Wimpy Winter

We thankfully are having a mild winter this year!  This has been the most wintery the landscape has been.  We hope this is the coldest winter we'll have in our lives.

Weird Warm Winter Weather

It's the middle of Winter and the high today was 70°F!! We took advantage of the fact that we didn't have to wear layers to go outside and we washed the bus.

Spicy

The things I splurge on now are so domestic-related.  Not only did I get new spice containers, but they are magnetized yo!!

Hello Sun!

We're hoping to be stationed in Key West next so that this will be where we park our bus and call home.

Visitors hoping to be residents

Spring in Maryland

Here's our spot in Maryland!  Most days have been cloudy or rainy or the trees didn't have many leaves on them. 

Today finally felt like a picture perfect day!

Gourmet Burgers

Who says you can't have gourmet burgers in a tiny shelter?  We live it up sometime with our hamburger press, a few splashes of beer, organic pasture-raised ground beef, blue cheese, garlic, onion and Old Bay seasoning. Sometimes it feels like we're vacationing and really we're just hanging out on a regular Sunday.

 

Batten Down the Hatches!

The rain has gone but the wind is still blowing.  When we have inclement weather, we lower our canopy to protect the bikes and generator from rain and to decrease the lift on the tarp from the wind.  I can't wait until the canopy is up because it means  beautiful weather!

Repurposed Tarp

Last year, I made a terrible mistake of not checking where our canopy was in relation to our hot grill.  I usually don't have to worry about their distance because the canopy is propped up most of the time.  But this night was a windy one so I dropped the poles and tarp and laid it flat against the bus.  Sadly, I didn't tie the tarp down well enough and I didn't account for the distance when the hot lid of the grill is fully open.

After cooking perfectly medium rare steaks, I could not rejoice in my culinary skills because my depth perception was not turned on.  I lowered the lid and saw that I had burned a giant hole in the tarp!

We survived with the hole throughout winter, but Michael was itching to change the frame.  Notice how the beam is sagging so low between poles.  So since he was doing that, we replaced the tarp with a brand new, non-burnt one.  Coincidentally, Michael's motorcycle cover was in such poor shape that he had the idea to reuse the old tarp as his new motorcycle cover!  

Michael drapes and cuts ...

I pinned and sewed ...

Voila!

Wet no more.

Legos on a Bus

I used to think there was no way we could play with Legos on a bus.

But last fall, I succumbed and let them bring the legos into the bus.  It hasn't been too crazy because of the stackable boxes they can store their pieces in, but it required a lot of maneuvering when I was cooking and they were right in the middle of the galley creating.  Luckily, with this warmer weather, I can now just send them outside! 

Take that, Problem!

Hanging around Michael has been such a confidence booster over the years.  Not just because I think he's handsome and like walkng next to him with a expression of, "Eh? Pretty hot guy, right?  I snagged him.  Yeah, that's right.  I must be hot stuff too.  Eh? Eh?"  But I've also learned so much by hanging around him.

This morning I woke up so cold!  The heaters near the bedroom were working, but the big one in the front had died.  Michael is not around this week so it was up to me to keep the kids warm.  I remembered this big heater had died earlier but Michael had opened it up and did something with the fan.  So I followed suit!

I opened up the back, but the fan didn't look too clogged.  So I did what any 80s video-game-playing kid does when something doesn't work.  I blew into it to remove any hard to reach dust.  Guess what.  It worked!

Brrr

This is our thermometer.  The top left number is the temperature outside in Fahrenheit.  The following two gauge the temperature of the bays underneath the living space.  The latter one is more important because it reads the environs where the water supply comes in.  It should never be near freezing.  As you can see, we're doing good in that bay.  So good in fact that it's warmer there than inside which is read by the last number. 

It is coooold.

Awesome Morning!

We saw our first bald eagle in Virginia!  As I do every morning, I pull aside our bedroom curtains to see what our view has to offer.  When I did, Max gasped, wide-eyed.  I looked out and see one of our country's symbols of freedom!

Here's to hoping the rest of the day is magical!

Bunionectomy Recovery

This is an xray of my left foot before surgery.  Look at how the the big toe's long bone is totally out of alignment!

Here's the foot after surgery.  Check out the screw and the staples! Gnarly, huh?  Notice also how much smaller my leg is!  Michael says I've lost my muscle mass.  I hope in addition it's because I'm eating more healthily!

The first day back was full of medication and sleep and Michael running around getting said medication and the new wheelchair and knee scooter that I needed to hobble around in and out of the bus.

The next day, Michael took me out for a stroll in the wheelchair!  I have never been in a wheelchair before so I didn't realize how schnazzy it was until Michael pointed it out.  The short walk around the campground actually pooped me out and my foot's pain started returning.

What I didn't know, however, is that the pain of the foot was not associated to running around.  It was because I had not been advised to take ibuprofen in between the percocet to relieve the swelling!  Once Michael's mom Karen told me that (she's been a nurse for 46 years!), I started to feel so much better.

