Thursday, December 7

Living Life

We're still in Nebraska. I guess I feel I have to say that because people that know us, know that we don't stay in one place for too long. We're planning on staying here all winter, though. That's the plan, at least. We spent Thanksgiving with a fellow road dog and his wife at their rental house. Joey really had to sell me on going there, next year I won't be buying. We absolutely enjoyed the rest of the weekend, though. We got a burst of energy and started remodeling and reorganizing. We took down the temporary bunks we had made for the boys and built them big new bunks, the full length of the old closet. We also made the frame for the foot of our bed so we can turn our full size bed into a king. We still have the side frame to build, new cubicles/drawers for our clothes, and mattress to buy, but we're off to a great start. For the bunk beds I glued material to the walls, and for the frame we used 2x3's, stained a red mahogany (which I'd eventually like to convert all the wood into the bus to). Bunkbeds

I had to drive all the way to Iowa again. I thought I could register our new cars just over the border in Iowa, but no, they have to be registered in the county of residence. For residency purposes we're still using our house in Fonda. Knowing this area all too well you wouldn't think I'd go 100 miles out of my way, do you? Oh, you do know me, yes I did. I missed a turn early on and never thought twice about it, until I saw I was 12 miles from Minnesota! I got the cars registered with one day to spare, gotta leave room for error. We then swung by Mel's to pick up our mail and then hurried back to the Bus to beat the roads from turning to ice.

This last weekend we made YET ANOTHER trip to Iowa....to pick up Joey's Jeep. Jeep? What Jeep? I thought you sold it, you ask. We got it back. Heck, we had an extra hitch, may as well tow something with it. While we were gone this day our breaker decides to go out leaving the bus without any heat all day long. We came home to a frozen black tank, that was extremely full! Good thing we knew the temps were dropping and picked up a bigger radiant heat heater on the way home just to put under the bus. Joey ended up having to take the next day off work to deal with the frozen tank but eventually the heater thawed the tank out and we were able to drain it. We also ran out of propane! The propane guy came the next day around noon and we were able run the furnace again. We made it thru a 9 degree night with just two small electric heaters. While the heaters do an excellent job heating the bus there was still a huge cold draft coming form the windows, so yesterday I bought insulation that is basically bubble wrap wrapped in aluminum foil and covered every window with it. It has stopped the drafts completley. It truly is amazing at how well the bus stays heated now. The furnace hasn't kicked on at all, and last night I only had one heater running on low, and it was very warm. We're pretty confident now we can hang out the winter in comfort.

3 comments:

zamozo said...

Hey Vicki! Good to hear from you! I love the customized bunk bed spaces!! It sounds like you've been busy. I'm curious about something... How do you do all that building (bunk beds, bed frame, staining) in your bus?? Do you do it outside the bus? Do you store power tools for that kind fo work? Just curious about bus life.

Take care and stay warm!

Vicki said...

Lowe's cut the plywood sheets for us, then Joey used his sawzall and cut the 2x3's inside the bus since it was so cold outside. A sawzall is one of those must have tools, and is always with us along with basic hand and power tools, like drills and such. The sanding and staining were also done inside the bus, in place. It was a trick getting the top bunk stained!

Great to hear from you too, Chris!

Vicki said...

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