Due to a series of unfortunate events, we took a road trip without our trailer. Our son was getting back from deployment, and we were determined to go to his homecoming. Since it’s the Marine Corps, we were given about 5 days notice of the actual return date. Of course, the actual date didn’t match up with the really great trailer trip we planned to take up to see him according to the preliminary window of return dates we were given. To make matters worse, the trailer was in the shop having some warranty work done, and wouldn’t be ready in time for the actual dates we needed it. We had no choice but to make the trip and stay in a hotel.
The trip was a 10-hour drive. This is much easier to do in one day when you drive a little Subaru and not a big truck and trailer. We decided to make a mad dash for it and try to make it a quick turnaround. And, that we did.
I could end this blog post right here and just say, we missed our creature comforts from our trailer. But, since you probably are looking for something to read while you eat your breakfast or something, I’ll expand. More specifically, here are the things we missed:
Our closets and drawers – We had to pack suitcases! The horror! We are not used to that! In our trailer, everything has its place. It’s the same with my suitcase, but it’s all squished into one suitcase sized spot. First world problem, I know, but I really love my trailer storage.
Our medicine cabinet – Our toothbrushes and toiletries live in there! Getting them out of toiletry bags and trying to share the tiny counter space in the hotel was a challenge. We’re just not used to that!
Our TV – We know how to work it and we know how to stream our favorite shows on it. The hotel TV was fine … if you like reruns of “Friends.”
Our food – When we are on an RV road trip, we don’t eat out much – except for lunches when we’re out exploring. This really helps keep us from getting “road trip gut” (that nasty, bloated feeling like the “Very Hungry Caterpillar” had when he needed to eat through a nice green leaf toward the end of the book). It also is much easier on the budget to cook some of your own meals.
Our bed and pillows – Again, we’re used to them! Hotel beds and pillows are just weird.
The air conditioner vent – This may seem like a strange one, but I find hotel air conditioners annoying. They’re loud, they come on whenever they feel like it, they blow the curtains around … they just bug me! In our trailer, we leave the air conditioner set at one temperature and have it run constantly while we sleep. We have the perfect temperature and some familiar white noise. And, the best part, there’s a vent that I can point straight to my head while I sleep!
Our dogs – We had to board them for this trip. We normally take them on our trailer trips. They love trailer trips, riding in the truck, and exploring new places. It was sad not to have them along.
Really, the hotel was fine aside from the dead bug collection in the elevator (they promptly vacuumed the bugs up when we told them about the collection). It was also during the awkward post-COVID time when the hotels were not sure how to handle things. There was no maid service happening. So, the fun parts about hotels – like leaving your towel on the floor and having a new one when you get back from exploring – were not happening. This made us miss our trailer even more – even though I’m pretty much the maid service for our trailer.
We love our trailer and love exploring the United States in it. We love America’s diversity in landscape – desert here – beach there – mountians there …. It’s awesome! RVing is a vacation lifestyle choice we’ve made 18 years ago and we’re glad we made it! Perhaps it’s the creature comforts that keep us going. When we do the math, owning, storing, and maintaining the trailer isn’t saving us a whole bunch of money on vacationing – maybe even none! We’ve even thought about maybe selling the trailer and traveling like “normal” people. Those thoughts never last more than a few minutes because we remind ourselves why we RV and what we’d miss if we didn’t have it. This year, with diesel prices going crazy, we’re taking shorter trips and are finding lots of new places to explore within three or four hours of home.
If you’re questioning your decision to start or to continue RVing, maybe it would be a good idea for you to think about all the little things you love about it and what you’d miss if you traveled like a “normal” person. I bet your creature comforts will come into play and you’ll love your RV just a little bit more. Happy Camping!
It happened. I never thought it would. I burned out on RV’ing. It was on day 91-ish of our almost 4-month trip. We were on RV park number 18 where we were staying for close to two months. It was hot. I had just made the round-trip walk to the laundry room (also known as the sweatshop for its lack of air conditioning) that was eight campsites away – yes, I counted. I realized I…was…done!
To be fair, we were moving from Washington State to Florida. We decided to take an epic RV trip to make our way there. We had set up to have our movers haul our belongings and our realtor meet them at our storage unit in Florida to watch them off load the truck. On our trip, we received word that our moving truck had been broken into which caused a fair amount of phone calls and coordinating. While we were in our longer-term spot, we found out that, as a result of the break-in and our desktop computer getting stolen, we also had bank fraud problems. So, we were trying to take care of stressful life things from the trailer with two dogs, the laundry room eight sites away in a town we’d probably never choose to live in. Oh, and we had no internet so we were running everything through one bar of hotspot on our phones. It was probably the worst possible way to conduct life’s business.
