As I Was Saying...

I'll just pick up where I left off back in October, at "Happy Sadness".
We moved out of our house and into the camper on the property at the beginning of the last week in October. That left me the whole week to finish up packing/cleaning and having the carpets cleaned while not living there. On the 31st, we found ourselves barely getting out in time. The renters had already begun moving things over and were to begin staying there on Nov. 1st! At about 9:00 pm, I literally mopped (and moped) myself out the front door. Jeremy was in the other truck hauling the last minute things and my Yukon was bursting at the seams. We hadn't eaten dinner, so we went to about the only restaurant we could think of that would serve anything gluten free at that hour (it was now 10:00). IHOP was the chosen one. Jeremy and I pretended to enjoy the meal with the kids, as eating out is very rare for us and should be enjoyed! I tried to act like I wasn't crying, and did just fine, as long as no one talked to me.

Above is a picture of one of our first dinners in "the camper".



Work for Jeremy was a bit scarce at that time, which was actually a blessing as we were trying to beat the winter weather and get the basement concrete poured. Many late nights were shared while building the ICF (insulated concrete form) Styrofoam walls, into which we would pour concrete. We would get the kids to bed (always WAY past bedtime) and then go out to the slab, and by the light of the halogen work lights, we'd stay busy until midnight or so. Several times we were serenaded by a pack of coyotes howling eerily in the woods surrounding us. Sometimes we'd hear the owls calling.

Jeremy and Ryley surrounded the camper with insulation (blue board) to help retain a bit of heat. It really worked well and cut down on the propane consumption...until the ginormous windstorm of November hit and all the boards were ripped down and scattered about.

We used a small Honda generator to power the camper. With no running water, we used the outhouse. Jeremy would haul 5 gallon containers of creek water for washing dishes. We bummed drinking water off any friends we could, and used the showers and laundry facilities at the local gas station, until I couldn't handle the depressing feeling of sitting in a laundromat with soaps on the tv in the middle of the afternoon with all the kids.

That creepy old guy was starting to get to me too.

From that point on, we were so thankful for the friends and family we have! We never took another shower or did another load of laundry at that gas station again. Things were looking up.

The kids and I would do the best we could during the day when Jeremy had to be at work. The boys liked helping with the walls, as they are quite similar to Legos!