Summer Plans

This summer we are planning a big trip. It will involve several states and camping. At this point we are not sure what we will be camping in. Our current trailer is a 1993 or 1994 (can't remember it is so old) Coachman Catalina. It has done us well but it needs some work. The running lights on one complete side is not working so we can't tow it in the dark, which poses logistical problems. It also needs a new A/C unit as ours is on the fritz. The wallpaper is falling down in places and our kids are growing out of their bunkbeds. One child still sleeps on the couch. It has no slides and we all can't sit at the table at the same time.

We were so close to purchasing a new 40ft. fifth wheel and had the financing all lined up and a deposit on it and a signed contract when the scandalous RV dealership sold it out from under us. We are assuming they got a higher price for it and therefore a better deal for them. We were so sad but in our family, where this sort of bad luck follows us, we roll with the punches and obviously there is something better out there for us. Okay, I am still mad about it and so very disappointed, but I can't do anything about it so I move on.

Anyway, back to the trip. We are still planning it even though we don't know what we will be going in. This year we are planning for 5 weeks. We will first go to Delaware and visit the Dupont Botanical Gardens. We want to see the pretty flowers and the fairy garden they have there. Then we want to go to Philadelphia and see Independence Hall, the Liberty Bell, The Franklin Institute, The National Constitution Center, Betsy Ross House, and maybe get in the Philadelphia Zoo. I am thinking that will take three days. We also want to try to get in Valley Forge.

Then we want to travel through Amish Country, tour about there a bit. Then move on to Gettysburg and then Harpers Ferry. This will be a possible quick one day trip for each. Then we have to be home for The Pickle to go to Boy Scout Camp. After his week at camp we will pick him back up and then go to Tennessee and into Nashville. We want to see the Grand Ole Opry Building, the Worlds Fair park, and perhaps pick up a show or two. Then move on to Memphis and eat some BBQ (Memphis style) and see Graceland and spend a day on the Mississippi River. Then we have to be in western South Carolina for a family reunion.

So this is the plan and as with the Sears Family, plans can change quickly and without warning. LOL

Are you a list maker?

I am. I used to not be but now I make lists. I DON'T make lists of lists, but I believe there are some out there that do {giggles}.

With our upcoming travels and the holidays, I NEED to make lists. Otherwise stuff wouldn't get done, packed, decorated. But I find that while I make some lists, some detailed some not, I don't always USE the lists when it comes to doing things.

Several years ago, my husband and I made a list of things we would like to get done for the year. It was the first week in January and we sat down separately and made our own lists and then came together to combine and discuss a family list, a joint list. It was really meaningful to do this. We spent probably several hours on this process. Then once the process was done, we closed the notebook we were using satisfied with our goals for the year and went back to our "regularly scheduled" programs. I found that list last month and I went to him and we read it together. Of the ten things we wanted to accomplish we did one, sell our car. It needed being sold so it wasn't really something we had to "strive" for, you know.

My lists do a couple things for me. One it settles me, two it organizes me, three it makes me focus. Right now I have three lists going. I have our Christmas preparations list, our Christmas gift list, and a packing list for a trip. Yup we are traveling, actually twice, this holiday break.

Along with my lists for major events I also like to make a time line. This helps me prioritize and give a deadline for getting the items on the list done. Does anyone else do that?

Often though, with my list, I don't seem to use it. Particularly when it comes to packing. Sometimes my list is just to organize me, and once I have written it, the items are in my brain and I don't need the list. Other times I will use it, refer back to it, and cross off the items on it.

What do you write your lists on? For me, it is usually anything I can get my hands on, a scrap of paper, an envelope, a torn piece of notebook paper, a legal pad. My lists aren't to keep forever, saved for future use. They are temporary. This brings me to replicating my lists. When we pack for a trip, we usually take the same stuff, pants, shirts, underwear, socks, toothbrush. But I still feel the need to write them down, there is something in writing the word "socks" that makes it stick in my brain. If it didn't write it, I would forget socks, 100% of the time! So for me, making a standard list on the computer and then printing it out and adding additional items as needed doesn't work for me.

So tell me about your list making??

Oh, and follow me (well this blog). Click on the "follow" button and you will get the updates. I would love some followers!

Getting that itch again!

We are all getting that itch. It has been only three weeks and this third weekend that we are on I can feel that the kids are ready to GO somewhere, anywhere and frankly, I am too.

