Decisions, Decisions, Decisions

It’s been a long time, huh?! I tell you what, acclimating back into the boring, suburban, sit still lifestyle is rough. I started bracing myself for the realization that our journey was coming to a close right around Florida. And it was making me pretty sentimental. After all, Perl has been our home for the last eight months! And in many ways, I love her so much better than my sticks and bricks.

Loki is ready for the road again. And to find a girl dog friend!

I mean, after all, she can take me pretty much anywhere I want to go. Every time we’re getting ready to head out of a campground, that same feeling comes over me. The fact that I can just put a few things away, pull in the slides, pull up the ‘porch steps’ and off I go. My house can move, it truly makes me gitty! This is my dream home.

After we arrived home, I parked at a nearby RV Park so I could keep her plugged in while cleaning everything out. It took me several days of scrubbing and packing to get things clean and moved out. Then, I promptly got sick. It took us down one by one. All I wanted to do was sleep, for like a week, ha ha! This last month has been getting caught up on sleep and trying to get better. I’m finally feeling alive again.

Oh, and of course it’s been trying to get the house cleaned up and dealing with the fun of day-to-day life. There was so much I needed to take care of when I got back home. Doctor and dentist appointments needed to be scheduled for the crew, the kids wanted to sign up for some activities, the RV needed a thorough check-up after her long voyage, the rental house needed some TLC, etc. And when we got back, it rained and rained and rained for days on end.

There were also decisions that needed to be made.  You see, the original purpose for Perl was so the kids and I could have a place to live. For those who don’t know, we downsized considerably. Our goal was to pay off debt and save money. Our financial goals would be complete in 2-3 years. Then we would purchase a bigger house to accommodate everyone.

We celebrated birthday’s for the youngest crew member

When we purchased lil’ blue, it was just big enough for my husband and his parents. My in-laws were coming from overseas to live out the remainder of their years with us. When we were near home, we were going to stay around the corner in an RV park. As this is our first trip back east, things have changed considerably.

First of all, the grandparents flew back home. After two weeks of attempting to adjust, my mother-in-law decided it wasn’t going to work. They stayed for two months to visit and abandoned their dream. The number one deciding factor was the health care costs. It was a lot more than they’d accounted for.

In addition, they weren’t guaranteed the level of health care they could get back home. I know, (gasp), they live in a third world country (albeit up and coming) and they can get much cheaper and better health care than in America. Please note, no political comments of any kind. I’m merely posting the facts as they relate to their situation.

So, now suddenly there is room for all of us to squeeze back into lil’ blue. While it’s not ideal, it will do until we are done with our financial goals. So you may wonder why I’m so sentimental about all this.

And we celebrated older crew member b-days (aka, me)

Well, while I may be a sentimental person, I also have a fairly practical side about me. A practical side that says, “If I don’t need Perl to live in, does it make financial sense to keep her?”. Yes, I’m saving money when I’m not traveling but the RV still costs us money sitting still. There are storage fees and insurance cost.

And our current sticks and bricks was meant to be a temporary resting spot until we paid things off and saved up. This house needs a lot of work and there are five of us living in 1200 square feet. With Perl, I don’t mind being squeezed in because the HUGE bonus is my scenery is forever changing and I love it! The other bonus is there’s so much to see and do outside of the RV.

I didn’t know how much I was going to love RV’ing. Sure, I knew I loved traveling and exploring. However, this lifestyle fits me like a glove. This is where the sentimental voices in my head are crying to be heard. It’s nowhere near as simple as saying, “You love it, keep on doing what you love”. There are so many other factors and people involved. That kinda happens when you get married and have three kids. And trust me, no one embraces this lifestyle quite like I do.

The twins, being the teenagers that they are, h.a.t.e. it. The little one misses her father like crazy when we’re on the road. And when my husband visits, he jokes that he’s roughing it! Really, I can show him roughing it through the many, many tent ‘vacations’ I’ve taken over the years.

Then there’s the fact that if I could get the twins on board, my husband doesn’t have a job he can work at remotely right now. In fact, his career seems to be taking off again as big companies like Amazon have been in contact and are expressing interest in hiring him.  The final thing that always seems to keep us enslaved to the system is the almighty dollar.

After being home almost a month, I personally don’t feel any closer to making a final decision. After all, there’s that month I planned to travel this summer. And then, I really wanted to take another trip across the top half of the country next year. There is so much territory left unchartered yet. One thing I do know, after getting the latest repair bill, I’m leaning more towards selling…..maybe……..okay, I’m not. But ouch, it was big.

So there you have it folks, my ramblings of what we’ve been up to and what’s to come. I hope to post out again before another month slips by.

 {HUGS} from the Crew!

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