This one is for Becky.....

Somewhere on the east coast there is an incredibly funny and beautiful friend of mine shackled to her corporate law desk. So I had to hurry quick to think of a blog to help her pass through Friday...

This morning, say 3:30 am I awoke to my Wilson (the sock footed puppy) creating quite a clatter. Moaning, whimpering, and lots of scuffling about. I awoke to it much like I used to awake to my children in their infancy crying out in the middle of the night. Jumping out of bed, heart racing I reached for my dog in the dark, instantly he calmed to my touch. Thinking he might need to go to the bathroom, because someone with a name that rhymes with fleremy forgot to let him out before going to bed, I walked downstairs and opened the door expecting him to fly outside...No Wilson just dropped to the floor contorting his body on the ground and moaning. Alarm went through me this is not typical Wilson behavior. Cuddling, eating, and voiding are what Wilson live for, if he is not responding to one of them then the world is not in order. I flicked on the light and screamed (according to Jeremy) out the loudest "O my DEAR LORD" the heavens have ever heard. Because there sat my darling sock footed puppy with a swollen face and panting furiously. Of course the first thing to do is to go running upstairs, turn on all the lights in my bedroom (including bathroom and closet), and wake Jeremy. You might be thinking "O Jeremy must be a vet or well schooled in blimp faced puppies." No, this is just my natural response to most adrenaline causing situations in my life. I don't even want to know the file the pentagon has on me from the many calls I made to Jeremy there.

So since Jeremy is used to this he just lays in bed with the pillow over his face secretly asking God what he did to deserve the likes of me.....

"JEREMY GET UP WILSON IS GOING TO DIE, I JUST KNOW IT!"

Jeremy looks over, he is concerned but believes my sock footed puppy will live.

I go downstairs with Wilson and do my best to make him comfortable. I lay next to him on the floor and pet him for what seems hours. It was there I realized why I was reacting the way I was. Wilson is more than my dog, he's one of my best friends. I don't know how I would've survived without his constant presence during the hardest move of my life. This sweet, chocolate eyed, dog knows me better than some dear people in my life. In the middle of the night I can put my hand down and it is always met with a comforting kiss my furry friend. How could I have let this happen to my puppy? Am I not his keeper?

Wilson is all right. After two shots in the bahooky, he no longer looks like he is "packing chaw" in his lips.

I think I may have gotten 4 to 5 hours of sleep last night and writing two papers today in a lack of sleep fog was no fun. But I would stay up with Wilson again in a heartbeat.

He would do it for me.

He's Wilson my sock footed dog......

THE SEALS! THE SEALS!

This little narrative has nothing to do with my trip across country. That I will I promise bring to this blog. It's just that my ADHD brain is EVERYWHERE and I haven't quite been able to focus, right now amongst the boxes and such, so i'm filling blog time with this short story about the seals.

I mentioned boxes right, got a ooooo about a few 100 sitting right in front of my kitchen bar, extrememly depressing....AND on top of the depressing boxes I have a NAKED Sean pretending to body surf down the boxes. That is it. That is all I can take. I just stacked the boxes and now my little strongman in the buff had just toppled EVERYTHING I had worked so hard for...so I packed the boys in the car and took them to the beach.

One of the perks of living in Monterey CA is that you have up to 5 to 10 different beaches you get to in under 15 minutes. Some for surfers, some for naturalists who scrounge around the little tide pools for sea urchins and the like, some for lazy loungers, even some for dogs, Monterey has got beaches for just about every character on the planet. I chose the one with small waves and perfect for sand castle making, o and it was close to the house so i knew i wouldn't get lost.....(and if you know me well you know this is a huge possibility)

The boys and I started our sand castle creations, slowly but surely Evan grew tired of this and started wading out into the waves. He is a water child, he's literally drawn to it....so between making sand castles and Evan body surfing I have my eyes on many different things. When all of a sudden I saw movement of some brown blobbish creature in the water extremely close in. Well because I am a product of the JAWS age I stand up and needed to get a closer look. It's a SEAL!!!! I literally start yelling this out loud, expecting huge crowds to follow me in my breathless excitement. "A SEAL! RIGHT THERE! A SEAL!" Still crickets no one is as excited as I , I'm talking even children, I got nothing. So I start running down the beach trying to follow the seal, surely this will get people off their lazy butts and at full attention. I'm so excited I don't even watch where I am stepping, "O Exscuse me! Pardon me! But do you see the seal?!" I say as I'm bumbling over people's lazy lounging grounds. I slowly start coming down from my excitement because I realized that people were not watching the seal (the beautiful, adorable, playful SEAL!!!) they were watching the idiot that was running down the beach, screaming "The SEAL! THE SEAL" as if Jesus Christ himself was riding on the seals back. That idiot as I think we all know is me. How sad. Even my children left me high and dry. They went back to making their sand castles, actually I think they were trying to dig a deep hole to hide away in so no one knew whom their mother was.......