I sit with a heap of laundry surrounding me, a family room that is in crisis right now and all I want to do is pack up and go. Two weekends ago we brought back our camper from our seasonal campsite about an hour and a half away. It sat in our driveway for a week and we moved it to the backyard. We unpacked all the food and perishables and parked it for the winter. The camper is sad, I can tell. I am too.

I don't know why traveling is so in my blood. I remember when I was little we were always going places, camping for a weekend, traveling for the day. Perhaps that is where I get it from. When we first moved to Virginia from Maryland, my dad announced that we need to get to know our new state. For the first two years we traveled all over the place, exploring, discovering what it was to be in Virginia. It was a good thing we did that because my first year here we had a big project to complete about Virginia. We had to make a book and divide it by the regions of Virginia and then explain the different regions, the land, the industry, cities, etc. Most people took brochures and cut them up and used them as their photos of the regions. NOT ME! I had real pictures, real stuff. Why? Because my dad took us there, showed us around, and we took pictures. So for the coastal region you have me at the beach. For the piedmont region you have me with the Richmond skyline, me in Fredericksburg at the battlefields. For the mountain region you have a photo of me in the mountains, me apple picking, me with the fall leaves, me me me me me. I got an A+ on that project but the teacher didn't like me any better and I was lucky to have moved on to the fifth grade and not have to do fourth grade over again. (But that is another story).

So back to the point here. We are itching to go somewhere but we are pretty much stuck here for the time being. The holidays are fast approaching, there are decorations to hang, more laundry than you can imagine, and a family room that needs some semblance and order.

My question today is: How fast can you pack the family and be off on an adventure? Let's say, for a weekend? A week?

My answer: we can pack for a weekend without having to take linens (like if we are going to a hotel or our camper in the summer) in an hour. That does not include shopping for food. But it does include packing food and drinks.

To pack for a week: 2 hours tops. And that is everyone in the car and ready to pull out of the driveway. We have gotten really good at packing. Every person knows what they need to pack. They know how to pack their own entertainment for the car ride. I pack all the toiletries, food, drinks, and linens. We have this all down to a science.

Traveling with kids

In the recent few days I have been thinking a lot about our travels this year and in years past. I was asked the other day in an email if we travel every weekend. Well, no not every weekend but many and most weekends we are going somewhere or doing something.

So this got me thinking about how we travel with kids. As I said before we have been traveling for years with our kids and I think that since they know no different they have learned to cope with long hours in the car. They are easy to travel with for the most part. My kids are currently 11, 10 and 8. They get along with each other well. But that doesn't always mean that they get along well in a car for hours on end. I help the process of traveling out a bit too. Here are some of my tricks to help kids cope with long hours cooped up in a car.

1. Packing:

Clothing goes in one bag or a suitcase but the kids have small backpacks that they can stuff with other items to help them stay busy and entertained in the car. These smaller backpacks now are packed by them alone, and as toddlers and younger kids I packed their backpacks for them.

When they were little like 4-7 years old I packed a favorite stuffed animal, a new pack of crayons, a new coloring book or activity book (love these and get them from the dollar stores), a hand held battery operated game, a couple reading books and sometimes other small toys they could play with in the car.

Now as they are older they usually pack their MP3 players, Nintendo DS games, a coloring book or two, reading books, pencils and crayons, a stuffed animal and other little toys or entertaining stuff. One rule I have is that it all has to fit in that bag and the bag must close. We only have so much room, you know.

2. DVD player:

Oh my heavens! I was in paradise when we finally got a DVD player that was attached to the ceiling of our suburban. We had it installed last year before our big trip to Florida. This was wonderful because we opted to get the headphones for the kids as well. Now we can drive for HOURS in silence as they watch a movie. As toddlers we had a portable DVD player and before that a larger VHS player. This has been a godsend to our traveling. When we didn't have those we had those VideoNow hand held devices and as little kids they loved watching Dora the Explorer and Clifford the Big Red Dog episodes on it. They eventually broke and we upgraded.

If you are going to travel far this is a must have in a car.

3. Stop Often:

My kids need to get out and run every couple hours. They still do. And personally I need it too. When we are on long trips we like to stop every couple hours and have a bathroom break and perhaps get a snack or a drink. I will talk about food later. We try to find a place where there is a bit of space or a fast food restaurant where the kids can play in their playground area for a few minutes before getting back in the car. Now this will add time to your trip but the end result of having happy kids in a car will more than make up for this inconvenience.