To be even more fair, the RV Park we were staying in was the best part of the town! It was its own community with lots of great amenities like golf, water aerobics, dog park, etc. The people were great. I was taking golf lessons. My husband was playing and practicing golf a lot. We made friends in the RV park! I’d highly recommend the RV park. It’s a short drive from a lot of cool places.
Nevertheless, I was done. It was after one of my 8-site walks to the sweatshop when my husband walked into the trailer to find me laying on the bed sprawled out and not moving. I was hot, burned out, and soaking up some air conditioning. He asked if I was OK because it’s rare to find me not moving and awake at the same time. I told him, “I believe it’s day 91 and I’ve decided my limit is 90 days for a trailer trip. I’m done.” As it turns out, it was going to be a few more weeks before our house was ready for moving in and I was going to have to suck it up … buttercup… like I used to tell my kids.
I’ve had some time to think about my RV burnout and here’s what I have come to learn and some things I’m going to put into place for future long trips to prevent it.
90 Days is my limit – We will now plan our extended trips within a 90-ish day window. It was really plenty for both of us.
I am not full-timer material – My RV dream was once to sell everything except what we really loved, put the stuff we loved in storage, and take off for a year. I have learned that I probably couldn’t handle that trip. I need a place to go home to after the trip and an itinerary. I have newfound respect for people who do this full-time RVing thing – especially the ones who do this with kids. My kids can tell you, I would have made a horrible homeschool teacher! My hat’s off to you for your patience and perseverance. I’d probably be in jail.
Slow the trip down! – 18 RV Parks? What were we thinking?! We regret trying to get from Washington to Florida too quickly. We thought we needed to be in Florida sooner that we did. In the future, we’ll have a 3-5 night minimum at any stop depending on what’s there to see and do. There will obviously be some stops that should be one-nighters on the way to someplace better. On this trip, we wished we had scheduled more time in most of the places we stayed.
As much is possible, stay in vacation mode – We really had no other choice than to deal with our moving break-in and bank fraud. We were also working on our mortgage process and had to keep dealing with that. This is too much un-fun stuff to do on an RV trip. It’s total buzz-kill! Since we’re never planning to move again, we should be able to avoid the moving fiasco on the next long trip. Life happens and we’ll have to deal with whatever comes up, but we’ll try to find more vacation-fun type things to do to off-set it.
Don’t stay in one place too long – We were in one spot for two months. This was a new experience for us. While we enjoyed getting to know people and getting involved in the activities at the RV park, we really felt the desire to move on and explore someplace new. We are figuring our maximum stay at any one place will be a week. Of course, there will be exceptions depending on where we are, who we’re visiting, and what’s going on in life but, this will be our general rule.
In all reality, our trip was really great! Apart from the moving stress, I’d do it again while spending less time in the last RV park and more time in many of the others. We really had a blast and loved getting to see so much of our beautiful country. We visited several National Parks. We also visited Las Vegas, Albuquerque, San Antonio, Galveston, New Orleans, and several of the top tourist vacation spots on the gulf side of Florida. This blog post is not a complaint. It’s more of a lessons-learned share.
We’ve been in our house for six weeks now. I love it! I Iove where we live! Guess what – I’m ready for another trailer trip! I’ve been bugging my husband about going on a little three-night trip. He’s not completely over his burnout just yet. So, we wait. We’ll go soon enough, I’m sure!
Photo Note: The fussy kid in the photo is my daughter (now 25 years old) one night when she was just done! This is one of four in a photo series. In the last photo, she’s asleep with her head on the tray of the highchair. It’s one of my favorites because it tells the story she couldn’t articulate. She was just done!
Next Trailer Girl Blog – From Freezing to 100 Degrees – Packing for Multiple Climates Without Losing your Sanity or your SpaceT
Note: This post is to help with your routine for getting the inside of your trailer ready to hit the road. Not the outside – that’s my husband’s job. This would be the routine you implement when you are just getting ready to leave the house or the campsite. See my earlier blog posts for setting up the inside of the trailer kitchen, bathroom, bedroom, etc for that information.