Raising my foot was of prime concern every hour of the day.  Apparently at night I had been lifting my leg up in the air to relieve pain.  One morning, Michael set up this contraption to help.  In the picture above, I still have the boot that the surgery resident doctors put on.  It came off 1 week after the surgery.  When Dr. Phipps took it off, he remarked at how much gauze was used to wrap my foot.

After the boot came off, I still could not get my foot wet. You can see my foot is orange from the antiseptic (?) and there are marks on it.  Before yesterday, I had to write the word, "yes" on the foot to be operated.  The doodle below my "yes" is Dr. Phipps's indiciation that he knows on which foot to operate.  

Michael rewrapped my foot a couple of times in the week after getting the soft boot off and before getting my stitches off.  You might notice my big toe is now shorter than it used to be.  It is!  Some people try to put gauze in between the big toe and second toe to create more of a space between them.  I would have liked to do that, but the gauze kept coming off.  Oh well.  I'm just glad I don't have a bunion anymore.

Here I am running around in the bus with my knee scooter.  It was really a great choice for indoors.  But running around outside was another matter because I can't lift the scooter into and out the car.  So this is when I knew we had to get crutches before Michael returned to work.  Without them, I would be confined to the bus and we were already running out of milk and frozen dinners!  Luckily, they're only $25.  I ended up getting the youth size because it fit my height and we get the feeling the kids will one day be needing them - escpecially roughhouser Max.  

I enjoyed a few days without stitches and without kids.  This was my time to get back into the groove of being the household manager.  I'm able to wash the dishes and make food with the scooter.  When I was determined to make some salmon on the grill, I figured out how to bring the scooter down the bus.  I just sat down, propped it on its hind wheels and used the brakes to slowly drop it step by step to the ground outside.  It's similar to one's controlling a bike down steps while standing behind it - except I was sitting on my butt and the scooter was several steps below me.  Getting the scooter back up required some grunting and profound upper body strength.  I don't think I can do it in the car because I had to be sitting on my butt and needed all the width available.  Well, maybe I could if I were desperate enough.  Maybe I need to do extra grunts.

The scooter outside is not really terribly needed.  My crutches do a fine job because I can stagger to wheelchairs that supermarkets and the Exchange provides.  

It was great that the kids were not here the first two weeks of recovery.  I may not have healed so well!

The first night they returned was a little nerve-wracking.  They slept in the bed with me because we had been apart for 3 1/2 weeks.  Luckily neither moved around too much nor kicked their feet wildly.  In the morning, however, the kids were moving around interested in the snow flurries falling down outside, and at one point, Max put pressure on my lame foot!  It was a good thing my other foot was there to push Max off!  This told me however that while the kids are here, the boot is my insurance against their natural, youthful energy.  I've already told them to not jump around on the bed, which they've nicely complied these first 2 days.

My dad was a big help when he came!  I was able to keep all the trash and recycling out of the bus.  Michael had a business trip so our sleeping arrangements were actually quite satisfactory.  Simone and Max slept with me on the big bed and my dad fit cozily in Simone's bunk bed!  He even said he had more restful sleep there than in his king-size bed at his house!  He thinks it's because he was restricted from moving so much and thus didn't startle himself awake as much.

Michael has a lot of business trips in the next few weeks, but with my three mobility aids and my two strong kids who love to run to the trash bins and to the laundry house, we'll get this house back in order despite my lame-ness!

Snowpocalypse 2016

Last year, the first flurries of snow came on Thanksgiving and the kids enjoyed blankets of snow the first weeks of January.  This year, however, the snow was delayed.  When it arrived however, it made up for its delay.

Slow Cooker Success

I used to associate slow cookers with working mothers who need to efficiently get their family home and get dinner ready at a reasonable hour.  I never think of stay-at-home moms who are home to watch the pot as the yummy ingredients simmer to perfection.

But I have changed my perception of who uses a slow cooker.  I prepared a chicken enchilada soup at 10 am.  I left and came home at 2 and it was complete.   My day suddenly opened up!   No more did I dread the arrival of 4pm which is when I usually start fretting over dinner.  You know what I did at 4pm?  I went to the store with the kids and did some shopping.  F. U. N!

I don't think I've ever seen a recipe for Sinigang (tamarind soup) in a slow cooker, but I think I'm going to develop it and right a cookbook all dedicated to my new friend the slow cooker.

Halloween 2015

We actually did our trick or treating in the RV park!  The were a few kids running around, and even more campers giving out candy.  Lots of older folks were prepared to give candy!   There were some families that didn't do it and outright left the park and I suspect it was for religious reasons but I was too embarrassed to ask. This left more candies and cupcakes for us!

Michael helped decorate the bus and carved the kids' design on the pumpkins!

Back in Virginia

One evening,  we're MD Living, the next morning, we're supernoVA

New Campground

It's fascinating how pavement can vastly improve one's mood.