Oh, also it is our rule in our family that everyone MUST TRY to go to the bathroom when we are stopped. There is no "I don't have to go" and then 30 minutes down the road they are complaining that they have to go "right now and can't wait".

4. Food and Drink:

One way to keep kids happy on the road is by making sure they have full bellies. We always always pack a bag of snacks for the road. We often will pack a cooler of drinks too. Even if we are driving an hour out of town a bag of snacks and a drink is a necessity. I pack several options, salty, sweet, healthy, junky. This way you hit all the possibilities. Oh, and pack more than you think you will need. It is amazing how much kids will eat!

5. Bag of tricks:

Yes you heard that right. I always pack a "bag of tricks" that I sneak in the car. I am not talking magic tricks I am talking stuff that the kids have either never seen before or haven't seen in a while. For shorter trips I usually try to save my stuff for the ride home. It can be the worst part of the trip and the kids can be very cranky on the ride home. This breaks up the monotony of the car ride and gives them something new to do or play with that they haven't done already this trip. For long trips like our trips to Florida I like to try to wait as long as possible in the ride there before I pull out anything new for them. Last year on our drive to Florida (a 14 hour drive each way) I didn't have to pull anything out of my "bag of tricks" until the ride back home. The kids were so excited to get there that they were great the whole ride down so I saved my stuff until our drive back. Sometimes I don't even need to pull anything out and I will then just save my stuff until the next trip. This is great too because then they don't know to expect new stuff because it doesn't happen on every trip.

What's in my "bag of tricks" you ask? Well for my kids a brand new coloring book or activity book for each of them is in there along with two or three packs of brand new crayons. I pack, for longer trips, a new DVD or two. We usually purchase them as we will want to own them but you can rent movies also. I love the new RedBox movie rental kiosks and love that you can rent a movie one place and return it somewhere else. We have rented a movie here before we leave and return it at our destination, then rent again for the ride home. At a buck a day, this is a deal for us. My kids love to write and draw so I often will pick up those little notebooks you can get at craft stores or in dollar stores for a $1. I also will put in a book that we haven't read as a family yet. When I pull this book out I will read it out loud from the front seat (not driving of course) while the kids listen. I show them the pictures as we get to them. I will save the longer books for this and it is great with toddlers if they enjoy listening to you read. We can read for a couple hours this way.

I don't spend a lot of money on my bag of tricks and often will include small toys that they have ignored for a while too. Now, I don't pull everything out at once. I save stuff and pull out one thing at a time. I let them play with that for a while and when they start to get bored again, pull out something else.

6. Pillows and blankets:

This is a must. My husband likes to keep the car cool even in the winter so a blanket will save a lot of fuss about who is too cold. They each have a blanket the size of a sofa throw in the car and so do I. Each child also has a pillow in the car that is accessible to them. If they want to take a nap, then they have everything they need. Often the will lean their head against the pillow to watch the movies too.

7. Traveling clothes:

Many years ago my grandparents traveled a lot. They are now deceased. When they traveled they had their "traveling suits" on. These consisted of a pair of pants that were comfortable, a shirt, and a matching blazer or jacket. A suit of clothing. But these suits were not like a suit you would wear to the office they were decent enough to go into a restaurant and have a meal and nice enough for you to not be embarrassed when others saw you. But comfortable enough for you to sit for long periods of time and not feel like your pants are cutting you in half. This was a different generation then but their idea is still the same.

For us the rule is that the clothes have to be comfortable but appropriate enough to be in public in. For our family that means that we do NOT travel in lounge wear, pajamas unless our next stop is a hotel or a place where we will be going straight to bed. Otherwise we wear clothing that is comfortable, sweat pants, or shorts, long pants that are not tight or binding. We wear layers on top. We start with a shirt and then add a sweatshirt or sweater. If we are traveling in the winter then we will bring our winter coats but not wear them in the car.

While traveling if we plan to be late getting in we will put the kids in pajamas around their bedtime and let them fall asleep in the car and carry them into the hotel or our destination for bed that night. But they do not start out in the car that afternoon in their pajamas. If you have really small children then pajamas may be more appropriate for traveling. But for us we wear our clothes.

