This is the real deal, raw emotion sort of post, written a couple hours after receiving an email from the Portuguese consulate, which stated “Application Cleared” in the subject line. I had to open and read immediately to see if that meant we had truly been granted our 120 day visas, the first hurdle to extended residency and moving to Portugal. And it had! Both Nick and I were approved and our Visa stamps are just waiting to be stamped into our passports.

But…

I keep reading, and see this:

…you must now send your passport to us as soon as your convenience… Take note that you have 90 days to claim the visa but we advise you to do this as soon as possible.

Ok cool, but we submitted our passports the day we applied back in December. I’m sitting in Coava Cafe, one of my favorite coffee spots here in Portland, working on a different blog (the one about bookends if you want to read that too), as I read all of this, and I am caught up in a wave of emotions. I realized, too late, that we could have submitted copies of our passports, and while hindsight is 20/20, here we are, and ARE OUR PASSPORTS FREAKING LOST?

You see, we’ve been waiting for our passports so we can go to Portugal and look at what we hope will be our future home (there are a few places we want to see). We need to be employed here, to get a mortgage there, and we also need a few months here to get through closing on the house before we can stop working here. We had planned to go in early January before everything got expedited (more about why here), but here we are. So yeah, really wanting those passports back so we can be on our way to look at places ASAP, like next week!

The other thing in this email that gives me pause, we received our appointments for our two year residency interviews in Portugal (yay!). This date sort of sets the timing for our move. Or at least gives us a timeline. My interview is in Alverca do Ribatejo (about an hour from where we’ll be living) on May 22, and Nick’s appointment is on June 17 in Lisbon. Also, my visa is from March 16- July 13, and Nick’s is April 16- August 13. Hmm… Our two year residency permit begins the day we get approved… I think the day of the interview? Once we have that visa, we MUST be in Portugal for six months out of the year, so we may need to be there from the date of each interview through the end of the year. But, I’m not totally sure.

Things are really happening now! I think?

So next up is finding someone to rent our house, re-homing all my plants, and getting rid of stuff quick, quick, quick! Oh and getting the dogs their EU passports too. And a million other things, including setting some realistic timelines for a couple small batch shop updates, and kicking off my fundraising plans for the Community Clay studio in Portugal.

So glad you’re here for this adventure! I promise I’m working on ways to sell a batch or two (or more?!) of my work in the US each year, and will be sharing that as soon as I get it sorted.

Here we go! Wish us luck locating those passports, por favor.

UPDATED February 16: Our passports were found and returned to us about a week later, with the Visas stamped inside. We are flying to Portugal for three weeks on 2/23 to hopefully find our new home.