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Montgomery, Alabama – Visiting family and learning about the Civil Rights Movement

Mar 42016



Selma-To-Montgomery-March

Travel dates :: January 29 – February 9, 2016

After wrapping up our time in Florida (see Florida panhandle post here) we jetted north to Montgomery, Alabama. This was on our list for a LONG time and it was a bit of a relief to roll into town. We had 10 days scheduled in Montgomery while we spent time with Jeremy’s brother and sister-in-law and their two adorable kids who are close to our kids ages. Jeremy’s brother is in the Air Force and he was able to sponsor our stay in the Family Campground on the Air Force Base. The sites were clean, well-maintained and included FULL hook-ups for $180 for 10 days – a steal at $18/day. We are so grateful to stay here during our visit.

Cousins-Alabama-fun

While in Montgomery we spent a LOT of time just playing with our sweet cousins. We have a small extended family – just 3 cousins and two of them are in Montgomery, so this is a big deal. It was a special time to bond and hang out. We went to our nephew’s basketball games, bought girl scout cookies from my niece – and watched the Super Bowl over at their place.

Playing-With-Cousins-Montgomery

The kids spent a lot of time playing outside in the sunshine. Riding bikes, playing Nerf guns and playing with the neighbor kids. It was so much fun.

But during the work week – while they were at work and going to school – we spent a lot of time exploring the local area. Most especially we spent a lot of time exploring places of historical importance.

Edmund-Pettus-Bridge

Selma to Montgomery National Historical Trail – We took a full day and drove the hour from Montgomery to Selma, Alabama along the general route of the Selma to Montgomery National Historical Trail. The 54-mile trail symbolizes so much about the Civil Rights movement and has three interpretive centers along the route. Our first stop was at the Selma Interpretive Center – right on the corner in downtown Selma after you cross over the famous Edmund Pettus Bridge.

Junior-Ranger-badge-Selma

Part of the National Parks system it is a small visitor’s center, but has some important displays . . .

Selma-earning-junior-range-badge

and it was here that our kids completed the Junior Ranger badge (the same badge is available along the whole route).

Bloody-Sunday-Edmund-Pettus

You can walk across the street to the site of “Bloody Sunday” attack at the Edmund Pettus Bridge. On March 7, 1965 a group of 600 African Americans peacefully marching were attacked on this bridge by local law enforcement. 50 people were hospitalized. Two weeks later another group would start their march here and ultimately make it to Montgomery.

[Read more…]

{ 4 Comments }

by Heather Filed Under: Alabama, Destinations

We updated our travel map. . .and thoughts on where we are headed

Mar 32016



Updated-Travel-Map-March-3

We updated our travel map with all the places we have stopped so far – including all the amazing places we visited in the East Coast that we haven’t gotten around to blogging about yet (hopefully I’ll have time to do this in the next couple months).

You can see the places we stopped and a short description of that location by heading over to the map page clicking on a red marker. If there is a corresponding blog post there will be a hyperlink to take you right to the post. If you’re looking at the list, the places with photos generally are the ones with corresponding blog posts.

It’s amazing to look back and see how much ground we have covered and to really sit and think about all the experiences we’ve had. From watching a Boston Red Sox game in Fenway park to swimming with dolphins in Florida – we have had such a wonderful time on the road.

Leaving-our-house-June-15Pulling out of our driveway, day one of our adventure

Looking ahead

Our initial plans were to only travel for about a year. When we left last summer (June 16, 2015) a full year seemed like a LONG time and honestly we weren’t even sure we’d last that long. We originally planned to pull into the Portland, Oregon area in late April/early May 2016 and have Jeremy start looking for a teaching job for the upcoming fall. We planned to enroll the kids back in school and get back to “regular” life.

That was our initial plan. But after being on the road 8.5 months, we are all so happy we can’t imagine stopping in just a couple months. What once seemed scary and daunting (traveling full time and towing our home) has become second-nature. We have discussed it a lot as a family and have collectively decided we want to keep traveling. . .

Hadley-Looks-out-Telescope-Tower-AmericasHadley looking for as far as she can see, Tower of the Americas, San Antonio, Texas

Currently we don’t have an end date in mind. We’ve discussed it a little bit – possibly 6 additional months, maybe a year? We don’t want to put a date on it just yet. As long as we are happy and having fun, can still afford to travel without pulling from our nest egg/emergency fund/house fund, and we believe the kids are benefiting from the experience . .. then we’ll continue to travel.

Winery-PennsylvaniaCamping at a winery/farm in Pennsylvania

Where will we end up? We don’t know the answer to this either. Some of our favorite people (friends from college) are in the Portland, Oregon area and we have always loved the Pacific Northwest. But after traveling the country our eyes are open to many other possibilities. We love the sun and would love to settle somewhere warmer without the continuous gray skies.

New_Orleans-Ferry-ExploreTaking a ferry into New Orleans

Only time will tell how long we travel and where we will settle back down into suburbia. We are fairly certain that we don’t want to do this forever. Although we see great benefit to full-time travel we also see great benefit in our kids playing sports, doing gymnastics, going to summer camps and making long lasting friends at “regular” school. We still have a LOT of time for this to happen before they get to junior, middle and high school – which is when we personally think these things are most important.

The beauty of all of this is – we can choose and we can change our minds. And if we change our minds tomorrow we hitch up the Airstream and head to the place we want to put down roots. And we do.

Wilderness-State-Park-Beach-Peace

Until then adventure awaits. . .