8. Know your kids/Allow extra time:

When planning a long trip in the car, the best rule of thumb is to know your kids. You know their tolerance level and you know their escalation signs. You know how long your kids can tolerate being in their seats. Knowing these key things will help to diffuse any problems in the car. Don't wait until it is too late. When you begin to see signs of travel fatigue that is the time to change the situation. Don't wait until it is too late. Sometimes simply saying "We are going to start to look for an exit to eat dinner. Who can spot a sign for McDonalds on it?" That will give you a few more minutes of calm. Or pull out something new, start DVD, or begin to read to them. The idea is to change the situation. Sometimes at this point I will pull out the food bag and begin to hand out snacks even if they didn't ask for one.

Allow extra time for stops. We average with our family of 5 30 minutes for a bathroom and drive thru break. If we stop to eat in a restaurant we can add an additional hour to our travel time if not a bit longer. We have tried to shorten this time and the kids get too stressed out. So we know we can't rush this. We love Google Maps and GPS. Google maps is great because you can change your course of the trip with a click. It gives the travel time also. As an example, it takes 11 hours almost to the minute to get from our house to Disney World. But for us we know it takes us 14 hours. Our trip down is broken into two days. We start in the afternoon and drive as long as we can into the night. We stop twice, once for dinner and once for a bathroom and clothing change break. We switch the kids into their pajamas around their bedtime. We find a hotel (not always the best idea with traveling with kids to just leave it up to chance) and we carry them into the room in their pajamas and tuck them straight into bed. The next morning we pack up and continue on our way. We will stop two more times on the way. Once for a midmorning bathroom break and once for lunch. No matter how fast we try to go it still takes us 14 hours. On the way home, we travel in one very full day if we can. We stop for a mid-morning break, lunch where we get out and eat, a mid afternoon break and then dinner where we sit down and get served. Then usually we are pretty close to being home, well, within a few hours. In short, plan for breaks and lots of them.

Traveling with kids can be fun if you are prepared. I have heard horror stories of families on the road, kids fighting in the back seat or kids screaming and crying the whole way there. That is not a fun way to travel. It is better to be even extra prepared with your bag of tricks than to be caught short and short tempered.

National Parks Annual Pass

Recently we have been thinking about going ahead and getting the annual pass for the National Park Service. We so enjoyed the Ft. McHenry Trip and we are looking at focusing our next few trips around the National Parks and Historic Sites around the areas we will be visiting. So it makes sense to go ahead and purchase the annual pass.

This is a great deal if you know you will be visiting some of these places in the year.

If you are a senior citizen then you get the motherload of deals. It is a $10 lifetime pass. You can bring in up to 3 more adults with you and kids are free anyway. You can visit any national park or historic site or seashore you want free of charge.

If you are not a senior citizen then you get the regular annual pass for $80. This is good for a full twelve months from the time of purchase.

This pass gets you:
• Per Vehicle Fee Areas - The pass admits the pass holder and passengers in a noncommercial
vehicle.
• Per Person Fee Areas – The pass admits the pass holder + 3 adults, not to exceed 4
adults (children under 16 are admitted free).

And it does not cover:
• Overnight Camping
• Developed Boat Launches
• Swimming Sites
• Specialized Interpretive Services
• Concessioner Service (Concessioners may honor the Senior/Access passes if included
in the terms of their current permit)
• Facility or equipment Rental Fees
• Cabins
• Lookouts
• Day/Overnight Group Sites
• Special Conservation Programs

We have already spent $14 to go to Ft. McHenry and upcoming trips will be to Ft. Raleigh and to The Wright Brothers' Memorial in North Carolina. Ft. Raleigh is free but The Wright Brother's Memorial will cost us $8.

Another future trip will be to Jamestown and to Yorktown. These two are a bit more spendy at $10 a person. We are now up to $42. With the pass though, I think we will use it more.

www.nps.gov

Plan B, Plan C, Plan D

What if we don't sell the house? What if we don't sell the business? What if we use the money we were going to spend on our Disney Trip for a summer trip? What if we rent our house? What if we sell the house but don't go for a year? What if we have no money? What if something breaks down on us and we can't fix it? What if? What if? What if?

I don't know if this is panic or rational thinking at this point. I read so many blogs about families who up and sold it all and are now traveling. I have scoured their blogs looking for clues to how they pay for it all. There ARE expenses to living on the road and I want to know what their budget is and how they make their money while on the road OR if they have it in savings prior to being on the road.

