OK, so first, apologies for neglecting the Blog, sorry. Anyone other than me reading it anyway? :-)
So, it is now almost the end of February 2012. I am actually in 'Okotoks' Canada visiting one of my (if not THE) best friend(s) She is a fellow Brit, we met almost 30 yrs ago when I was working in a warehouse grocery place and she came in as a seasonal worker. I actually disliked her intensely at first (can't remember why) But after getting to know her, we have been the best of friends ever since. In fact, she was the one that convinced me to move to W. Germany in 1986 to become a nanny for a US Military couple! Crazy I know! But, that is where I met my beloved hubby, best friend, Jay<3 We were married in May of 1987:)
Anyway, I am here in Canada, very beautiful Country, pretty chilly too! I think the temp out there right now, is around -7 brrrrrr!! As you have probably gathered, Jay is in Afghanistan now, we keep in touch through daily emails and a phonecall every two days. He is doing pretty good out there, he still has his "Matthew moments" as we call them, he says laying down at night is the toughest time for him, because he has the 'time' to let his mind wander, invariably it wanders to thoughts and memories of Matthew. It's only to be expected though, it is only just over 3 months sine we lost him! I have my moments too, i'm sure we will forever, maybe just not as often. I miss Jay terribly, this deployment has been the hardest one ever! We will both be a lot happier when we are both home and together again! Jay's deployment is the reason I am here, he didn't want me home by myself, he said he didn't need to worry about me being alone as well as everything else on his plate, so, for the first three weeks, I stayed with Jay's Mom and dad in S.CALI. They had put their house up for sale and I went to help them pack it all up, they sold within 2 weeks (at a big loss) and are moving very soon to a gated over 55 community, lovely place.
So, I am now here in Canada until April 16th, I am actually looking forward to going home and having a little 'me' time before Jay gets back around the 10th May. I am happy to be here with my friends, they are taking such good care of me, we are doing the sightseeing thing, shopping, meals out etc, I really do appreciate them!
As for our plans for fulltiming in an RV and travelling around this huge beautiful USof A, I have been kind of obsessed with all that (typical me really) I have joined a couple of online RV forums, and RV advice/help forums. I have even subscribed to an online magazine for fulltimers etc called "Workamper news", it's a great forum and has lots of regular members that can answer questions from newbies, or give advice on anything you may be thinking about concerning the fulltimer lifestyle. Just a brief description of 'workamping' in case this phrase is new to you, it was to me too until recently. It is a list of employers, usually campground/RV park owners, that are looking for help during the busy seasons to run the parks. They offer either a Full Hook Up (FHU)for your RV, which includes electricity, water and sewerage, sometimes WiFi and cable too, sometimes more. Or they will offer FHU plus a wage for all hours worked over the FHU value. There are other offers too, some are completely voluntary, but you would at minimum get the FHU, this can save you the cost of your rental space and allow you to visit a State that you maybe wouldn't have gone too otherwise. So, I have become obsessed with reading these lists daily, I send the ones that sound interesting to Jay to read through, I have also been sending him links to RVs that I find on various websites online! I'm sure he is sick of seeing his mail box full with emails/links from me:) In fact I got a comment from him only this morning, all his email said was "babe, you gotta start sending links to RVs we can actually afford" LOL.
So, we are still on the same path, we have changed a few things though, we are going to start seriously looking at Diesel Pusher motor homes when Jay gets home, our (new) plan now, is to buy the RV, sell up all/most of our 'stuff and move onto the base 'famcamp' area, this is a long stay RV campground on the base, that allows you to stay from 14 days all the way up too 2 years. They charge $500 per month, inclusive of all utilities. Jay will still be able to work his current position on base to keep earning a wage to pay off the debts, plus we will be saving around $1,500 a month from the rent and utilities on the house we rent. Our rental contract is up in June, so we will be asking if we can do a month to month contract until we have everything in place to move onto base. It's a little scary to think about giving up all that we have collected over the 25 years of being married, when we started out with the decision to do this, I don't think either of us thought about those boxes in the garage filled with Matthew's childhood treasures, his Lego's, his dinosaurs, bionicles etc. That's going to be tough, do we give them away? put them in a yard sale? Maybe our oldest Son Nathan will keep them for us until we can let them go? Hopefully, by the time we are ready to do this, Nathan will be leaving his Station in Hawaii and moving to a navy base in the lower 48:) We shall see.
OK, I think that is enough for this installment, I know, it's been a long one, but it has been two months and I am trying to keep up to date!
Signing off....huggs Kim x
