That's what The Hot Contractor likes to call the engine that's in this big ol' truck we bought. It's a 1998, 1-ton, GMC, duly, crew-cab, long-bed, diesel truck. It's a beast! We are going to convert it to veggie oil ASAP.
As I'm typing, we are on the road, traveling from Santa Cruz to Oroville. All our stuff is packed in The Hot Contractor's aunt's barn in Oroville. She needs the barn back, so we're going to pack our stuff on our flat bed trailer, to be picked up by The Hot Contractor once we settle somewhere.
(The story of the flatbed: The Hot Contractor was chopping down a tree for someone on Freecycle after we'd offered his chopping services in exchange for their firewood. They joked with him about taking their moldy old, nasty disgusting, 20-foot travel trailer off their property. He did. Then he spent two days tearing it apart with a hammer and a nail puller. He then built it into a beautiful, 20-foot, flat-bed trailer. Not only is he crafty, but he's oh-so-frugal too. My dream man. And now he's going to convert it into an 8' x 8' x 20' cargo trailer to haul our stuff across the country.)
Now back to our regularly scheduled blog...
This whole process of converting from the motor home to a truck and trailer was a bit more work than we planned on. Let's just say it's been a crazy month! But we made it! Whew! And we're finally on the road. Having this to look forward to has been motivation as we were feeling so overwhelmed.
The last three or four weeks, The Hot Contractor has spent many hours (usually from 10 pm to 2 am) researching veggie oil conversions and bio diesel processors. We went from wanting to convert the engine to veggie oil, to wanting to create a mobile bio diesel processing kit for the back of the truck, to now wanting to do veggie oil again. We've had to weigh the costs of time, space, money, availability, efficiency, and more. Since we plan on this fuel conversion being a permanent thing, we want to do it right and well. I'm so proud of The Hot Contractor for all the work (and time!) he has put into educating himself on this. He's now ready to install the veggie kit once it arrives.
One of the things that was so stressful about this process for us was when we took it to a bio diesel mechanic (who does the conversions). He evaluated our motor, and told The Hot Contractor that we need a new one. He said this one "might last 300 more miles." The compression test showed it was basically running on six out of the eight cylinders. We looked into buying a new engine, having one shipped across the country, buying another truck that had a usable engine, yada yada. None of these options were cheap, and all of them required us to stay in Santa Cruz longer than we wanted to. So, we decided to just go for it on this engine. We're gonna milk every last mile out of this thing! If it breaks down in the middle of the country, we'll deal with it then. We figure it will just add to the adventure. The Hot Contractor likes to call it "The Jesus Motor" because it was given the doomsday prognosis of "maybe going another 300 miles".
And that was 700 miles ago.
Showing posts with label adventure. Show all posts
Showing posts with label adventure. Show all posts
Monday, April 4, 2011
Sunday, December 19, 2010
Before & After RV Remodel
Finally getting around to posting our before and after pictures of the RV remodel. Here goes!
Kitchen:
Here's the Family Shrine, and the refrigerator with chalkboard paint. The kids love doing art work on the fridge.
Bath:
Trying to show my favorite vintage hook I got, and the crown molding my hubby put in the bathroom.
Living Room:
See those beautiful glass windows above the chairs? We didn't know what to do about those. Then, we had an idea to paint them with chalkboard paint! They were covered nicely, and they're so useful. We write notes to each other, or our To Do list, or Grocery List, or meal planning on them. I love them now! My "after" picture didn't turn out for those...will have to post that later.
My Hot Contractor, working hard. Cute and happy.
Loft/Kids' Room
This is after The Hot Contractor tore it apart and rebuilt it.
Happy kids in their loft. They love it! We have their toys and books around the edges, and their bed in the middle.
Bedroom:
My kids, helping the Hot Contractor work on things.
There's no "before" for this shot, but this is our "office".
I wanted to show the crown molding my Hot Contractor put up. This is the view from laying on the bed.
Here's the outside of the RV in process. The Hot Contractor rebuilt the loft over the cab because the outside wall had come off. There were some pretty amazing things underneath that loft....like three ant colonies!
He also took off all the windows for painting and repairing the walls. He had to remove many of the inner walls as he discovered more and more dry rot as he began taking things apart. I'm just glad we discovered it, and that it's gone. Plus, with all the walls torn out, it was a good reason to do new texture and paint.
