We already make a difference!

7/05/2012 03:10:00 AM by LivingAndLearningOnTheMove
     I have the most awesome kids! I was looking at something and I said something to the effect of, "I just want my children to be happy, successful (in whatever way they want to be), and make a difference in the world." Brad overheard me and said, "Mom, we already make a difference, we feed the poor!"

     It's funny because throughout their childhood we have always picked up different types of activities to "give back" to the community or help others. Once, we helped with Operation Christmas Shoebox; another time, we helped with Meals from the Heartland. We've had so many opportunities to serve and each time, they have become some of my children's most treasured moments! They remember how they made sure that the shoebox had hygiene items (so they can stay clean), along with school supplies, knowing if the child didn't have school supplies he or she wasn't able to go to school. They remember!!! They remember and want to do more of those things. I also found that giving is the most rewarding thing we have ever done.


     So again, it's funny that I just wanted them to make a difference in life and they overheard and said that they have already! How awesome! Their most recent adventure of helping is by going on this website called www.freerice.com. What they do is work on subjects like: math, grammar, etc. and for each answer they get right, they feed the hungry 10 grains of rice. (By the way, I LOVE that they are learning while they are giving.) I think Kristi is at 10,000 or more already! LOL! For the last 5 DAYS STRAIGHT, that is their first thought and last thought of the day! "Mom, I have to go on free rice and feed the hungry." LOL! They are too funny and so sweet trying to do all they can. We will have to find further opportunities for them as we travel across the United States living and learning and now helping others too!
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Father's Day

6/17/2012 11:30:00 PM by LivingAndLearningOnTheMove
     We started out the day having some of our favorite foods at an all you can eat restaurant! Oh no! Not so great for our diet; but, we had fun and watched it at least a little bit! The kids loved that they had all of their breakfast favorites all in one breakfast meal!

     It is so hot here in the south (currently Texas), that we often times try to limit our exposure in the sun during the peak daytime hours. So, we went back home to the RV and had a sort of family movie time and watched a few movies. The kids loved watching Cinnamon the Dog, Journey 2, and even John Carter! The kids don’t seem to mind the heat as much as we do so they did go out and had fun with their friends for a little while.

     Much later in the day we spent quite a bit of time in the pool. There were quite a few kids in the pool including many of the Brad and Kristi’s friends so Frank and I actually had a little time to ourselves too! During the time that we spent in the pool we kind of played around with our underwater camera! It was a lot of fun; however, I can see we have some work to do on it! :-) Some of the pictures of me were not so good; but, the kids looked great (especially one of the boys under water). Overall, I think Frank had a happy Father’s Day! I know we had a great amount of quality family fun! Hope you enjoy the pictures!!!     
Me just getting to the pool!
Kristi and I trying to get a good underwater picture! Didn't help that the water was
very cloudy and painful to the eyes (or that we kept trying to drown each other - a little inside joke.. LOL)!
Kristi giving me a kiss!
Brad and I also trying to do an underwater picture! Not so pretty! LOL!
(I guess at least we weren't trying to drown each other!)
Brad and I swimming together.
Brad doing a somersault!
Corbin doing a somersault!
Brad playing/swimming with an almost, somewhat real smile?!!! :-)
Kristi with one of her girlfriends!

Brad goofing! :)
Brad and the boys.
Brad and Corbin underwater! Isn't this a pretty good one?
Kristi and Corbin - playing some sort of jail game. Once they catch each
other they are supposed to go to jail at the stairs of the pool. Daddy thought
they were a little ~too~ close! Too funny, huh?!  :-)
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My Young Entrepreneurs’

5/14/2012 08:30:00 PM by LivingAndLearningOnTheMove
     Our children are the most social little creatures that there are out there! It’s always funny when our kids meet other kids at the playground and we end up finding out it is another full-time family that we “know” from online! We end up meeting the parents later and it is just hilarious! It seems like everyone at the RV parks we stay at know our children!

