Federal Way: Here We Come

At least we won't be homeless. Robb signed a lease yesterday for a great apartment in Federal Way. It has two bedrooms, two bathrooms, a fireplace, a balcony with a storage room, full size washer and dryer, and a remodeled kitchen with brand new appliances and countertops. It's over 1,000 square feet, has a heated pool at the complex, as well as a really big gym. It's definitely an upgrade from our current apartment. The only negative about it is the city's location. Federal Way is probably about a 30-40 minute drive from Seattle, NOT during rush hour. And it is about 20-30 minutes from Tacoma. While we would have preferred living closer to Seattle, we couldn't pass up this place. It's possible that one of us might even work in Tacoma, so living between the two metropolitan areas might work out well. Yay, we have a place to live!

Finding a Place to Live

There's nothing very exciting to report in my life. I spend the days packing boxes and watching daytime television (Family Feud, Cosby Show repeats, etc.) I also spend a lot of time online looking for jobs and apartments. The job search is slow. The apartment search is faster. When I find a good apartment/house listing I send it to Robb and he makes an appointment to see it. He's able to fit in 3-6 showings a day. While there have been a couple of good leads, we still don't have a place to live. We started out with higher expectations (washer and dryer in unit, an apartment that isn't on the 1st floor, etc.), the only requirements now include cats being allowed and availability by August 1st.

I think the apartment searching process is stressing Robb out. He thought it would be a little easier to find an appropriate place. And it doesn't help that he's doing it all by himself in an unfamiliar area. He has a lot of showings in the next couple of days. We hope that we have enough options that we can make a decision by Monday. If we have a place to live then we can focus on the other stress factor in our lives, finding a job.

Robb Discovers Seattle

After many long days of driving, averaging about 8-10 hours a day, Robb made it to Seattle yesterday. He is sharing a house, until the end of July, with a woman we got in touch with through CraigsList. He will spend the next couple of weeks looking for a job and trying to secure us a place to live starting in August. Today he explored the city a little bit; he drank coffee, walked through Pike's Market, and strolled along the waterfront. He says it's cold at night. While the heatwave in the West does reach to Washington, it doesn't reach as far as Seattle. He says that I'll love it there. It's comforting to know that in his first 24 hours, Robb doesn't hate the place. I'm a little jealous that he gets to explore a new city without me, but I also know it will be nice to get there and have someone already familiar with everything.

As for me, I packed the entire bathroom yesterday (that's two whole boxes)! A small victory, but the 'baby steps' makes me feel like I can do this. I think my plan of attack this upcoming week will be to pack up the office and most of the bedroom. I think I should look at a calendar and make a packing/cleaning schedule. It'd be nice to finish packing a couple of days before the moving truck gets here so I don't have to go into panic mode.