"Cheese!"
Here's us driving away. I'm driving the RV, pulling The Hot Contractor's tool trailer with The Princess in the cab of the RV. The Hot Contractor is driving his truck, hauling his flat bed trailer with my car on top, and he has Little Brother with him. We looked like something out of Beverly Hillbilly's traveling down the road.
Shameless Plug:
Now that you've seen what my talented hubby can do, may I ask that you keep him in mind for projects you or your friends might have coming up? We will be traveling the country, so we may be coming to a neighborhood (or RV campground) near you! We would love to meet people, explore new places, and be able to make some sort of income while we do it. For more about what The Hot Contractor can do, or to see pictures of past projects, you can check out his website here. Thanks, friends!
Sunday, November 28, 2010
Update On Our Plans
Since it's been more than two months since I posted about out adventure, I figured it was time for an update.
We decided mid-September to move into the RV pre-baby, rather than try to do it with a newborn. The thought of packing up and moving while pregnant was also a little daunting, but I think it was the better option of the two. Considering this has been my easiest pregnancy so far, I was feeling up for it.
So, we began the remodel. First, The Hot Contractor rebuilt the area over the cab. It was all dry rotted, and he even found three ant colonies living under the loft bed! He rebuilt it, and now it's water proofed.
Then he tackled the dry rot in the other areas of the RV. He ended up replacing/rebuilding almost all the other walls, as he kept discovering more dry rot with each removal. It took a little longer than we planned. Once all the walls were done, he repainted them (and the cabinets). We chucked the gold cabinet hardware, and put on our oil rubbed bronze ones. I plan to do a before and after post, and I don't have my "before" pics handy right now, but here's a little sneak peek of the "after".
We also decided to paint the fridge and the gold laced mirror cabinet doors with chalkboard paint. They're super fun! The kids draw on the fridge whenever they have an artistic itch, and we use the freezer part for our grocery list. We've been using the other three (previously gold-laced ones) for our to-do list. Here's a sneak peek.
You'll notice our family shrine here too. :-)
Here's how the bedroom turned out.
The Hot Contractor and I both sewed new curtains. He did most of it, as he worries I might destroy them. Again, justified worry.
Without going into too much detail, we became very stressed as the Mad-Rush-to-Finish-Before-Thanksgiving arrived. We loaded up Wednesday before Thanksgiving, and hit the road! Somehow we made it. It was probably those days working from 7am-11pm for the two weeks prior. Ugh. It was hard, but it's over.
I left Oroville before The Hot Contractor because he had more things to load, and I needed to get to Sacramento to buy our refurbished washer/dryer before they closed. The Princess and I were in the RV, towing The Hot Contractor's work trailer loaded with all his tools. Unbeknownst to us, the ball on the hitch was a little too high, and every time I touched the breaks, I would skid. Sometimes not even stop. It was the scariest drive of my life! We made it (miraculously) to Sacramento 15 minutes before they closed. I told The Hot Contractor how scared I was driving. I thought the brakes had gone out, but he checked everything he could think of, and found nothing wrong with the brakes. He had the thought about the ball on the hitch being too high, and the weight of his trailer lifting the back tires on the RV when I braked. He lowered the ball, and it fixed the problem. I love that he's so knowledgeable, and that he can figure out stuff like this! I felt so safe and protected by him, knowing he wouldn't let us get on the road again until he was sure it was safe. We ended up spending the night in Sacramento, parked in the driveway of the RV salvage place. We left early Thanksgiving morning, and made it to Santa Cruz only a couple hours after we told my in-laws we would be there. I was full of gratitude. We had a wonderful Thanksgiving.
We decided mid-September to move into the RV pre-baby, rather than try to do it with a newborn. The thought of packing up and moving while pregnant was also a little daunting, but I think it was the better option of the two. Considering this has been my easiest pregnancy so far, I was feeling up for it.
So, we began the remodel. First, The Hot Contractor rebuilt the area over the cab. It was all dry rotted, and he even found three ant colonies living under the loft bed! He rebuilt it, and now it's water proofed.
