A Little More than a month to go!

Well here we are just over a month until go time!  We have built our custom bunk beds for the kids and added some more storage and the foot of the beds.  I have given my leave of absence notice 3 months ago and they are having me train my replacement until I leave. I have installed a battery cut off switch as the battery died after leaving the trailer sit for a few months. We enrolled our kids in Cyber Academy for online schooling and have arranged for the kids to end their schooling 2 weeks early!  The principal gave us the info on the Cyber Academy and let us know the last few weeks of the school year are mostly prep for the next year.  We have been collecting items that we will need for the journey such as maps, camera and lenses, tools for the camper and truck, an 80 gallon fuel tank for the bed of the truck and a Trailer aid ramp for changing a flat on the trailer.  My father in law has traveled the country several times and he is turning all his maps and points of interest that he has collected over to us to use.  I'm currently building a custom center console for the Dodge truck as my wife has mentioned on several occasions that there was no storage in the truck. We removed the center seat and the new console will be 32 inches long by 25 deep by 14 wide. We have removed the driver side rear seat and built a custom platform for our dog Norman. He is our 70lb Briard which has become something of a celebrity lately! More on that in a minute. We have gone paperless on our bills and the house will be up rent tomorrow morning. We are going to south Florida next weekend for a farewell visit to both of our parents and to let the kids see the Grandparents.  I'm also trailering my Mustang down to my parents house who graciously let me store it there for the trip!  When we return from Florida we plan on taking the trailer to our house to start packing it!  We are trying to decide on a grill to bring with us as the Big Green Egg is way to big and heavy for the trip. I have found an electric grill from Weber that looks interesting and I like the fact that I don't have to worry about charcoal or lighter fluid.  Now for Norman Our celebrity!  Norman, like I stated before is a our 70lb Briard and he is also the Super Scooter dog that has recently been featured on such shows as David Letterman, Good Morning America, Inside Edition, Ellen and the film crew from Animal Planet just left our home Friday after they did a segment on him!  My wife has trained him from a puppy and he is a beautiful dog! My wife has been traveling to and from New York City for all the T.V. shows and may be flying to L.A. to meet with one of the dog food company that has contacted us! We have no idea how big this thing may get.

Busy Busy Busy

Yesterday we began the process of building the bunk beds for the kids!  When we picked the camper up in Elkhart and had a few days to try it out, we figured out really fast that we didn't want to open and close the sleeper sofa everyday so we built bunk beds. We will be removing the sleeper sofa and keeping the recliners that came with the camper. They are not complete yet, but you can get the idea of what they will look like.  A buddy of mine came up and helped me with this project over the weekend.  The last photo is of the new auxiliary fuel tank that I wanted.  It holds 80 gallons of diesel fuel and will come in handy so we don't have to worry about filling up every 300 miles! After our trip back from Elkhart I felt this was mandatory. It seemed like I was constantly watching the over head fuel gauge for distance to empty and when your getting 10 miles to the gallon you can go through 35 gallons fast.  I don't like the feeling of the over head saying 135 miles to empty at 3/8 of a tank left and it really drops fast after that.  It just seems to rush your decisions of where to get fuel and force you into getting fuel at smaller stations that may be harder to get in and out of.

In the begining!!!!

Welcome to our world!  Two years ago, December 2008, while traveling home from our Christmas vacation, Karen and I were talking about the Christmas holiday being over and it was time to go back the daily grind.  I said to Karen "If we didn't have the kids I would love to go home and put work on hold and travel the USA for awhile". Karen replied to me "Oh I think it would be better with the kids". My response to her was "Do you think we could do it?" It was at that very moment, north bound on I75 just north of Gainesville Florida that this plan started to grow and take shape.  The ride home from Florida never went so fast as we starting thinking about home schooling, selling houses, where we would go and the adventures we could share with our children(Kaylee 6 and Bryson 3). Fast forward two years and here we are less than 6 months from leaving my job renting out both houses and packing everything into a newly acquired 2010 Heartland big country 5th wheel camper. We first had to decided on the truck we would choose for this journey.  I'm a die hard Ford man who's been through more than my share of Mustangs so the first truck we looked at was the F250 Super duty Crew cab, only to find out that the back seat would not be big enough for Kaylee & Bryson or NORMAN!  Norman is our 75lb Briard French herding dog who will also be going on this trip as he is a BIG part of our family. Back to the trucks.  We then looked at the Dodges and found the Mega cab model and Karen took one look and said this is the one we need.  With nine more inches of rear seat room and reclining rear seats we were sold on it.  So I scoured Auto trader.com for the best deal I could find and low behold one popped up in Louisiana and a few days later we were the proud owners of 2009 Dodge Mega cab Dually.  The next step was for us to find a camper, and I use the term "camper" loosely as my idea and Karen's idea of a camper were a little different at first.  I wanted a smaller outdoorsy feeling camper and she wanted the mac daddy loaded to the gills top of the line luxury hotel on wheels.  We were fighting by no means but we met in the middle as we always do on most things.  She convinced me that we are going to spend every waking minute in the same camper with the kids so bigger was better and I explained to her that we cant tow a "camper" that weighs as much as a small home.  After the Atlanta RV show we decided on the Heartland 3500rl and started looking locally for one and we found one that was less than 1 hour away at a RV lot.  We went to lot on the weekend and walked through the camper and agreed that was the camper for us.  Over the next few days we got pricing and options on the trailer we wanted but the RV place we were working with really didn't go out of their way to answer all of Karen's questions so she contacted a large volume wholesale dealer(Rv Capital). Rv Capital answered all Karen's questions and informed her that we could just order directly from them, so we did.  We discussed if we wanted them to deliver it to us for a fee of $1800 or we could go to Elkhart and pick it up.  We decided on the latter!  We made vacation plans for May 2010, we packed up the kids,and the new Dodge pickup truck and picked up our future home! When we got to Elkhart we found the the local dealer that was delivering us the camper.  They were very thorough on how to work everything and Karen was taking notes as fast as her hand could write.  Man, there is a lot of stuff to remember with a camper of this size!  Did I mention that the size of this camper made the Dodge, which Karen and I both thought at first a little too big of a truck, look tiny.  From the ground to the top of the camper is a little under 13 feet. Talk about a white knuckle ride leaving the parking lot for the first time. The kids were great the whole time of the delivery and when leaving the dealership.  I think they new Dad was a little nervous with the toy.  We proceeded to Indiana Dunes campground to setup and try out the new home.When entering the camp ground I asked the lady if she could give me an easy spot as this was my first time backing our trailer and they didn't have any pull through spots. Everything was smooth as silk after backing that behemoth up between 2 giant trees all the while trying not to hit the minivan parked across from our campsite.  It took us about 10 minutes of backing in and pulling out then back in and then out to get just right.  We spent the next 2 nights at the campground taking in the sights and sounds and realizing this dream that started less than 2 years ago is about to really happen!!!