Jeff and I can finally breathe a sigh of relief. We signed the papers, paid the deposit, and set the move-in date (Feb. 1) for our very own place in Portland (well, for a year anyway). Hooray!

It’s sort of disgusting to think about, but we’ve been searching for a rental here for, like, four months or so. And Jeff’s been doing it almost full-time. I don’t feel like we were being overly picky, either. We were basically looking with these things in mind:

• Somewhat easy access for taking Cooper outside. We’ve done the elevator rides down to a freezing alley at 10 p.m. to let the poor guy do his business, and we’d rather not deal with that again – for Coop’s sake and our sanity.
• Enough room for all the crap we’ve accumulated. We had hoped for a 2 bed/2 bath place with storage, but we’re settling for a really big 1 bed/1 bath place with a storage unit.
• If possible, close access to a Max train station. I get a ridiculous deal through Nike – a $25 per year pass for the whole transit system (regularly $968) – and we felt we should try to take advantage of it.
• Being walking distance to SOMETHING, even just a little grocery store. We love walking to movies, restaurants, dog parks, etc…we’re not ready to be in suburbia quite yet.

Outside of our new home

We ended up doing somewhat well across those categories – we’re two blocks from a dog park and two blocks from one of the coolest stretches of city in Portland (23rd Street), could easily get to mass transit if we really wanted, plus we’ll be living in a beautiful old revamped building that has a ton of character. We’ll have one unit in a building of five units, and it sounds like the other tenants are a friendly group of folks who love happy hours on the bricked back patio – right up our alley!

As we celebrate, I must give another big thanks to everyone who sent prayers and happy vibes our way in our home search. It really worked out for us and we’re so thankful!

So until Feb. 1, we’re enjoying our time living the high-rise life in the hip, bustling Pearl District. Not too shabby of a deal, I’d say!