Then he tackled the dry rot in the other areas of the RV. He ended up replacing/rebuilding almost all the other walls, as he kept discovering more dry rot with each removal. It took a little longer than we planned. Once all the walls were done, he repainted them (and the cabinets). We chucked the gold cabinet hardware, and put on our oil rubbed bronze ones. I plan to do a before and after post, and I don't have my "before" pics handy right now, but here's a little sneak peek of the "after".
We also decided to paint the fridge and the gold laced mirror cabinet doors with chalkboard paint. They're super fun! The kids draw on the fridge whenever they have an artistic itch, and we use the freezer part for our grocery list. We've been using the other three (previously gold-laced ones) for our to-do list. Here's a sneak peek.
You'll notice our family shrine here too. :-)
Here's how the bedroom turned out.
The Hot Contractor and I both sewed new curtains. He did most of it, as he worries I might destroy them. Again, justified worry.
Without going into too much detail, we became very stressed as the Mad-Rush-to-Finish-Before-Thanksgiving arrived. We loaded up Wednesday before Thanksgiving, and hit the road! Somehow we made it. It was probably those days working from 7am-11pm for the two weeks prior. Ugh. It was hard, but it's over.
I left Oroville before The Hot Contractor because he had more things to load, and I needed to get to Sacramento to buy our refurbished washer/dryer before they closed. The Princess and I were in the RV, towing The Hot Contractor's work trailer loaded with all his tools. Unbeknownst to us, the ball on the hitch was a little too high, and every time I touched the breaks, I would skid. Sometimes not even stop. It was the scariest drive of my life! We made it (miraculously) to Sacramento 15 minutes before they closed. I told The Hot Contractor how scared I was driving. I thought the brakes had gone out, but he checked everything he could think of, and found nothing wrong with the brakes. He had the thought about the ball on the hitch being too high, and the weight of his trailer lifting the back tires on the RV when I braked. He lowered the ball, and it fixed the problem. I love that he's so knowledgeable, and that he can figure out stuff like this! I felt so safe and protected by him, knowing he wouldn't let us get on the road again until he was sure it was safe. We ended up spending the night in Sacramento, parked in the driveway of the RV salvage place. We left early Thanksgiving morning, and made it to Santa Cruz only a couple hours after we told my in-laws we would be there. I was full of gratitude. We had a wonderful Thanksgiving.
Sunday, September 12, 2010
Hittin' the Road!
So, it's been a long time since I've blogged. What's new? But, I have a great reason to blog right now. I'm super duper excited about this adventure we're about to embark on. We're moving into an RV, and are going to explore the great U-S of A!
Here's how it all transpired:
We've wanted to leave California for a long time now, but for various reasons just haven't. Partly because we haven't known where we want to go. This summer, we took a family vacation to New Hampshire to check it out. We've done some research, and New Hampshire is rated as the "freest" state, and home of The Free State Project. Our little Libertarian hearts are longing for some of that freedom, so we've been mulling it over. It would be a big move, but we've got some adventure left in these spirits, so why not? We're planning on this being our final destination after our adventure, but we're also open to having our minds changed by our adventure.
A few weeks ago, some friends of ours gave us an RV that they no longer needed. Our other friends had given it to them. And some friends of theirs had given it to them. So, we're the latest recipients of this love, and are so grateful for this huge blessing! Traveling the country with our kids has always been a dream of ours. We've always said we wanted to do it for a year while homeschooling them, but since they're not quite school aged yet, that probably just means we'll have to do it again someday.
Since I'm currently with child (did I neglect to mention that here?), we are trying to figure out the timing of our move into the mansion. We're not sure if we should bust tail and get in there before the baby is born, or wait until a few months after he comes to move in. All just details, but stuff we're working through right now. The Hot Contractor has been getting more work in the Bay Area than he has here (which is pretty much none), so we're considering just movin' in and going down there for a while this Fall/Winter, and "practicing" living in it. I think it will be fun.
The cool part is that we took it camping last weekend (can I just pause here to tell you what glorious Camping Sleep this pregnant Mama had in that thing? Seriously. Camping Sleep and Pregnancy just don't go together well in my experience). While camping, we discovered all these things that are broken/need fixing on it. Like how the generator doesn't work, and the hydraulic system is broken, so we aren't able to level it. And how if it's not level, the fridge and freezer don't work. And how the water pump leaks, so whenever we use it (which is whenever we want to turn on water), it leaks a lot of our water, and we end up with an empty water tank in about a day. And the window coverings that don't exist. It might sound like I'm complaining, but really, these quirks excite me! Know why? Because we get to make it our own while we fix it! Woo-hoo!!!