I hope I meet someone soon who loves "THE SEALS!" as much as I do. If I do, I'll you know.....

I want, I want, I want.....

Okay so I'm having a blog-fit (did I just coin a new blog phrase?)...I knew it would come and here it goes....

I want to go back to my warm, fuzzy, orderly, run of the mill life...

I want to run with kathy and Tash in the morning and come home feeling fit and understood.

I want to talk to Sarah like 15 million times on the phone during the day and then see her a half hour later at school pick up...

I want to have a glass of wine with Renee and laugh at ourselves,

I want to keep asking my neighbor Sungh for ingredients that she doesn't have...

I want my kids to be able to play with Raymond, Sophia, and Spencer until 9 pm

I want to go over to Patty's house and eat triscuits and talk about historical figures and then talk about everything else, and how we should probably rule the world

I want to walk Maggie the dog and see Doug while I'm there and have a fun chat....

I want to have my puppies play with their best puppy pal zazu

I want to go to WESTBRIAR elementary and see my friendly pick up peeps,

I want to go to Whole Foods on Maple and plague them with my children...

I want to drive on Country club road and wave to Megan Wallace and Al Fusca while they make their yards look like paradise

I want to see Mrs. Streb

I want to have an entertaining conversation with Cindy in the preschool parking lot and smile and laugh about it the rest of the day

I want to go to church on Sunday and laugh with all my kids......

I want to go to the pool with Patty and laugh, and laugh, and laugh

I want to see Kathy every afternoon, and feel like I'm home...

I want to call Andy the babysitter and have him babysit my children and build amazing lego creations with them

I want to walk my insane dogs and have people I KNOW drive by me and shake their heads...

I want to go out with all my girlfriends and be surrounded by their beautiful laughter....

I just want to come home today. I know I can't and this rant has helped, I hope I got it all out and I will return to explaining our journey tomorrow, I just really needed to do this today..thanks...

A summary with the good, bad, and the ugly

Well now that we made it here I feel, I would say the best word is, deflated.
So many days working so hard for this goal to get here and then we are here and the hustle and bustle of establishing our family here makes me a little lost.
So what I'm going to do is hopefully each day take a part our trip on this blog, just to give me something nostalgic to do....
I first need to point out that when Jeremy and I bought our 26ft. home on wheels we kind of just jumped off the cliff and did it. Admittedly Jeremy did a ton more research than I did (shocker) but we literally one night decided to do this and we did it. Most books like "RVing for dummies" and "10 must know tips before buying an RV" say to rent an RV for a small trip (not 18days) before purchasing, we don't do that we jump and hold our breath and hope we land on something soft!!
We honestly weren't sure how we were going to like it or eachother after 18 days.
I'd like to report it an outstanding experience. I truly believe every family should do something different and off the wall together. Not specifically cramming yourself into an RV for 18 days while touring 4000 miles but something LIKE this, definetly something that takes you outside of your comfort zone. You get to know eachother all over again, the good, the bad, the ugly.....
The kids sayings become even more hilarious than when your life is day to day because you ARE eachothers entertainment.....
Sean asking if God or Jesus has a honey? (Sean is the only 5 year old male child that i know that can't wait to get married, so he's very concerned when someone is not, he is very distressed that God and not even Jesus are married and have a honey to share life with...)
Evan screaming out that "SEE MOM I TOLD YOU THAT SEAN IS ACTING LIKE A KING"....what? what am I supposed to say to that? Well what i did do was turn around and ask Sean if he would please stop acting like a monarchial tyrant....it seemed to work...
and then
Aaron, o man, Aaron, we have lovingly nicknamed him the FLEE (flea) Foremost Leading Expert on Everything. The child is a running tape of facts, and I mean running.....
The one negative that I do need to point out is that living in an RV can sometimes feel like well, you know those days that you seem to keep stubbing the same toe, hitting your funny bone repeatedly, or knocking your head on the same dad gum kitchen cabinet? Well this is most days in an RV, everytime I opened a cabinet to grab a bowl or a pan, something would attack me water bottle, plates, graham cracker boxes...etc. or you go to brush your teeth and 5 different things fall out of the medicine cabinet all landing on your miniscule baby toe......the words that would fall from my lips sometimes made since and sometimes should not have been said!!!!
But all in all we had a good time, I have lots of specific stories and I will post those and pictures to go with sooon......

2:30 am we have arrived.....