     Brad and Kristi also know most of the animals (particularly dogs) that stay at the parks! The reason this is, is because everyone walks their dogs and they end up meeting them. They have come a long way since we first went full time. When we first started, they would just assume since the dogs are being walked and there are so many people here that the dogs are friendly; however, they have learned that simply isn’t the case. So, they are always great about asking, “May I pet your dog?” 

Sanabella!

A very adorable, very energetic puppy!
     
     Needless to say, they have had quite a few dog walking and dog boarding type jobs at the various parks! This last little puppy, they watched somewhat frequently, and we all became a little attached! This little furball was a big fluff ball!  The most adorable little thing. She has a very unique name though; I believe it is Sanabella (I think)! It sounds very cute when you say it anyway! :-) Unfortunately, that little furball has gone on her merry way to North Carolina and us onto Texas.

A small nap after running the puppy all throughout the RV park!
Just woke up - moving a little slow for herself (our speed)!!!
      Throughout this experience, my children have become quite the little entrepreneurs! The two things they do the best are taking care of/loving animals and making jewelry (out of real beading and crocheting)! So, they have already made business cards to hang up for the dog walking/caring service. As far as the jewelry business, they’ve made business cards and in their spare time they are making a lot of items in bulk so they can sell at the vendor tables at the different RV parks/resorts where we stay. I wish we had our camera when we were at the motor vehicle office a few weeks ago! They were crocheting a bracelet for most everyone waiting (which was quite a lot considering there were probably over 100 people waiting)! Then, they started making earrings too. They were making quite a bundle! One of their first customers was holding up a pair of their earrings saying, “Earrings for sale, earrings for sale!”   :-)   I told her I need to hire her as their marketing manager! LOL! I almost thought we might get in trouble like we “set out” to do business inside the motor vehicle business office! LOL! They had only brought their items to stay busy while waiting for us to be done. Had we not had to wait around for 4 hrs before even being seen, they probably wouldn’t have made it quite so far in their business there! Who am I kidding?! They did come up with it pretty fast!   :-) Hope you enjoy the pictures of the little fluff ball! I’ll have more pics of their new business skills as they proceed with their businesses!
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Our Ice Cream Party - Thanks Micah & Auntie Stephanie!

5/10/2012 01:10:00 AM by LivingAndLearningOnTheMove
We had to plan this party quite quickly! As you know, in this lifestyle one never knows how long their neighbors will be around before they get the “itch” move on!  :-)  Just kidding! Yes, that's true; but, in this case one of the families that participated were scheduled to leave in two short days! Now, THIS blog post is going to be fun! As you all know, the kids are benefiting with an ice cream party thanks to a lot of wonderful people out there! Here are the pictures of the party as I promised, Auntie Stephanie!

To begin with, I had all of these wonderful ideas of having a huge party - you know, the bigger, the better! I was going to buy streamers, screamers, party hats, and all of the wonderful things that make up a party. However, when I started thinking about the practicability of such things in our environment, it wasn’t such a realistic thought! You see, if we had the party here at Thousand Trails, I can see us putting up streamers and all just to “get in trouble” and have to take them down. Not to mention feeling like a bit of a nuisance to the elderly in this community.  *giggle*  We thought about and decided it would be a lot more fun to make the mess elsewhere so others can clean it up! Just kidding… (us ladies ended up cleaning up the mess none-the-less!) After running some figures of what was do-able with that many people, we decided to have our party at CiCi’s Pizza! Remember altogether, we had a total of 23 people! We were able to have all we can eat and the managers were even letting us bring in ice cream along with all our goodies for sundaes! We decided against the screamers that you can blow (might get us in a bit of trouble with CiCi’s), figured streamers and other ideas were out, so we focused on what we all LOVE the most – food and good people to socialize and share it with! Needless to say, you can tell by all of these wonderful smiles that EVERYONE had a wonderful time! A great time was had by all! (Beware, lots of pictures for Auntie Stephanie and everyone else to follow!)   All in all, it was an AMAZING time! Thank you to all that made this happen in so many ways! You know who you are!