When we first got it, the front door wouldn't close, so The Hot Contractor rebuilt the door. It took a few days, but it was well worth having some privacy when we went camping last weekend. We also decided to tear up the carpet, and put down laminate floors. We found some really fun stuff at Home Depot, and since it's a sprawling mansion of 29 feet, it cost us about $200 in flooring to replace it all. I also got a carpet remnant (shag, of course) at a carpet store for $35. We're going to cut it to size, and have a nice cushy carpet runner under our tootsies. Ahhh....how homey does that sound???
We're going to repaint the cabinets and walls eventually, and replace the oh-so-retro (but not in a good way) cabinet hardware with some cute oil-rubbed bronze knobs I got cheap on eBay. I'm going for a vintage country look. We bought some upholstery fabric, and are making cute curtains for the lodge (The Hot Contractor is doing that too. He's just a better seamstress than I am, and has a hard time letting me sew important things...because he's a little afraid I'll mess them up. Justifiably). A few of them ended up shorter than we wanted (width-wise), so I have an idea of adding some fun fringe or tassel fringe to the edges to extend them out a bit. I'm still looking for the prefect fringe, so let me know if you see any. ;-)
Another idea I had....since storage is an issue when you're living with five people in a 29-footer, I'm collecting vintage hooks to put on the walls all over the RV. Whenever I think of this, I imagine cute little hooks decorating spacious feet of wall space.
And then I go in there.
And I realize there aren't very many places to hang hooks because there is very little wall space. Even though I will be spatially challenged, I'm determined to succeed with my vintage hook decorating idea. I think it will be functional, yet cute. And that's what I'm going for.
One aspect of our adventure that is really challenging is laundry. If we're living in this thing full-time, I really don't want to be dragging three kids to a laundry mat every other day just to keep up on my laundry. I use cloth diapers, cloth napkins, cloth towels (instead of paper towels), and even more "cloth" stuff that I won't mention here. Some things I'm willing to give up, but some things I'm not (like cloth diapers), so I must find a way to do laundry in this RV. If I don't do one to two loads a day, I'm behind, and that's only with two kids! We came across this machine that washes and dries your clothes all at once, and is about 2'x2'x3'. We think we have a place for it in the RV (we'll lose one of our nice Lazy-Boy type chairs, but I think it will be worth it....especially since we'll add a counter top to it so we expand our kitchen counter space). It's about a $1,200 unit, and a little out of our budget for this "Design on a Dime" endeavor, but I called around to RV salvage places, and found a used/refurbished one for $600. Cool, huh? It's down in Sacramento, so we'll go check it out the next time we go that way. Maybe y'all should start calling me Frugal Mama, because I'm SO feeling it right now.
There's a lot of dry rot we're discovering, so The Hot Contractor is planning on tearing all of that out and replacing it. There's a little teensy bit of me that is afraid of what we will discover, but it's all a part of the adventure, eh? And again, we get to make it our own!!
There's the update. I think I need to start an RV blog. RVMama? What do you think? I definitely need to find some way to document our adventures. For now, Homesteadmama will have to suffice.
Here's how it all transpired:
We've wanted to leave California for a long time now, but for various reasons just haven't. Partly because we haven't known where we want to go. This summer, we took a family vacation to New Hampshire to check it out. We've done some research, and New Hampshire is rated as the "freest" state, and home of The Free State Project. Our little Libertarian hearts are longing for some of that freedom, so we've been mulling it over. It would be a big move, but we've got some adventure left in these spirits, so why not? We're planning on this being our final destination after our adventure, but we're also open to having our minds changed by our adventure.
A few weeks ago, some friends of ours gave us an RV that they no longer needed. Our other friends had given it to them. And some friends of theirs had given it to them. So, we're the latest recipients of this love, and are so grateful for this huge blessing! Traveling the country with our kids has always been a dream of ours. We've always said we wanted to do it for a year while homeschooling them, but since they're not quite school aged yet, that probably just means we'll have to do it again someday.
