One year in Portland

Well this is our anniversary of living in Portland for one year. We even survived the winters. Well I guess we did a half a winter when we got here and now another half of winter. Last week we have beautiful winter weather for Portland. It even got almost to 60 a few days.

A day trip to Tillamook. We found out they made more then just the cheese blocks we saw at Costco. Milk, Yogurt, and best of all Ice Cream (Remember this picture for the end.)

We went to a city Easter egg hunt. Here is Andrew is in middle of the field collecting all his eggs.

Our apartment was small so not to many places to hide eggs but the boys still had fun Easter morning.

Our first snow in Portland was at the apartment. We just a dusting but Michael and Andrew were so excited they just watched it fall and then we went outside to run around to try to catch it.

Our first trip to Multnomah Falls

I can’t count how many homes we looked at and with three boys it was no easy task, but we finally found a new home.

Andrew at the top of the stairs.

Christopher so happy to be in his new room.

Our backyard

During our last days at the apartment, two ducks kept coming to the back door looking for crackers. The boys were just so amassed that they came right up. Not something that ever happened in California

Michael’s summer camp did a show about the solar system. Michael got to be a moon.

Andrew preschool had a jog-a-thon fund raiser in the gym. Here is Andrew running his laps.




















All around Portland there are countless pumpkin patches. We made it to 4 different ones this year. All were fun for the boys and we got quite a few pumpkins to decorate.

Andrew turns 4!

Thanksgiving at preschool

There was a drive thru light display of about 5 miles loon at the end was our favorite cartoon charter Scooby-Doo. Andrew did not want his picture taken.

Our first snow storm, I don't think we will ever forget this week plus one week off of school.

Back to Tillamook my boys grew so much in one year. Yeah were Steelers fans.

Tons of cheese!! Each of those blocks are between 40 – 45 lbs. Michael and Andrew just can’t believe all the cheese they were packaging.

Mommy I can’t be smile for my picture I need to finish my ice cream. Chocolate is so good!

We also stopped at the Blue Heron the best part of this stop was the petting zoo.

Yeah they know food is coming.

We also stopped at the Blue Heron the best part of this stop was the petting zoo.
Besides all of that we have had countless trips to the Portland Zoo, Children’s Museum and OMSI however I ran out of room.

Being a Landlord Sucks!

When we moved form California we were unable to sell our house, so we chose to rent it out. (Our only other option was to let it sit vacant and we really can’t afford two house payments.) We heard a bunch of horror stories so we thought we would be smart and use a property management company. The owner of the property management company was really nice. He came out and took pictures, put signs in yard, and began adverting. When someone was interested they would do a background check, run credit reports, and criminal histories. All we had to do was give the ok. The rent was even directly deposited into our bank.

Well everything went well for the first 7 months, and then in middle of November the bank let me know that the money was not in our bank account. We called the management company and they let me know that the rent had not been paid that month, however the tenets were supposed to come in that Friday and pay the outstanding balance. It would have been nice if someone from the management company had called us before the bank did…

The tenant did go in and pay part of the months rent so I still had hope. They then claimed that the rest would be paid by December 1st. Well December 1st came and another promise of paying the rent in full by December 5th. Well that would be the last we would hear from them for a few weeks. When the tenants finally decided call the management company we were told that the Tenant claimed they might be able to come up with a few hundred dollars, and that they had been told to get out.

The last week of December they told the management company that they would be out January 15th. Well, we had a friend go by the following weekend only to see 4 cars in the driveway!

After a lawyer sent a letter giving them a court date did they decide to call again. They wanted to work something out. The management company told them to pay all the back rent plus lawyers’ fee or move out. Well they didn’t want to pay so we moved forward with the eviction.

They did not respond to the eviction complaint, so we got a default judgment. We then got a lockout date of February 6th at 9:30am from the Sheriff to execute the eviction. Heath went down make sure they were out and to assess the condition of the house. After all the horror stories we were prepared for the worst but were pleasantly surprised that the house was in fairly good condition. Even the Sheriff was surprised that they had not thrashed the house. They left a bunch of junk and the house was pretty filthy, but nothing that could not be handled by a thorough cleaning!

We were disappointed by the yard. Most of the back lawn had been replaced by solid weeds. The roses had not been watered in months, and several were completely dead.

Heath was amazed when the former tenant had a friend come by to pick up an old desk that was left in the front yard. Their friend told Heath that they were moving out until 4:30am that very morning.
Unfortunately we have no other option then to rent it out again. Heath was able to get all the stuff left behind by the tenant moved into the garage for haul away and a neighbor let Heath put the bags of garbage in his dumpster


Our House the grass is dying and a nice yellow brown now.
They left the TV along with the bed.

We guess they don’t want to vacuum in there new place.

We never had a pool and don’t believe they had one either but they left behind a pool ladder.

Yard of weeds and what use to be a rose garden.

Not sure if they broke the dishwasher

On left desk that they sent friend to pick-up, friend did not take any boxes of junk they left or anything else.

Bed left behind.

Not sure how wires got this way. Believe they had a dog but not sure.