Day 1: Arrival

My idea with this blog is to write in it daily. With a small child and lots of unpacking to do, we'll see how that goes. It might be lengthy, it might be brief, but I want to keep a log of our first year. The feeling upon arriving somewhere new is always so different than after a significant period of time. I want to be able to look back at the beginning of this and see where we've come.

The first few of these days are going to be backdated because we've actually already been here almost a week. I will try to catch up.

September 25, 2010
We drove through Portland, the actual city of Portland, and begin drifting farther away. We kept going past where I thought we'd get off the highway. I had been a bit apprehensive toward the end of our trip, wondering what our new place would actually be like. We only saw a few pictures online. It was overwhelming looking at all those places, not knowing the area at all, thinking about the space we'd need, about what I'd need as a stay-at-home mom. Lots to consider. And we'd been dragging our feet for so long that when we finally picked, we felt like we had to pick quickly.

Bethany. That's the area where we were headed. Off the highway, down the road a good distance more and finally to our street. All the houses on our block look virtually the same. Huge three car garages out front, small entrance to the side. I don't know what architect thought up that unfriendly design or who thought to build entire subdivisions like that. We saw a few kids playing out in the street. Heartening. 
Our house is pretty standard. Three bedrooms upstairs. Living spaces downstairs. Of course we noticed every little thing wrong as we walked through: dirt, broken hinges, missing handles. The feeling of having made a mistake started coming upon me. We called our landlord who came by soon after. Very nice guy who assured us on all our concerns.

The house echoed that night, empty. Fraser and I slept downstairs in the living room, a little camp out before all our stuff came. 
I was worried that I wouldn't be able to hear Jacob upstairs but his cries were louder than ever the next morning at 4:31, bouncing off all the wooden floors and bare walls.

Day 2

September 25, 2010

Well, suburbia looked worse today. Gray and rainy. Excellent. I distracted Jacob from our sleeping bags as long as possible this morning. Shilo did a better job: he chased her around our house, much to her dismay. Finally he demanded that we get up. Breakfast. Breakfast at 5:30am. Not many places open around here at that time. The GPS wasn't very helpful either. Starbucks was the only option we could think of but a breakfast consisting of more than "muffs" as Jacob calls muffins was what we all needed. We happened upon an IHOP, no thanks to the GPS. Open 24 hours. Awesome.
A couple more errands, winding around streets that all looked the same and sounded foreign, and it was time for Jacob's nap. 9:30. 

Not much to do when you have no stuff. No internet. No idea where you are. No neighbours to be seen or heard anywhere. It was as if we moved into a vacant neighbourhood. Our feelings of dread build. 

Later in the day we go to the playground in our neighbourhood. This is one of the main reasons I chose this house. I have to be able to meet people at a playground, right? It's just a three minute walk from our house; behind our house even, down a bike trail that's next to a lovely green space area (definitely the loveliest aspect of our house). We met a few people: Matt and Esther with a little boy, John. He worked for Intel for awhile. Financing department.  Also Angela and Ryan with a little girl close to Jacob's age, Olivia. Young, fun-seeming, lived nearby. She told me about a church, Sunset Presbyterian where there's a group that gets together as well as an inexpensive daycare there. Definitely going to look into that.

Dinner at a Thai restaurant recommended by Matt. Siam. Tasty food. Americanized like all Thai food here. But very good. Jacob wasn't into it much this evening. He wanted to look at all the golden Buddha statues instead. Alas.... I guess when we go back to Thailand we can leave him with the grandparents.