Oregon At Last

After days and days in the car, Boozer looks how we all feel:

Are we there yet?

And then, what we had been waiting to see...

Oregon at last! We'll arrive in Bend this afternoon... finally!

Still Driving...

We had the worst weather driving today, with tons of rain, sleet, and snow. Yes, snow. Apparantly, here along I-80 in Wyoming the snow has not melted yet. Awesome.

Frank & Boozer were so tired from the drive that they promptly fell asleep when we reached the hotel room. This is what we call a "Totem Pug" in our house - it seems that the most comfortable spot to sleep is always where your brother is already laying. We added the stuffed toy just for good measure.

Pop Quiz!

Q: How do you know when you're officially in The Middle of Nowhere?

In Nebraska, near the Wyoming border

A: In the parking lot at your hotel, you park next to tumbleweeds*

* Truthfully, I have no idea if these are really tumbleweeds, but they look like it, don't they?!

On the Road Again

Everyone in the backseat looks comfortable as we get headed down the road!

Travel Plans

The house closing went smoothly, so now we're all set to hit the road! Before we go, a high-level look where we're heading is below:

Starting from where we are in Chicago, we'll drive all the way to Bend, Oregon. Yes, its as far as it looks - we'll spend over 35 hours in the car! We'll be in Bend for the month of June, then will spend the Fourth of July weekend on the Oregon Coast at a small beach town called Depoe Bay. From there we're headed to Shell Beach, a town outside San Luis Obispo, California... Oprah named SLO as the happiest city in America, so who can argue with visiting there?! After spending time in California, we'll head to Boulder, Colorado.

So how did we pick these places to visit? These three states have been on our radar as places we're interested in, so we've been searching online and chatting up anyone who knows anything about them. These cities all seem to get mentioned over and over again as places people love to live, with milder weather and lots of opportunities for hiking and outdoor recreation. We're not super-outdoorsy (yes, I realize that this comes as a total shock to most of you!), but we'd like to be! :)

The car is all packed and we begin the long trek tomorrow when Jason is done with work... more updates from the road!

Moving Day

We've been working hard to pack up and sort the house, and today was the big day - the movers came to move us into our storage unit. We downsized and got rid of things we didn't need so we'd be sure to fit in the storage space, and luckily we even had room to spare.

After they left, it was strange to see our house all empty...

The Living Room, all cleared out

And even crazier to see everything you own all packed in and in one small place!

The house closing is tomorrow and as long as everything goes according to plan, we'll hit the road Wednesday.

A New Adventure

As many of you reading this know, we loved our trip out west last year and have been thinking about returning to the western part of the country, possibly even moving somewhere else. We're not sure exactly where we'd like to go, but after 10 years in Chicago (and a brutal winter!), we decided that it was time to start figuring it out.

We listed our house for sale and were lucky enough in this market to accept an offer just a month after the listing date, with the closing scheduled soon after.

Under Contract!

We decided that this would be a great opportunity to do some traveling and exploring. We'll be moving everything into storage, packing up our little car, and hitting the road... and so the next adventure begins!