Of course, many of the things I do to prepare for takeoff is because I made a mistake in the past – like forgetting to latch a door and while we were on the road the door came off its rollers. Things like that. After 17 years of RVing, I believe I’ve made enough mistakes to make me a bit of an expert on getting the trailer or RV ready to roll. Here’s my routine. I hope it helps you. For reference, we have a 5th wheel with three slideouts. I’ll write this as if we’re leaving a campsite in the morning.
Kitchen/ living area
Finish my coffee – one should never attempt to get ready to roll without being properly caffeinated. If you’re one of those healthy decaffeinated all the time people, go ahead and skip this step. I’m not one of those decaffeinated types.
Wash up all of the breakfast dishes – and put them away. Don’t forget to empty out the coffee pot. It’s pretty gross to come back to old grounds in your pot.
Wipe down the counters and put anything on the counters away securely in the cupboards.
Shove my throw pillows into the dishes cupboard – This is a fairly new step for me. I had never done this (even though it had been suggested), until recently. Our 5th wheel has a pretty frosted glass cupboard door where I put the dishes. One time, the dishes crashed into the glass and scratched it up. In another rig, one of my Corell plates hit the cupboard door with such force that it slid out and shattered all over the floor. Shoving the throw pillows on the shelf between the dishes and the door keeps all of this mayhem from happening. Note: if you have a dog in your trailer, you might want to lint-roll the pillows before putting them in the cupboard. Another thing we learned the hard way …
Take out the trash – if you’re just going to another campsite, this step may not be necessary.
Put the refrigerator bars in – Our refrigerator has these built in and we have to remember to set them up. If you don’t have refrigerator bars, I highly recommend them as a way to keep things from sliding and falling out when you’re on the road or when you open the door. You can get them at Camping World or Amazon. They also make cupboard bars that do the same thing in the cupboards if you’re having problems with sliding in your cupboards.
Put everything that’s loose away in the living area.
Eject any DVDs or games from your consoles and put them away.
Secure your TV for travel. – Ours has a Velcro strap.
Unplug any devices and stow your cords.
Wipe down table, end tables, etc.
Bathroom
Change the towels and put out clean ones – Especially if it’s the end of the trip. It makes it feel less depressing because I’m prepping my trailer for our next trip.
Put away anything on the counters or that’s loose in the shower.
Clean the shower – If we’re going to another campsite, this is one that can be skipped.
Clean the sink and counter area.
Clean the toilet – If someone is outside taking care of the tanks, wait until the black tank has been dumped for this. Then, remember to add the toilet chemicals and step on the flusher to add a few gallons of fresh water into the black tank.
Latch any doors that have latches including the shower door.
Bedroom
Secure anything that’s loose
If there’s a TV, secure it – In our old trailer, we had a latch thing we had to put in place.
Make the bed – Change the sheets depending on where we’re going next and how long the trip has been. If it was a quick weekender, I’ll just change the pillow-cases.If we’re just going to another campsite and it’s only been a few nights on the road, I’ll just make the bed without changing the sheets.
Latch any doors that have latches
Close doors with hinges
Now the floors
Sweep out under the slides with no carpet – Two of our slides have no carpet and I run the broom under sweeping for little things that can get stuck under them. Getting things stuck under slides can be a costly mistake and can damage the slides or the floor.
Vacuum the floors and carpets – We have dogs so, sweeping the trailer is futile. The dog hair just transplants itself into another part of the trailer. I vacuum. Of course, if you’re boondocking, this could be a challenge without electricity and some of your floor clean-up will have to wait. Having a Swiffer might be a help if you can’t vacuum. We almost never stay anywhere without electrical hookups.
Vacuum under the slide piece of carpet – Our living area has carpet under the dinette and the theater seats. I lift up the carpet that hangs over onto the floor and moves with the slide and run the vacuum under this. This will prevent anything like a small pebble, dog kibble, or whatever from getting stuck under there while the slides come in and prevent floor and slide damage.
If there is still dog hair floating around, Swiffer.
Mop if necessary – I really hate mopping even though I do it in the easiest way possible. I use Bona hardwood cleaner (even though the floor is vinyl – it still works). This is spray that you spray on the floor and mop up with a mop that has a washable microfiber end. It’s really easy and does a great job.
After a visual sweep of all of your rooms double checking that you haven’t left anything out:
Put some snacks in a handy place so you can reach them on the road – I hate it when I forget this step!
Put some drinks in the truck for the road
Grab whatever you’ll need in the truck on the road – Purse, phone, sunglasses, magazine … whatever.
Put the dogs in the truck
Pull the slides in
Put the steps up
Lock the door
Use the “big potty” – That’s what we call the RV park bathroom. You don’t want to use your RV bathroom because A) you just locked the door and B) you just cleaned it.