We moved to a different campsite in July and the upgrade in the condition of the roads is amazing!  At our previous campsite, only the pads on which the RVs parked was paved.  Everything else was a gravel road.  It was fine enough for riding a bike -  in fact, this is where Max learned how to ride his bike - but forget about using one's scooter or roller skating.

Now at our new campsite, the kids can do all three sports!

This site also has so many more families with kids Simone and Max's age.  Unfortunately, our kids are so shy that it's difficult for them to play with the plethora of kids running around.  They say hello, but never approach the kids and ask to join in.

We're here for another month.  Hopefully they'll start getting used to the new kids.  

Bus - Drought

When Michael worked on fixing the bus's electric system, he had to turn off all the electricity coming from the campground.  This requires flipping the breaker switches.  After Michael fixed it, he forgot to turn on the 20amp switch which heated our water supply.  That night we had 5 inches of snow fall and we assumed that our lack of water was from the temperatures being so low.

For the whole day, I just waited for the sun to warm up our hose.  I also installed a heater in our bay where the water comes in.  Around midday, I used Michael's creative suggestion and melted snow to soak our dirty dishes.

As the sun sank lower in the sky, however, I became impatient and wanted water more immediately.   I unscrewed our water hose from the campgrounds service spigot and anticipated free-flowing liquid.  Nope.  It was frozen!!  Long story short, Michael realized that his not turning on the 20 amp had caused the water in our hose to freeze.  

Michael planned to stop at the convenience store for any supplies we might need, but there was no need!  Within 1-1/2 hours the water was warm again and flowing freely through the faucets and toilet.  

Those few days without the conveniences of life in the dead of winter can really humble a person.  When Simone had shouted, "We have water!"  I was as relieved as I had been when Michael returned from the West Coast.  I had the same emotional moment when the refrigerator turn back on.  I cherish modern technology!!!

Bus - Electric Shutdown

Three weeks ago, Michael went on a business trip to the West Coast.  I thought that the only thing I would have to take care of in  his absence is dump the blackwater tank every few days.  No problem!

Well on the morning of March 1, there was a big problem.  I woke up at around 4am and was freezing despite my flannel pajamas and my two blankets. I looked down the hall to make sure that the heater lamps were on.  I knew  they weren't because they normally have a small red light to indicate they are working.  It was pitch black.  After fumbling for a tiny LED light, I read the temperature gauge which read 45 degrees.  I knew then that we had lost power in the entire bus and it was only going to get colder if I didn't figure it out.  

Before Michael had left, we were casually talking about what we would do if we lost power to the bus during a cold night.  Miraculously, I remembered what Michael said.  (It usually takes me twice and usually after a near-disastrous incident to remember) The first thing we would do is turn on the cars - and that's what I did immediately thinking the kids and I would head to a hotel soon after.  I called Michael who walked me through all the breakers in our electrical room and underneath the bus in the main service panels.  All breakers were in the "on" position and had not been tripped due to a power surge.  So what was going on?!?!  

Michael had installed a monitor that also shuts down our electric system should a large surge occur either within our system or from the campground's input service.  Michael directed me to check what the monitor said.   After an hour in the cold and in the heated car reading the manuals and the monitor screen, we figured out no surge had occured, but one of the panels had lost power completely.  How it lost power was a mystery until Michael told me to disconnect some 50 amp plugs.  

One of the yellow plugs had a burn mark on it but I thought it was because of a chemical that was nearby.  I sent Michael the picture above and asked if the scorch had been there before.  Michael had an "a-ha!" moment and realized this was the culprit.  

Across the country, Michael couldn't fix the problem, but he wanted to get us heat ASAP.  I had thought we would just jump in the heated car and get a hotel, but Michael remembered all the extension cords we have to help us power 3 heaters and a heat lamp.  By 6am, the heaters were going, but the temperature was only in the 50s.  

Michael had jerry-rigged this connection during the summer.  Who knew it would come in handy in the winter!

Throughout the day, the temperatures rose to a comfortable 70.   We survived for the next 3 days and ate a bunch of food that surprisingly stayed fresh in our refrigerator.  We did lose some sauces and some milk, but overall the kids didn't feel as if anything was amiss.  Oh, except for the TV.  Max did miss his Cartoon Network very much.  

We wore lots more clothes and became more attuned the daylight.  Once 6pm hit, we would light candles and prepare for an early retirement to bed.  Mentally, I was a bit of a mess.  I became anxious and didn't even want to go to the gym to exercise (which would have been a great break in the monotony of staying in the bus).  When we had gone to the storage to get more extension cords, I rushed back to the bus because I was fearful another electric fire would spark.  

Michael returned on Tuesday night and when he reached the car at the airport, I felt my whole body sigh with relief.  

The next day, Michael fidgeted around with the wires under the bus and fixed the electrical system so that we would be less likely to repeat the incident.  He pried apart the plugs in which the fire had occurred and this is what he found:

Thank the gods that this fire didn't spread to the rest of the bus!  We came out pretty lucky in that the only thing we experienced was discomfort for three days.    Our luxury was short-lived however because another "adventure" waited for us around the corner.