A great overview picture of all 23 of us!
Adults socializing!
My daughter and her good friend - BFFAEA - (This is what
they say - Best Friends Forever And Ever AMEN!)
Older boys having fun!
More of the older boys having fun!
I should call these guys the "big kids" - Allen and his father-in-law
Margie and her lovely mother
Rita and Peter DeMichiel
Katie and her daughter
Schrier family (minus my son - how is he getting away
with not being in these pictures?)
Gary and Kerry Murphy
Rita showing off her FUDGE swirl. How yummy is that?!
You can't tell us ladies like our chocolate can you?  :-)
What a beautiful smile from Katherine!
The dishing of the ice cream! We had three huge choices either vanilla, chocolate, or fudge swirl!
My son having the best of both worlds (ice cream and the electronics/video game area)!
Love these messy smiles! :)
This is where the kids had the most fun I think! They had the choice of cool whip,
chocolate syrup, caramel syrup, sprinkles, and I think one other choice? They
made some great creations! I should have taken pictures of them!  *giggle*
You can tell right here that Lizzy has a BRAIN FREEZE! We all know what
that is, right? Everyone had one of those before? Yikes! They aren't fun!
A great group picture of many of the full-time family kids before we left.
Unfortunately, we did miss a few of the kids that had to leave early (Lundy).
They grow up way too fast (which make all of these great pictures even better)!

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Our RVing Family Rocks!!!

5/08/2012 11:30:00 PM by LivingAndLearningOnTheMove

I’m not sure I will really be able to get my point across to those of you out there that don’t live this lifestyle. Most RVing families can agree that we have found that this lifestyle is simply the best with so many more benefits than not. But, in order to live this way, we have had to sacrifice a few things. Most of the sacrifices are small in nature such as giving up conveniences like having a washer, dryer, dishwasher, huge living area, etc. One of the biggest sacrifices to us is that we had to leave behind our loving extended family and friends. Once on the road, we have found that other RVers have become our “on the road” extended family.   :-)  

 

This is the picture we submitted to the contest!

Our extended family members on the road are simply AMAZING! I just had to write about a recent experience of how wonderful others can be – including others that we haven’t even met in person (only online such as in forums or Facebook). Stephanie Mulac, the owner of the Full-time RVing - FTRVing.com, made a contest for the photo of the Super Moon that had the most “likes” from people on Facebook. Five full-time RVing families that were still at the Orlando Thousand Trails RV Resort Park (where WE are); all decided to head out and enjoy some fun at the pool all at the same time (including us). The kids were swimming and having a great time together when one of the other mothers had a brilliant idea to take a picture of the kids with the Super Moon in the background. Right at that moment, the Super Moon was so pretty and very low still in the horizon. Within minutes we had all of the kids out of pool ready for the picture. Unfortunately, by that time the moon was a bit higher and didn’t appear as large or bright as it did a few minutes ago. It was also right in line of a nearby lamppost! It’s the thought that counts, right?! So, we entered the picture and decided if we win, the kids would enjoy an ice cream social! So, we watched and reared the teams to like our picture!  It came down to the last few hours and we were neck and neck with another person.
Here is another one of the kids with a total of
5 participating Full-time Families including the
Lundy, Murphy, DeMichiel, Keller, and Schrier families!
Pool fun at Orlando TT!
What came after this moment is what truly showed what an AMAZING group of people we call our RV family! Prior to the event being over, other RVers including others that had their own picture in the contest listed us on their Facebook page to get even more likes! Hmm (clearing my voice), I’m not going to mention any names… Michelle Thomas! LOL! Then still others out there were making such sweet comments about our photo and our children. Still others were voting for us, and just wishing us well wishes throughout. At the end, we ended up losing – having 136 likes versus 139 likes to the winner, Micah Sheheen. Stephanie Mulac, the group owner, decided that since we were so close she just had to donate the money ($50) to the kids’ ice cream party from “Auntie Stephanie”… we love you Auntie Stephanie!!! Then, within minutes, Micah Sheheen let us know that she wanted her ($50) to go to the kids’ ice cream party too! She figured it could be a pizza and ice cream beginning of summer kick-off party! Yay! My heart is still warmed over by all the great generosity within the RVing community! It just shows one what kind of tight-knit community we are a part of with this lifestyle! I love you guys! Our RVing family ROCKS!!!  (Next post will show the awesome ice cream party!)
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So much for paradise!