Help the driver hitch up as needed – I am in charge of helping pick up chalks and leveling blocks and I also am in charge of doing a visual check on the trailer. I check to make sure the cord is plugged into the truck, the emergency cable is on, all the windows are shut, antennas are down, etc.
Hit the road and have a great trip!
Note: This is just our routine. My husband could write his own blog post about what all he does outside. This list is just how I do things on the inside. I hope you found it helpful.
Next Trailer Girl blog post – Too Much of a Good Thing – RVing Burnout
I was one of THOSE Moms! I used Disney videos to babysit my kids so I could do things like fold laundry and make dinner. As a result of listening to Disney videos in the background of my house chores, I got to know them pretty well. At one time, I was able to sing all of the words to Davey Crockett, knew all of the words to “Under the Sea”, and knew when “The Wiggles” came on in the morning so that my son would be mesmerized for 30 minutes and I could clean up the breakfast mess. Really, without the Disney videos and Disney Channel, the house would have been a wreck, we would have all worn dirty clothes, and we probably would have starved. Winnie the Pooh was a favorite of my kids’. As a result, I also got to know Winnie the Pooh and all of his friends pretty well too. My Winnie the Pooh character is Eeyore. You might think Eeyore and RVing are an odd combination. I hope to convince you otherwise.
First off, I believe that Eeyore is the most underrated cartoon character – ever. (Well, at least up until about the year 2004. They may have invented a more underrated cartoon character since then, but my kids went to school and I wouldn’t know.) I have heard people say that he is a downer, clinically depressed, and brings a dark cloud with him everywhere he goes. I believe those people have only ever looked at pictures of Eeyore. They’ve never bothered to listen to him. Have you listened to Eeyore?
Eeyore is probably one of the most flexible, roll-with-the-punches, characters out there. His house collapses into the river and floats away. What does he say? I couldn’t find the exact quote, but it was something to the effect of “I guess it was time to move anyway.” Did he sit on the shores of the river and pout? No, he saw that there was an opportunity to find a new place to live and got on with finding his new digs.
How about this quote from Eeyore, “Funny thing about the rain is that it always stops eventually.” Think about that. When was the last time you were on a RV trip (or any day) and it was raining or you were just having a day where things weren’t going your way. If you think about all of the things going wrong, it’ll just annoy you more and cause stress. If you were to think about it as having an end, it might not look so bad, right? At the end of a rough day on the road, I am always thankful for it ending and getting to have dinner, or having a glass of wine, or having some ice cream, or just going to bed and have a do-over the next day.
Here’s another Eeyore-ism that I love. “They’re funny things, Accidents. You never have them till you’re having them.” This is a lot like how we learned everything we know about RVing – by making mistakes (aka accidents). If you’ve followed my blog a while, you’ll know that we ruined an awning getting it stuck in a tree, have had to back the trailer at the Canadian border, broken things that we haven’t latched correctly, and have had a host of other “accidents.” This is how we learn. We are currently on an extended trip and we’ve learned a whole slew of new things about pacing ourselves, paying attention to where an RV park is on a map in relation to area attractions, and how early we need to get up in the morning so we can avoid the 8:00 dinner rule while on the road.
One of the greatest inventors of all time, Thomas Edison would tell you the same thing. While visiting his winter estate on this trip, I saw a quote from him where he started it, “I am always afraid of things that work the first time…” He also said, “I have not failed, I’ve found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” We can all learn from Eeyore and Thomas Edison about “accidents” or mistakes. They can’t be 100% avoided and they teach us what to do differently the next time … or the next time after the time we try do the same thing the same way again again …. (Sometimes we take a few times to learn). While RVing is arguably one of the best ways to travel and see the country, it is fraught with challenges and opportunities for “accidents.” How you look at them will make all the difference in how your trip goes.
“Thanks, but I’d rather stay an Eeyore.” Eeyore wants to be Eeyore. How many times have you walked around the RV park and wished you had those neat chairs or that Blackstone grill? How many times have you watched the guy down the row back in and get it right on the first try after it took you about 27 times to back in and get it straight? Giving yourself a break and doing things the way that works is OK. There’s no one way to do this RVing thing. What you probably don’t know is, the people with all of the great gear have been at it 17 years and had dysfunctional equipment when they started. And the guy that backed in and got it right the first time? He’s a truck driver and backs trucks to loading docks all day every day.
