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Monthly Archives: March 2014

Our Home is in the Mail

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Our Campsite in Porteau Cove Provincial Park, BC

Losi 3 Person Tent by Nemo Equipment

This has been our home for much of our wanderings across this great land.  We began to notice something funky with the tent in late fall.  It started to seem as if the tent material had shrunk.  All of a sudden, we were noticing that the poles fit tighter and that the floor wouldn’t lay flat all the way to the edges.  Shortly after we noticed that, the zippers on both the tent and the fly started to separate from time to time.  It would usually zip up just fine, but then it would start to come apart in the middle anywhere from five minutes to several hours after we had zipped everything up.  It only happened periodically at first, but then the frequency increased as time wore on.  Since it was too cold for bugs, we just dealt with it and promised to look into once we were no longer reliant on it for shelter.

And so, I packed up our collapsible home this week and made a trip to the post office with Van.  I’m happy that this is the first warranty claim of the trip (though we did return Alan’s Big Agnes ground pad earlier in the trip to replace it with a much improved Therm-a-rest), but disappointed it’s on the most expensive piece of camping equipment we own.  I’ll keep you posted as we find out what Nemo Equipment will do to replace or repair the tent.  In the mean time, I’ll be dreaming of our first camping trip of the new year once the snow melts and the tent is back in our possession.

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Happy Third Birthday Little Bug!

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Today is a big day.  Van turns three!  Though truth be told, he thinks he’s been three for a few days now, ever since celebrating with his Gran, Pa, Uncle Jack, and Aunt Jenni on Saturday.  It’s been quite a year, and I’ve been honored to spend nearly every day and night with him.  Watching his excitement, frustrations, and quiet pleasures has taught me so much about what is important and how much I take for granted.  I can only hope that I’m teaching him half of what he teaches me.

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Van, as we wind down our (for now) trip of a lifetime, I look forward to building new traditions with you and growing a home with our little family.  It is hard for me to know what you will remember from this past year (except that we stayed at a Days Inn in Idaho – you have a remarkable memory for that fact), but I hope that you continue to feel comfortable in a world without walls.  I hope that you never stop exploring or asking questions and that you continue to nurture your family and friends (both of the living and stuffed animal variety) with the care I’ve seen from you over this past year.  I promise that we’ll have plenty of time to eat our meals at picnic tables once the snow melts and that we’ll spend many long days in the sun – moving into a house made of sticks won’t change that.  Thank you for bringing me immense love and joy and teaching me more than any learned professor has.

Happy 3!

Happy 3!

Emerging from Hibernation

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It may seem as if we dropped off the face of the earth, but I can assure you that we have not.  After New Mexico (which I have yet not finished blogging about), we’ve been staying with friends and family to celebrate the holidays, escape the cold nights, and plot our next move.  We spent Thanksgiving in Colorado with Alan’s family, spent another week in Denver with our dear friend, Andrew, drove out to Michigan to visit with my family, and then have spent much of the last three months in New York with my parents (THANK YOU, MOM AND DAD!!!).  Between lots of grandparent time for Van, we also spent a couple of weeks down in the DC area to see friends and (drumroll) have spent some time house hunting and visiting friends in our intended new home of Western Massachusetts.  Yup, after traveling the country, we are winding up right where I used to live fifteen years ago.

For those of you following our journey offline, you know that we had put an offer in on a house that was accepted.  Unfortunately, the results of our inspection demonstrated that instead of buying a serious fixer upper, we would have been buying a tear down.  Back to the drawing board for us.  To make our house search easier and to get to know the area better, we rented a partially finished room in an unfinished basement of a lovely and lively artist.  She described it to us as camping indoors and almost wouldn’t show it to us since she didn’t think it would be suitable for a family.  Little did she realize that we’d been living out of our car for the last year.  Camping inside?  With access to running water, heat, and electric lights?  Sold!  It’s a temporary situation, so if we don’t have a new home by the summer, we’ll have to find a new temporary home.  But, the thought of not having to move every few days makes this dark basement seem like a luxurious retreat.  And the area around the house couldn’t be more beautiful.  The views from her studio are stunning, and there are multiple hiking trails that leave within a quarter-mile of the house.

And through all that awaits us, I look forward to continuing to share it right here.  But, before I start writing more about what we’re up to right now, I’ll be walking back a few months in time and writing a couple more posts about our wonderful month in New Mexico.  Easily one of the highlights of our trip.