One family sold their business and bought a big ole bus, gutted it and are now traveling. I know they are traveling on savings. Okay, I get it. But how much?

One family travels and then the dad will pick up a job here and there. The mom does photography. They work when they need to and travel about, but they tend to stay in one place a long time and they aren't out looking at the world like we would be so much. I love their family and I love their blog.

One family up and sold a lot but didn't sell their house yet so they traveled a bit and are now back home where the dad has his own business. I haven't been able to confirm but I think he just closed up "shop" and traveled and then opened back up when they returned. The are home and homeschooling and dad is working again. Not sure what happened.

One family up and sold a bunch, couldn't get their house sold and are now renting it out for a year while they travel. They started their trip in July. I assume they have savings? or something as there was mention that the dad lost his job a couple years ago. Hmmm....

One family (yeah I follow a bunch of them) sold it ALL including the house and the dad has a job doing something (don't know what yet) that involves travel so they travel with him and his job. Sounds fun, but limits you to where you can go.

I can only assume that these families have a bunch of money in savings. Plus I have also found that 3/4 of the families that I follow with kids have a motor home and not a travel trailer. I have found 2 with a travel trailer, no I lied, 3 families.

I know that expenses are actually cheaper on the road (believe it or not) and we are looking forward to that BUT....

there are just all these different facets to this project. We have come up with several plans to make this trip and they include the BIG Plan A which is sell it all and take off for a year and we have a Plan B and C which include taking off for a smaller amount of time and traveling only in the summer and keeping the house and our stuff.

Oh the options.....

But for now the boys are off at an air show having the boy time of their lives I am sure and the girls and I are heading to the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. The boys took the cameras but I have my phone so I will post photos of our trip soon.

Planning, planning, planning...

and more planning! We sat for an hour today and mapped out at least two do-able plans for "the big trip". There were lists of pros and cons, lists of priorities, and lists of to dos. The lists were good. Sometimes I need to write things down to "see" it in my brain. Also when I write things down I am able to get a better sense of what needs to be done first. We keep saying "sell the house" has to be done first but there are so many things to be done prior to selling the house. In order to sell the house we have to make some repairs to the house. That will cost a bit of money. Then we have to pay off the second mortgage to make our house price more marketable. To pay off the second mortgage we have to sell my car. See where I am going with this?

So really on top of the list of things to do is get supplies to repair the fence and clean up the car to take pictures of it so we can list the car for sale.

Oh the planning! This trip WILL happen. It will!

Organize, Organize, Organize!

That is the name of the game today. The kids are cleaning their rooms and we are finding we have too much stuff for the amount of storage bins we own. We are reducing our stuff and purchasing more storage bins at the same time. The kids I think will have the hardest time with the downsizing I think. Our son has one foot in childhood and one foot in tween time. He struggles with giving up stuffed animals, toys etc from when he was younger even though he knows he doesn't play with them. Our middle daughter, well I just haven't figured her out yet. Perhaps she likes a messy room as she doesn't seem interested at all in cleaning it up unless she has one of us adults in there with her doing most of the work. I have thought it was laziness but I just don't know. Our youngest though would rather just throw it all out. Give her a trash bag and she is the first to fill it up. We love that she does this, however, we have to go back through her trash to make sure there aren't toys in there that she will one day miss.

Everyday we think about our trip and what purchases we make today will either help us on the trip or we will have to sell it or give it away before the trip. It makes purchasing items much easier when you think, "well I can't take it with me so in 10 months I will just be getting rid of it. Can I last that long without it?" Usually the answer is yes, I can live without it and I don't purchase. Such a nice feeling!

Today we will be purchasing two things. Storage bins for the kids toys and such. These bins will serve double duty for us on our trip. They will either be storing things for us or they will be going with us and used as storage for clothing and such. The rules are that these bins must have a top that is attached so we don't lose the tops. The second thing we will be purchasing today is a new TV. Our old, analog one in our family room died this morning. We considered going without TV for a while and that is okay with us but we think we will be better off purchasing one today. We will be moving our other analog TV down from our bedroom and purchasing a smaller flat screen to put in our bedroom. We will take this smaller, new one on our trip. We are researching how big a space the TV space will be in the trailer so we don't purchase too large. But right now we are thinking somewhere in the 29-32" range.

This organization today will also help in the sale of our house. We have another yard sale coming up next week which I hope to have a ton of stuff out there that we just don't use or need anymore. The money from the yardsale will go towards paying off debt.