Since I'm currently with child (did I neglect to mention that here?), we are trying to figure out the timing of our move into the mansion. We're not sure if we should bust tail and get in there before the baby is born, or wait until a few months after he comes to move in. All just details, but stuff we're working through right now. The Hot Contractor has been getting more work in the Bay Area than he has here (which is pretty much none), so we're considering just movin' in and going down there for a while this Fall/Winter, and "practicing" living in it. I think it will be fun.
The cool part is that we took it camping last weekend (can I just pause here to tell you what glorious Camping Sleep this pregnant Mama had in that thing? Seriously. Camping Sleep and Pregnancy just don't go together well in my experience). While camping, we discovered all these things that are broken/need fixing on it. Like how the generator doesn't work, and the hydraulic system is broken, so we aren't able to level it. And how if it's not level, the fridge and freezer don't work. And how the water pump leaks, so whenever we use it (which is whenever we want to turn on water), it leaks a lot of our water, and we end up with an empty water tank in about a day. And the window coverings that don't exist. It might sound like I'm complaining, but really, these quirks excite me! Know why? Because we get to make it our own while we fix it! Woo-hoo!!!
When we first got it, the front door wouldn't close, so The Hot Contractor rebuilt the door. It took a few days, but it was well worth having some privacy when we went camping last weekend. We also decided to tear up the carpet, and put down laminate floors. We found some really fun stuff at Home Depot, and since it's a sprawling mansion of 29 feet, it cost us about $200 in flooring to replace it all. I also got a carpet remnant (shag, of course) at a carpet store for $35. We're going to cut it to size, and have a nice cushy carpet runner under our tootsies. Ahhh....how homey does that sound???
We're going to repaint the cabinets and walls eventually, and replace the oh-so-retro (but not in a good way) cabinet hardware with some cute oil-rubbed bronze knobs I got cheap on eBay. I'm going for a vintage country look. We bought some upholstery fabric, and are making cute curtains for the lodge (The Hot Contractor is doing that too. He's just a better seamstress than I am, and has a hard time letting me sew important things...because he's a little afraid I'll mess them up. Justifiably). A few of them ended up shorter than we wanted (width-wise), so I have an idea of adding some fun fringe or tassel fringe to the edges to extend them out a bit. I'm still looking for the prefect fringe, so let me know if you see any. ;-)
Another idea I had....since storage is an issue when you're living with five people in a 29-footer, I'm collecting vintage hooks to put on the walls all over the RV. Whenever I think of this, I imagine cute little hooks decorating spacious feet of wall space.
And then I go in there.
And I realize there aren't very many places to hang hooks because there is very little wall space. Even though I will be spatially challenged, I'm determined to succeed with my vintage hook decorating idea. I think it will be functional, yet cute. And that's what I'm going for.
One aspect of our adventure that is really challenging is laundry. If we're living in this thing full-time, I really don't want to be dragging three kids to a laundry mat every other day just to keep up on my laundry. I use cloth diapers, cloth napkins, cloth towels (instead of paper towels), and even more "cloth" stuff that I won't mention here. Some things I'm willing to give up, but some things I'm not (like cloth diapers), so I must find a way to do laundry in this RV. If I don't do one to two loads a day, I'm behind, and that's only with two kids! We came across this machine that washes and dries your clothes all at once, and is about 2'x2'x3'. We think we have a place for it in the RV (we'll lose one of our nice Lazy-Boy type chairs, but I think it will be worth it....especially since we'll add a counter top to it so we expand our kitchen counter space). It's about a $1,200 unit, and a little out of our budget for this "Design on a Dime" endeavor, but I called around to RV salvage places, and found a used/refurbished one for $600. Cool, huh? It's down in Sacramento, so we'll go check it out the next time we go that way. Maybe y'all should start calling me Frugal Mama, because I'm SO feeling it right now.
There's a lot of dry rot we're discovering, so The Hot Contractor is planning on tearing all of that out and replacing it. There's a little teensy bit of me that is afraid of what we will discover, but it's all a part of the adventure, eh? And again, we get to make it our own!!
There's the update. I think I need to start an RV blog. RVMama? What do you think? I definitely need to find some way to document our adventures. For now, Homesteadmama will have to suffice.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