2/27/2012 12:30:00 AM by LivingAndLearningOnTheMove
     I’ve decided that I’m going to start writing more often; even if it is only to write a few paragraphs of what I’m thinking or what is going on. I’m going to write even if it isn’t something happy and spectacular; after all, how many people’s lives are always happy and positive?

     This weekend was one of “those” weekends. We had all of these plans, everything planned out and it was going to be an awesome weekend. We are in a very pretty area where there is so much to do, mostly with water; at Crystal River – where only a few weeks ago we swam with the manatees. The place we decided to stay was a bit pricier than where we have been staying since we have a membership at Thousand Trails and can stay for pretty close to nothing with our membership. Still it wasn’t a bad price; we just decided since it was a bit more we were going to make sure that we actually do something – have fun that is! 

     Well, we arrived here on Thursday, February 23rd. First we had to set up then we hurried off back to the Orlando area to get our baby Gizmo back to the veterinarian for follow ups and checkups to make sure she was okay. As I’ve stated in a previous post, she has been having blood in her urine and we’ve been very concerned. We are hoping it is just that she has an infection and the antibiotic isn’t working, so the infection is just resistant to the antibiotic that she has been taking. Anyway, it was a long day of driving all the way to Orlando and back! We left about 1:15pm, arrived there about 4:15pm (even though we should have been there by 3:30pm, left by 6:15pm, and arrived back on time to basically watch a little tv and get ready for bed. We figured Friday we could enjoy what the area had to offer.

     Friday comes and my back is killing me! I really couldn’t believe it! The weather was a little weird but definitely not cold or dreary. None-the-less, I thought a little relaxing and resting (i.e., napping with a heating pad, meds, and my neuro-stimulator) and I’d be fine so we could have fun later in the day or at least the next day.  While I rested and relaxed, Frank and the kids went out to see how much the boats and wet suits cost to rent, if there was a way to swim with the manatees without worrying about a boat, etc. They tried to see the manatees from where we saw a bridge and people looking off when we were swimming with the manatees a few weeks earlier. Nothing, from there you couldn’t really see anything they said. So, they come back to the RV and decide to go swimming and swam while I was still resting.

     Saturday came and went with more back pain and worries of Gizmo. We received word that it’s possible that Gizmo could have kidney failure. Not that she does, but that she can have it. Just the thought of that scares us. We aren’t ready to say good-bye. We are truly hoping that this isn’t true and that we’ll have Gizmo for many years to come! The kids had a good Saturday playing and having fun. They had the opportunity to see someone fish for crabs and they had a lot of fun seeing the crabs rush around in the cage! The fisherman catches them, puts them in a cage in the water, and pulls them out as he is ready to eat them! It was interesting to see the crabs up close and personal! I’m hoping to get a picture of them to put with this blog post!

     Since we didn’t get to have as much fun this weekend as we thought we would, I planned a whole bunch of outdoor activities for Sunday. I figured we can walk the trails near Crystal River, go on some geocaches, swim at the pool, and whatever other outdoor activities that came up including fishing (as Brad had hoped)! Unfortunately, we awoke to pouring down rain. We quickly checked the weather and found out that it was supposed to rain for the entire day along with the next day! How terrible! Maybe we should check the weather before we make all of these outdoor plans? We do not get local tv channels; but, we can easily check the internet… we just often times forgot since we are in sunny Florida! Darn it! Hopefully we can come back another time and enjoy this paradise – but for now, we decided to make the best of this awful rainy day by having a movie day (including Puss ‘n Boots) and following that up with a game night! It was great because we ended up teaching the kids one of our all-time favorite games, Spades! The kids have fallen in love with the game, especially Kristi! She has specifically asked if we can play the game every day! So, I guess, this weekend that could have seemed to be such a bad weekend – turned out to be a great moment to be remembered!  :-)    
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