Another sweet Eeyore take-away, “A little consideration, a little thought for others, makes all the difference.” Of course it does! This applies to RVing on so many levels – driving, parking, and at the campground. This actually could solve a lot of the word’s problems as well, but that’s a blog for another day…
Eeyore’s flexibility, self-awareness, and ability to recover from mishaps make him the ideal road trip buddy. Bring his attitude along on your next trip! I’ll leave you with this last quote, “I might have known,” said Eeyore. “After all, one can’t complain. I have my friends.” Whether your friends are on your trip or not, it’s a blessing to have them … and remember that you do. Counting your blessings is always a good idea – especially when you’re traveling. Happy travels!
Next Trailer Girl Blog – Cleared for Take Off – My Checklist for Preparing the Inside of the Trailer for the Road
We recently sold our sticks and bricks house in Washington state and are in the process of purchasing a new construction house in Florida. It won’t be ready for three months. So, being sort of homeless and loving the RV life like we do, we’ve decided to take an epic road trip South and East. Since we’re not really full-timing and we have a moving truck taking our house stuff to Florida, we are wondering how we’ve done on our preparation for this epic road trip…
Packing was hard! – We knew we’d have freezing temperatures as we left WA and hot and sticky temperatures as we arrive in FL. How the heck does one pack clothes and shoes for that. I for one, opted on the side of packing more summer than winter clothes. It seemed like a perfectly logical choice to me. Well, we are five days in and I’m wishing I would have packed a couple more winter type layers. We even poked around in some shops looking for another cute layer that would work in FL on say … Christmas that wouldn’t be too bulky in my already stuffed closet. No dice. So, as we sat in Idaho in 37-degree temps, I was madly washing my grunged out clothes I wore for moving and cleaning the house so I don’t run out of clean warm clothes.
While we were preparing to move, we read a checklist from the movers. It had important tasks on it like filling out the thing at the post office to change your address, turning off your utilities, and eating the food you can’t move out of your fridge and freezer. We thought, “Naw…. We have a giant RV fridge and freezer. We don’t need to worry about that!” In fact, we made EXTRA food to put in the freezer! There’s something we got wrong! As it turns out, you can’t over stuff your trailer freezer! Something happened where our LP and electric got confused and didn’t know what to do and shut off our refrigerator. We re-set everything and read the manual (a fine time to get around to reading the manual!) which said, “keep things away from the back of the freezer so that air can flow.” OOOPS! With the freezer being so jam packed, we had a “jammed in the back of the freezer” situation… also, some melted ice cream, which was the biggest bummer. We pulled out some meat that we had marinating, but then hit a windstorm which made grilling pretty impossible. When it was 37 degrees and windy our meat had to wait. We’ll get to it … and it’ll be delicious!
You can’t move liquids – We ended up leaving a lot of cleaning supplies behind for the new homeowners. We gave liquids that we thought we probably wouldn’t use on the trip like rice wine vinegar, duplicates of item, the Costco sized olive oil, etc to the next-door neighbors. Of course, I packed all the wine! Then, people kept giving me wine as a going away gift. So, I kept packing wine! I’m not sure how many bottles I’ve ended up packing! Given that a gallon of water weighs 8 pounds and wine comes in bottles which are heavy, I figure that’s quite a bit of extra weight in the trailer. I have been working hard at doing my part to lighten the trailer load!
We completely filled the fresh water tank – Seems like a good idea, right? Well, as it turns out, with a trailer stuffed with clothes, wine, and extra food in the freezer, a full fresh water tank added a lot of weight. I could even feel how sluggish we were getting over the mountain pass from the passenger seat. As it turned out, we didn’t need all of that water because our RV park had a city water hook-up. So, we lightened our water load by using pumped fresh water from our tank and dumping it at the end of our stay. The trailer seemed much happier in towing. That is, until we hit the windstorm and I heard my husband say, “Hmmm… maybe it would have been a good idea to fill the fresh water tank to add weight to the trailer…” When we arrived two days later in Idaho after 9 p.m., our RV paperwork said, “Freezing temperatures expected. Unhook all hoses by 9 p.m. Not responsible for any damage to RVs.” THAT would have been a good time to be stocked up on fresh water and propane. We used the water sparingly and ran our electric fireplace (that I used to think was over the top) and had no major problems. We have learned that we need to pay a lot more attention to the weather in our next spot so that we prepare the trailer properly.
