Oh my goodness, where do I start?

First things first, WE ARE ON THE ROAD! I’ll write a full post on that next (with plenty of pictures!), but I would be remiss if I did not cover the craziness that was the last 2 weeks.

 

Our to-do list for the last three days was about a mile long.

For those who were not aware, part of this process was getting rid of all of our stuff. With the exception of our art, ski gear, and Christmas ornaments (which our friends have generously stored for us in their basement), we sold or gave away every stick of furniture, every book, every item of clothing or other possession that would not fit in the RV or car.

We did this because we felt drawn to simplify our lives and have less STUFF, for practical reasons (why pay tons of money every month to store things we aren’t using?), and finally, because many of our things were worn out and due to be replaced anyway (see: couch we have had since college…).

We are pretty conscious of reusing and recycling what can and avoiding waste. This meant trying extra-hard to donate or sell things instead of just throwing them away. Goodwill got a LOT of our stuff! Most of our furniture we sold on Craigslist, piece by piece. That was no easy task. Especially because with a normal move, you start off with the best of intentions for purging and refreshing your belongings, but then the crunch of time and effort required usually means you didn’t get as much done as you’d hoped so you end up just throwing things in a box and saying, “I’ll deal with it later.” We didn’t really have that out. For most things, if it didn’t get sold or donated, we had to throw it out- it couldn’t come with us.

The other big part of our job was getting the house empty and otherwise ready for tenants to rent. We are SO GLAD we made the decision to use a property management company, because it made things so much easier. We still had a lot of things to do in the final days, though. Nik installed a new dishwasher (which of course ended up having a leak the night before we left). We mowed the grass. We collected a few things that stay with the house (e.g., ladder), but aren’t available for tenant use, and put it all in an exterior closet. We installed a padlock for that closet. We worked with the property manager to hire contractors to have a new baseboard heater installed, have a new door installed, have the new dishwasher fixed, have the house cleaned, and have the yard landscaped. We forwarded our mail. We did a million other tiny things that I am now forgetting. But, the tenants have signed the lease and will be moving in at the end of the month! Hooray!

While all this house-readying and stuff-purging was going on, we also packed lots of things into the RV and did a lot of work on it that needed to be done before we could leave. For instance: installing the towing system on the car! Thankfully, that worked. We were doing a test drive around the neighborhood at 10pm the night before we left with me hopping out at every corner to check that everything was working correctly.

Though we had been living in the driveway for a couple weeks before we left, we never had a full on “drive the full set-up elsewhere for a weekend” sort of trial run. It was in the plans to have a full month of that, but you know how construction tasks go: everything takes longer than you expect. So, our month of little jaunts around CO ended up being two weeks in the driveway. So it goes.

We also were saying goodbye to our friends, which was, of course, emotionally draining, and dealing with some feelings of being “ungrounded.” That wasn’t easy, either.

After about two weeks of me working straight from the time I woke up from the time I fell into bed, everything was ready. Nik, of course, has his job during the day (mine requires much fewer hours and is much more flexible) so he helped before and after work and on the weekends. We were so exhausted by the time we rolled up yesterday. It was good to sleep in today for the first time in months. Time to exhale.

Answers to common questions:

• We are sleeping GREAT. We have a fantastic new memory foam mattress and lots of blankets and are super cozy.
• Our solar panels are kicking butt. We can run the space heater and microwave at once without being plugged in.
• It was hard to get rid of things at first, but once we got started, it was very freeing. It was only difficult for the things we were very attached to. For those things, it helped to give it to friends that I knew would appreciate it so whatever it was would have a loving home. That sounds silly, but it helped a lot.
• Cheat is loving it so far and I think he sees Daisy the RV as “home” now.
• Other questions about moving into an RV? Leave them in the comments!