Make sure and follow us so that you don’t miss our adventures! The best ways to keep in touch are:

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  • Follow us on Instagram – I’m always sharing real-time photos of our travels here!
  • Follow us on Facebook – Also a great place to get post updates and photos

 Family-Friendly-travel-gamesRV-appliances-products-recommended-side

{ 16 Comments }

by Heather Filed Under: Planning

Travel with kids :: Our favorite travel board games and card games

Mar 22016



Family-friendly-travel-size-games

Earlier this year I posted an Instagram photo of us playing Monopoly Game Star Wars and I got a great question from a soon-to-be full-time traveling family about our favorite travel size games. So I put together this list of our favorite family-friendly travel size games! We have an 8- and 5-year-old, so your list may vary depending on your kids ages and your preferences.

We find that having a variety of games in the trailer entertains the kids on rainy or quiet days, provides another option besides movies/TV, requires no extra power or electricity (great for boondocking!) and can be a great way for our kids to connect with other kids on the road when outside play isn’t an option. Shop travel-size games on Amazon.

Even if you don’t plan to travel full-time this list is great for spring break or summer road trips, camping, plane rides and just life-on-the-go!

Our TOP picks for family-friendly travel-size games ::

Travel-Sequence

Travel Sequence
Probably our FAVORITE game!

Kings-In-Corner-Game

Kings in the Corner Game

Trouble-Travel-Version

Trouble Travel Fun On The Run 

[Read more…]

{ 8 Comments }

by Heather Filed Under: Day-to-Day Living

St. Andrews State Park and Henderson Beach State Park {Florida Panhandle}

Mar 12016



St-Andrews-State-Park

Travel dates :: Jan 23 – 28, 2016

After leaving O’Leno State Park we headed north and west to the Florida panhandle.  We were really looking forward to this area of Florida. We heard the beaches were amazing and we couldn’t wait to check them out. Our first stop was St. Andrews State Park where we had a two-night reservation in spot 104. This spot was AWESOME – right on the end of a row, it was huge and shared one side with a lot of shrubbery – so it felt nice and private.

Henderson-Tracks-beach

It also had access to the lagoon (read: muddy shoreline) which the kids really loved. They had a lot of rain before we got there so it was muddier than normal. But the kids loved that. They had fun picking out the deer footprints in the sand. We saw a lot of deer while we were here!

Playing-at-St-Andrew-State-Park

And the kids spent a lot of time RUNNING around our campsite. It was big enough that I didn’t have to worry about them bothering other campers. I like it when this happens (and I think the kids do, too).

The first night we were at St. Andrews, the Bareneckers graciously had us over for dinner! We always love hanging out with the Bareneckers and their four adorable kids – and they always seem to have a delicious meal to share – we are so grateful for them and we had a great night hanging out with them.

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{ 1 Comment }

by Heather Filed Under: Destinations, Florida

My favorite RV-friendly appliances and products :: Instant Pot, Dehumidifier, Electric Skillet, more

Feb 282016



RV-appliances-products-recommended

My favorite RV-Friendly appliances and products

I often get asked, “What are your favorite appliances you use in your RV?” or “What items should I buy for our trailer if we plan to go full-time?” . . . 

For a long time I didn’t do a post on this because I didn’t feel much like an expert on the topic. But after traveling full-time for eight months in our Airstream trailer I feel like I have figured a few things out – so I’m sharing my favorite RV-friendly appliances and products.

When you have limited living space you want to make certain that the things you buy or store in your RV are providing some benefit. You might want to consider these things when selecting appliances and products for our RV ::

Cost savings – Does it save us money? It wasn’t long after hitting the road that we discovered that we almost always have some type of electrical hook-up, so choosing appliances that use electricity (instead of propane gas) saved us money.

Storage – How much space is required to store the appliance and does the benefit warrant the space needs?

Convenience – Does it save us time and effort?

Quality of life – Does it provide a benefit that improves our quality of life on the road? Sometimes we might sacrifice cost savings, storage needs and convenience because something improves our quality of life and it’s important to us.

Instant-Pot-RV-friendly-appliance

Instant Pot – I had so many kitchen appliances in our house that this was a tough department for me to downsize. The Instant Pot IP-DUO60 7-in-1 Multi-Functional Pressure Cooker, 6Qt/1000W rocks my RV world. It wears many chef hats – it’s a rice cooker, a slow cooker, a pressure cooker and so much more. I’ve cooked a spiral ham in under 2 hours, 8 pounds of pulled pork in 75 minutes, frozen chicken in under 30 minutes and so much more. . .if you only have room for one RV appliance – I recommend this one! This is our biggest appliance in terms of storage needs but it fits in the wardrobe/closet in our kitchen just fine. I will often cook outside with this – running an extension cord directly from our RV site hook-ups to the picnic table or we also have a folding tray table that works great for this.

Rival-small-electric-skillet-RV-friendly

Electric Skillet – This is one appliance I wish we would have started our journey with, but only recently purchased. The Rival CKRVSK11 11-Inch Square Electric Skillet, Black is a small electric skillet that allows us to cook using electricity without using propane. It also comes in handy when we need more cooking space – as our 3-burner stove top is small when it comes to multiple pots/pans. This skillet is great for stir fries, eggs (non-stick), pancakes and more.

Electric-Dehumidifier-small-RV-size

Dehumidifier – We just got this small dehumidifier, Eva-dry Edv-1100 Electric Petite Dehumidifier, White, a couple months ago. I wish we would have purchased sooner. It’s small but packs a serious punch when it comes to pulling the moisture out of the trailer. Moisture is NOT your friend when it comes to RV life and especially in the winter months when you’re sleeping with windows closed – moisture and condensation on the windows is expected. Since getting this dehumidifier we’ve seen a big improvement in overnight window condensation and our towels dry faster in our bathroom! We use this daily so it usually lives in the bathroom or the kitchen – but is stored in the closet when we travel.

[Read more…]

{ 27 Comments }

by Heather Filed Under: Day-to-Day Living

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