An update on our plans

Wow, it has been a year since I updated this blog. We were so excited at the time about our big trip. We seemed to think we had everything together and a fool proof plan.

So here is what happened. We were taking the Dave Ramsey course and in the last post I said we were going ahead with the purchase of the new travel trailer. Well, we found out that we couldn't get a loan for it so we didn't get it. Our small 30 x 10 camper has done us well again this summer at the campground. We finished up the Dave Ramsey course and thoroughly enjoyed it and the love the message, however we didn't quite grasp it like we should have and didn't even make a budget after that first month (last October).

We were so depressed about not getting the trailer that we booked ourselves a Disney World trip instead. Probably not a very good idea but we got the food plan for free and we had a great time.

Winter and spring seemed to creep up on us and we continued with the status quo, wanting to change but unable to commit to change. We enjoyed our camper again at the same campground every weekend and the kids and I pretty much stayed there through the entire month of July.

Reality set back in when I realized that my summer vacation was over and I had a few days before returning back to work (as a teacher) August 2 from my month long vacation. (I only have a month off where I work). We decided to spend a few more days at our river house (camper) and during that time we made the final decision that we were going to make this 'big trip' work this time.

We came home with renewed interest in making all the necessary changes. My husband is working hard to make as much money as he can right now and in the process try to sell his lawn care business. We would really like for him to be able to keep it going while we are away but that doesn't seem possible really. I am working on a 'long shot' and making a proposal to my bosses to give me a year's paid sabbatical. It is a terrible long shot but I am going to go for it anyway. All they can say is NO.

Here is our plan: departure date: July 1, 2011.

*New fifth wheel travel trailer in tow using our existing Dodge truck. It will be a tight squeeze for the kids in the back but we don't plan to travel too far at one time. I think we will be okay for a start.

*Sell the house, move into an apartment or the trailer until school is over, save money and store the bare essentials.

*Sell all possessions that we are not totally in love with and worth storage fees to keep.

*Save, save, save. But before we can do this we have to pay off our second mortgage $17,000 so we can sell our house. Then we have to pay off a line of credit (another $17,000) so we have a cushion of emergency money if we need it and no debt on the road.

*Come up with a money making activity that we can do on the road to make us some money while out there. This is going to be hard and I welcome any ideas you all have for this.

*Explore, make lists, and try to plan for any hardships that we might expect. I know we can't plan for everything but if we can learn from others then we are one step closer to no surprises.

Here is the fun planning:

*purchase National Parks Annual Admission Pass ($80) and will be well worth its weight in gold! We just went to a National Park last weekend (post to follow) and spent $14 for admission. We figure a few more parks and we have this one paid for. Yippeee!!!

*Work on curriculum for the kids for next year.

*Begin to plan our course of action, where we will visit, approximate time spent places, research research research.

*connect with other families doing this exact thing, begin to make friends on the road.

*work on our re-entry plan, possible jobs, businesses, etc. This goes along with what to store, and what to sell. There are days I struggle with this.

I welcome all advice on these topics.

Another week gone

We had a yard sale yesterday which means we stayed home this weekend. I thought that it would be a great time to do some long neglected things around the house but nothing got done. Not even laundry. I now have a pile that is larger than when we get home from the river on Sundays in front of the washer. Oh well.

This week will be a crazy one. Sometimes work and school get in the way of doing so much. One more reason to homeschool. If only we could manage our finances on one salary.

We began taking Dave Ramsey's course Financial Peace University tonight amongst all else we have going on. I enjoyed the first class. We thought we would take it because while we don't have that much debt and we have only one credit card and that balance is less than $1000 (way less) we felt like we needed some perspective on saving and planning for our future.

With this course the issue of the new trailer comes into play. What would Dave Do? Well, Dave would probably say no way. But we are going to go forward with that purchase anyway. We figure it is a done deal, even though we haven't signed on it yet, we still are going to do through with it and get the new trailer and then use Dave's strategies to pay it off quickly. Truly our new trailer is our second home, like people buy beach houses and river houses. This is our river home and we need something bigger than 8 ft wide to house us all a bit more comfortably. However, we were talking tonight (my husband and I) and we already feel the difference in mindset coming on, which is a good thing for us. Tonight I sat next to a lady who has filed for bankruptcy TWICE in her life. WOW!! We are no where near that nor even desperate, or behind in any payments.

