We are now official full timers. We’re in the process of starting a business where we’ll be traveling and working the rodeo/fairs/festivals/trade shows circuit. That will keep us out about half the year, since it is pretty seasonal. WE’ve also been talking for the last few years about selling our house and moving onto some property, nearby, but not in an HOA. We’ve gone back and forth about building a house VS staying in our rig on our own property, but for now that’s still a bit in the future.
Gabe got onto even time, four weeks gone, four weeks home. Which means a pay cut of 25%, give or take. It also means that he’ll be home a bit more to help out with starting the business.
So, we’re selling our house. We’ve moved out (mostly) of our house and are currently living in our trailer at Lake Conroe, TX, close by where all our activities and whatnot is.
We had to get rid of our animals, which at the time was three dogs and three cats. The dogs was such a hard thing to do. But in our situation, it wasn’t fair to the dogs or to us. Even if we stayed at the house, sooner or later, we’d have to give them up. With being gone half the year with the business, they’d be with my brother more than with us.
We got two storage units, one for our stuff that we’re not getting rid of (at least for the time being, as these things tend to go), and one for all the business stuff so we can start working while living in the trailer. Let me just say, for those of you who are wondering, we have a lot of stuff….and there isn’t ONE item that is light. (Gabe’s sitting next to me saying ” I think there were a few t-shirts that weren’t too heavy.”)
During the process of our move that was supposed to last 14 days, with 21 days of him being home afterwards to just hang out together, we had a Tae Kwon Do tournament where I got kicked in the face twice, we got sick, I pulled my back (a few times), we set our utilities to be shut off and they were…..a week before we were actually out of the house, we got a 20 cubic yard dumpster, and we used about 25 cu yards (luckily some people out of work showed up to take our metals off our hands). I decided to sew the kids Halloween costumes (no, I don’t sew), our truck rolled over something on the freeway and it took a week to get the parts and another week to get it back, our trailer was getting warranty work done and was in the shop, and we celebrated Caelan’s Birthday. So in the end, it took us 4 weeks to move out, with one to still be sorta moving out, but actually living in the trailer.
So here it is. Monday. Tomorrow we drive Gabe back to Louisiana so that he can make his 2:30 am crew change on Wednesday. Me and the kids will hopefully be home Wednesday midday, just in time for Tae Kwon Do practice. However, after that, we can get back to homeschooling (which we haven’t done in nearly a month), and the regular rhythms of our lives. Gabe will be gone six weeks this time around because he’s changing boats and he needs to get into rotation. He’ll be gone for both Thanksgiving and Christmas (getting off on Dec 28th), so the kids and I will probably spend our holidays serving a the Houston soup kitchen.
