What's New In 2016 — CalifOregonia

The end of 2015 brought about many new adventures of the urban adult variety for Dylan and I. He started a new full time job in December with Western Shelter, purchased a Toyota Tundra in May, and my family and I purchased a house at the end of November, while I have started the entertaining task of finding a design internship. With Dylan negotiating the world of a full time working man and myself learning the ropes of first time home ownership, there has been limited time for adventures into the backwoods. That being said, once we settle into our prospective new roles and when the weather warms up, we will happily be getting back out there and reporting new adventures, but for now here’s a little more in depth update about our new urban adventures.

Dylan's New Job

Full time employment is a wonderful thing to have, watching Dylan start this new path with a company that couldn’t suit him better has been incredibly elating. He is the new Marketing Coordinator for Western Shelter, a company that builds military grade tents for organizations like FEMA and others that provide medical attention to disaster areas. Now when I say tents, you may be thinking tents of the camping variety, I cannot understate how unlike camping tents these are, they would be more relatable to temporary homes or hospitals, Dylan has used one of these tents during his Search and Rescue Missions to give a more apt scope to how durable these are. Needless to say, it’s a pretty cool product and it will be exciting to watch Dylan grow as a professional with this company.

Dylan's new Tundra

With the purchase of his new truck, we will be able to access worse (aka more fun) roads, for more backwoods hikes that you can't access in a Honda Civic (sorry Zippy, you were great but you don't have a TRD suspension or 4 Wheel Drive). Within 24 hours we put over 200 miles on the truck and made our way up to Mount June, in record time...we didn't have to slow down for one pot hole, woohoo!!! We are looking forward to a summer full of previously unaccessible adventure in the new truck.

Tessa's New Home

Complicated, intense, daunting, and exciting are words I would use to describe the process of purchasing and moving into a new home for the first time. It has been incredibly exciting to leave apartment living behind and start the process of putting a home together. Things I’ve learned:

· Painting takes longer than you think

· I miss my truck (Mustangs and ice don’t mix!)

· Furniture shopping is fun

· Waiting for your furniture to arrive is not

· Curtain rods are a pain to put up

· Figuring out what creaks and cracks your house makes at night is daunting

· Turkeys can fly and they love my roof

DIY projects are next on the list of things to do for my home. Dylan and I are going to attempt to make a bar, side table, coffee table and a few other decorative things. Dylan and my latest obsession are tools! We are excited to be able to be able to put a few conversation pieces into my home.

We look forward to going on more adventures this year, and getting back to sharing more of our adventures with you.