I have been talking to others about the trip and so many ideas are swimming in my head about where to go and what to see. I need to start writing it all down.

There is a PBS special coming up about the National Parks System. I can't wait for it to come on. I think it comes on in a week or so. Check your local listings for it.

Many Irons in the Fire

Right now we are at our river place. It is a 30 ft. Coachman travel trailer, 1993. It has no slide-outs, but we all fit, sort of. I can cook but have 3 inches of counter space. I have to put a cutting board over the sink for a total of one square foot of counter space. We have two bunks but three kids. One of our kids has to sleep on the j-couch.

We are working on income for when we are gone too. We have some ideas but nothing quite ready for publishing yet.

Saving money is the first priority. I just participated in a craft show today and made $200. We have another yard sale coming up next weekend. Did I tell you all that we are in the process of purging as much of our clutter as possible right now?

Okay, we need a goal. I will get back to you all on that.

More to come.

This is IT!

We think we have found the 5th wheel we want.

It is a Sandpiper 355QBQ 2010 (or we will take a 2009 too). This is the floor plan.

And this link will take you to photos of the rig.

http://www.rvwholesalers.com/design/Sandpiper_5th/Sandpiper_5th/gallery/355QBQ/view.php

Guess you are wondering

what it is that we are planning that will be life changing. Am I right?

We are planning a big trip. We have always wanted to travel across the country with our kids. We have decided that we are going to do this. We want to make this trip while the kids are still young but old enough to remember it.

Now we are not just talking a couple week thing. We are talking a BIG trip. Perhaps a year long. In order to make this happen we have set in motion several things. At this point we are in the research mode. AND boy have we researched so much already.

The first thing that we did was Google some blogs or websites of others that are doing this very thing. We have found several blogs and websites that are geared toward families making this trip too.

We found:
Families on the Road

Live.Work.Dream

The Bottom Line: Living the RV Life (Article)

These have been very helpful and we just purchased a book, Live Your Road Trip Dream: Travel for a Year for the Cost of Staying Home By Phil White, Carol White. We just received this book from Amazon yesterday and so far we have scoured a good section of this book.

One of the first things we need to decide is for how long will we be out on the road. We have thrown around the idea of an entire year. But my husband owns his own lawn company and he is concerned (rightfully so) about how his business will survive with us gone for that length of time. Then we thought about going for just a month. I am off for the entire month of July every summer and this would be an ideal time for us to go for the entire month because I won't have to quit my job or take a leave of absence. We would hold on to all our benefits with my job and a month IS a long time.

Recently we have begun to play around with me taking a leave of absence from teaching for the entire year and we could take several extended trips. We could take our month of July then return until late fall. I could home school the kids here (in our house) and we could continue to take week long trips in the fall then late fall take another extended one. We could return home for the holidays and then leave again in January for another extended month or two. Return to get my husband's business running again and then leave for shorter trips again.

The second decision we have to make is what vehicle are we going to take. We currently own a 1993 Coachman 30ft travel trailer. While this is nice and we use it almost every weekend, it lacks in the space issue. We have no slides on this trailer and the kitchen space is in the hallway to the kids' bunkbeds. One of our children has to sleep on the J-sofa. This doesn't pose a practical rig for us to take on this type of trip. We are looking for a rig that will have beds for everyone. We have found several that have two sets of bunkbeds which is great. We don't think we will go with a standard travel trailer either. We are thinking either a 5th wheel or a motor home. With a 5th wheel we would also need to get a truck to pull it, and with a motor home we would have to get a car to pull behind for local travel.

Any thoughts?

Our Crazy Adventures Start NOW

A bit of background:

After a 5 1/2 year courtship and an almost 12 year marriage you would think that I am used to the wild hairs we get from time to time. My husband and I seem to have something sitting on the backburner at all times simmering. It simmers and just waits for one of us to stir the pot a bit. It will begin to bubble and if someone doesn't turn down the heat then we are off on another grand adventure.

This time we both have stirred the pot, added a few spices, and no one is turning off the heat this time. The pot is bubbling over and we are getting excited about this adventure.

We will begin here at our home in Virginia where we have created a nice family and a nice happy life. With three kids in tow and a dog ever so excited for an adventure we are about to embark on the grandest and most life altering yet. Stay tuned for lots of planning, some frustrations I am sure, and some great happy times.