Hello all, I know, I know, I have been horribly abscent with this whole blog thing. It's just that I have been in the back woods of this country for most of the 18 days, after Wisconsin we pretty much dropped off the face of the planet...
I have to type fast because as of right now i am on a pay as you go internet hook up thing and I don't know how much they are charging. I just saw the computer in the hotel lobby and gleefully swiped my credit card....
Why might I be in the hotel lobby at 2:30 am blogging to you incredibly good people? Good question. Because Seany in all his spontanaity decided to pee like a race horse in his bed THE VERY LAST NIGHT WE ARE TO SPEND THE NIGHT IN THAT DANG GUM RV..... Sooooooo upon arriving to the hotel we are supposed to stay at we find out they don't really have a reservation for us tonight Or i'm sorry i mean THIS MORNING... and so hence the problem with sleeping in an RV that smells like well you can guess....
So that leaves me here in the hotel doing laundry at 2:30am pacific time.....it has ended on a hilariously normal note for us I think, I mean you guys know me, my life is never normal, I have never asked it to be except for tonight just tonight I would've loved just a touch of normalcy.....
I've got to go check my laundry.....promise more to come, I will catch everyone up....that is after I have sterilized my entire RV.....

The FIRST FIVE

aghhhhh, a contented sigh.....we are now sitting at a lovely, calm, not in constant movement (like the rv) restaurant called "A' Bravo" in Green Bay, Wisconsin and the best part minus the lovely red wine sangria I am sipping on is that this restaurant has WIFI!!!!!
O how I wish I could beam all of you dear lovely friends and family here like Star Trek. But I can't so the obvious second choice is this blog.....
Where have we been, hmmmm, where should I start:
We left Richmond, Va. on Saturday the 6th, many tears shed, lots of red snotty noses and then of course as we drove away ten minutes outside of meemaw and corn corns house we realized we forgot the laptop! Dang it! We had to go back and the weeping and gnashing of teeth began all over again! Man! We then made a quick stop in Vienna to bid a FINAL adiu' to our dear NOVA friends (by the way this was like the 22nd good-bye but we really meant it this time).
After leaving NOVA we were finally on our way, FINALLY.....next stop Alleghany National Park in New York, we of course arrived there in the pitch black of night....this being our first night setting up our RV for camp, we wished for better conditions. But we have superdaddy and he can handle anything. The best part was finding out they didn't have a water hook-up on sight so we had to venture out into the endless night to find the bath house with three boys who are still not out of the nightlight stage. Let's just say I got a deathgrip moonlit handwalk with my boys.....
The next morning we arose and got ready for our first stop of many....Niagara Falls....
Well, to sum this up, we got on the wrong bridge headed for the CANADIAN side of Niagara instead of the US side. And even though we keep hearing that yes the Canadian side is much prettier we didn't want to go there! We just wanted to turn our BIG BUS around so we learned something that day, Canadian Customs check takes a whole heck of alot longer for an RV than for a regular car....good grief....
Finally got to the American side (good to be back in the old us of a) and enjoyed the Maid of the Mist....
Next stop Indiana Dunes State Park, beautiful, really if you pass through, enjoy camping, and mind numbing cold Lake Michigan, this is the park for you! Of course Sean gets his huge ginormous cast wet (by the way we've nicknamed him Mr. Crabs due to his intense resemblence to a male crab and his huge one armed claw). So Sean and I spent alot of time in the campsite bathhouse continually turning on the hands free blow dryer......the things that mother's find themselves doing, endless...
2nd day of Indiana Dunes, we have just finished our incredibly delicious breakfast ( made by my GT Xpress 2000, so many ways of cooking food miniature like, so little time..), Jeremy and I had just finished that wonderful, calming first cup of java and were feeling content when as we were doing the dishes we realized the water was not draining from the RV's sink....hmmmm, must be an easy clog, who are we kidding it's us, it's not going to be an "easy clog"......6 hours later, 2 bottles of bleach, 2 bottles of DRANO, and "THE MASTER PLUNGER" and still a sink full of standing water. What you might be wondering is what the big deal is? Well when you live in a home that is MOBILE standing water of any sort is the enemy. We had to drive to walgreens, the waste dump site, all with sloshing water....
This was all fixed this morning as Evan and I did laundry in Wauconda , Il and Jeremy found an RV service center with the other two boys and two dogs, the VERDICT, the RV service center informed us that "you might want to pull the other gray water valve"....oooooo, we'll do that!! Thanks! They didn't charge us anything but except our pride......
We are now in Green Bay and will hopefully be able to post more soon, who knows, WIFI seems to be so hard to find as we get deeper into this country...

The Night Before...

It's the night before our epic cross-country RV adventure begins...and we're already running behind. Not the best start to an 18 day trip, but it's the way things usually are with our family of 5 plus 2 little pups.

18 Days and 26 Feet will chronicle our first (and hopefully not last!) RV vacation in our 26' Class C motorhome. We're moving from Virginia to California, and attempting to make the best of a tough move with a trip that should be unforgettable.

Let's hope it's a good unforgettable.

Out till tomorrow-