PIT STOP BEFORE TEXAS: 6 WEEKS IN OREGON!

As I type this, we are en route to our new home in Austin, TX. I can't really call it a “home” yet because we don’t have a house, apartment, and haven't booked any place to stay when we get there. It should maybe stress me out a little more than it is, but we are just the “fly by the seat of your pants” type of people (sometimes). It was so sad to leave this morning but I am seriously so thankful for all the time we got to spend in Oregon with my family and our friends.

We arrived in Oregon almost 6 weeks ago exactly, which seems like we were in Japan SO long ago. I mentioned in my last blog post that the time would fly by in Oregon and it seriously did. We are both unemployed currently, which I guess makes us full time gypsys….

Oregon was wonderful. We stayed with my mom for the whole 6 weeks and we were super busy. I think we were almost gone every weekend. We got a good few days of snow, which made me appreciate that Oregon usually only gets it for a few days and then it goes away. It’s beautiful and fun to play in but it can also make it hard to make many plans. We were able to go to the coast for a long weekend with my Mom and Rich, which is gorgeous. The Okinawan beaches are AMAZING because they are warm, the water is a beautiful blue, and its JAPAN, but the Oregon coast is wonderful because of it’s giant waves and the beautiful beachy/rocky areas. It tends to rain a lot on the Oregon coast but we were graced with beautiful weather our whole weekend. We also were able to spend two nights at Odell Lake with some more of my family. The weather there can be stormy at times but we had another perfect trip. Blue skies, lots of snow…it was great. Arthur and I went skiing (Arthur’s first time) with my Uncle and two cousins, which was so much fun. Arthur picked it up super quick and by the time we left he had it down really well.

My Seattle trip was fun. It was right around the inauguration so I saw quite a few protests, which were interesting. My friend I went with took a nap during the day so I decided to go shopping. There were tons of protests where I was at so I went into a few stores to get away from it and because I actually wanted to do some shopping. When I walked out of the store, it was getting dark out and I looked down the street, and I saw a GIANT crowd (hundreds) of protesters walking towards me. Mind you, my hotel was int he direction they were coming from. I ended up walking the other way and trying to find a roundabout way back, it was just a little crazy! I just didn’t want to get involved in that at all because those can get violent and crazy at times. I finally made it back to my hotel but not before another large group of protesters were marching down the street. I ended up just standing close to a store and staying out of the way. It was pretty interesting to see first-hand. The vulgarity of some of the signs and the children who were marching with them yelling things they probably didn’t know about were pretty saddening.

Arthur and I had fun visiting his cousin and her family in Portland. I was able to go to a few spin classes super early in the morning with my mom (530AM :/) which were actually really fun and nice to have someone get up and go with you. We had lots of delicious food, I was able to hang out with my niece and got a lot of baby exposure. At times it gave me baby-fever, other times was a good form of birth control ;) (JK). I hung out with my cousins and God-child at a trampoline park, which made me realize I might be getting a little older (or just less in shape). I had lots of wonderful lunches and dinners with my Dad and Becky. It’s so nice to be able to see family so much after being away for a couple years. I got to go on a ride along with Derek, WHICH WAS AWESOME. I wish I could get paid to just ride along with him all the time. The adrenaline! It was so fun to see Derek and Katie. AND I got tons of time in with my mom, shopping, eating, baking, doing random things together, girls nights with my aunt and cousins and mom, so many things that I love. We had so many dinners with family and friends and I'm just so thankful. We did have one sad moment having to put my cat down (she was 19 years old!) but it was time :(. I really missed my family and it was such a nice 6 weeks in Oregon. It was weird this morning driving away and not flying to Japan but it also is kind of nice knowing I am 10x closer in Texas than I would be in Japan (even though I absolutely adore Japan).