people were really friendly. We are unsure how many families there are with young children in the church, however. Quite a bit of gray and middle age. New Hope is a non-denom church about a mile from where we live. It some ways it seems a little similar to Loundonville. They seem to have a diverse (age) and enthusiastic congregation. The preaching that we have heard so far is perhaps a little on the shallow side ........ recurring gospel message (which is fine) but not much after that. We need to give it more time. The next church we want to try is a Foursquare - don't know much about what that means but have heard reasonable things about the church. So go where led!
We are beginning to plan a trip to Portland when the weather is agreeable (no crossing mountain passes in blizzards!). The thought now is to take the dogs with us rather than figure out what else to do with them. Ikea is the idea. I don't know much beyond those concepts right now.
We got our Oregon drivers licenses last week. The test freaked us both out, but we both passed. Still have NY plates but will have to get around to changing them one of these days. Hate to waste all the time we have left on them.
It seems we have been busy enough to not think much of going backwards. In other words, I don't think any of us are fixated on life back in NY. We are more consumed with finding our way around here and getting settled. It sure has been nice to not pay idiot sales tax, especially since we have had to buy quite a bit of stuff for here (I think you know we sold a lot of stuff in NY so we wouldn't have to move it.) We did learn during the move that we have too much stuff so it we are a work in progress to get to the point of less stuff. The thing that really gets me sometimes is that we buy stuff so that we can put stuff we already have in it. Ugh! stuff! Of course, we are still talking about more stuff we think we "need".