We made reservations – We actually planned our trip out and have reservations for every night. As we discovered last night as we pulled into Wonderland RV Park near Capitol Reef, I messed up and only made a one-night reservation when I meant three nights. The RV park owner was super nice and actually called Thousand Lakes RV park down the road and got us the other two nights there. As it turned out, the spot they had available for us has spectacular views! This has been one of the best mistakes I have ever made! Now that we’re settled, I double checked all of our reservations to make sure I didn’t make any more reservation date errors. I’m happy to report, we are good to go on the rest of our reservations.
The dogs (Chevy and Chase) are being good road trippers
The Dogs – Of course, we had to figure out how to travel with our dogs. We have never taken them on a road trip that lasted more than a week and never much further than three hours away from home. Luckily, while we were in Florida checking on our house progress last month, we checked to see if we could find any place that carried our brand of dog food. No one did. We also checked major pet stores to see if we could find it. We couldn’t. We called the vet a couple weeks before we left and he was able to recommend a more readily available dog food and we were able to make the switch before the trip. That could have been a big problem. We also realized that we needed a “truck bowl” for them for water. Problem solved easily at a grocery stop.
We’re now on our 8th night into this trip. I’d say things are going pretty well. We’ve had a few mishaps – mostly related to the cold that we’re trying to get away from. But, overall, I’d say we’re doing just fine! We certainly have plenty of food and wine! We finally got around to grilling tonight and it was delicious! The dogs are great road trippers. We’re having fun! Follow my blog for more stories from our adventures on the road.
Next Trailer Girl Blog Post – That time Walla Walla, WA tried to Pretend it was Florida and Failed
To say things are weird and contentious right now in America would be an understatement. I would say people are acting on their absolute worst behavior. The news outlets are loving it because some are misbehaving so badly, they’re creating sensational news stories that the news outlets can further sensationalize and get more people glued to their TV’s. Social media has people thinking they’re anonymous and acting without filters or any modicum of politeness or human decency. It’s a train wreck!
With all that has been going on in the world and having a job where social media advertising is a part of it, I’ve been spending much more time than I’d like on platforms like Facebook. It’s there where I had my little aha moment about RV’ers and why I like them so much. Everything sort of clicked into focus one day.
I am a member of probably seven or eight RV Facebook groups. If you’re not already, I highly recommend joining one or two (maybe not eight). A major portion of what pops up into my feed is about RV’s, National Parks, etc. It balances out all of the crazy political posts and bad news posts. It was around the time craziness in Washington DC – my friends on both sides of the isle posted articles, photos, memes and opinions about what was going on. Many of the posts were a sad and disturbing commentary on the great divide that is happening in our great country right now. That is, except for the RV’ers.
While Washington DC was falling apart, RV’ers are posting pictures, “Here we are all set up by the beach in Key West!” “Lookie here! I did a new modification.” “I bought new throw pillows. I love them!” “There’s snow on the ground, but we’re camping in our driveway anyway!” There were also the help posts. “Anyone know what this switch is for?” “Anyone know a good RV park near _____?” Other RV’ers comment with help, encouragement, and praise for great modifications and renovations. It’s refreshing! I would go so far as to say that RV’ers are example of what America should be like – helping each other out, encouraging one another, and building each other up.
In our 17 years of RV’ing, I have found this to be true throughout our experience. We have found fellow RV’ers to be incredibly friendly and helpful. We have had fellow RV’ers help back us in. We once knocked on the door of an RV park neighbor when we returned from the grocery store with a half-gallon of ice cream only to discover we had locked ourselves out. She made room in her freezer to temporarily store our ice cream and sent her husband out to help us with our lock out situation. Of course, if there are reversed situations where we can help a fellow RV’er, we do what we can.
In walking around RV parks, people are friendly. They say hello, wave, talk to each other’s dogs. They’re also chatty! I can’t even count the number of times my husband has gone out to do something quick like check a hose and come back inside 30 minutes later because he got into a conversation with the neighbor. I love chatting with other RV’ers as well. We’ve had people outside of our trailer kind of staring at it. Then, they ask, “How do you like your rig?” My answer is generally, “We love it! Want to see inside?”
We’ve done hotel vacations. People are nice at hotels too, but it’s different. With RV’ers, there’s a bit more of a camaraderie. Maybe it’s because people can see what’s going on in the RV park from their windows. Maybe it’s because people who own RV’s tend to be a little more easy-going (because they have to be – RV’ing can be a disaster for people who have trouble dealing with things going wrong on vacation!)…maybe it’s because they’re on vacation … I don’t know what it is for sure. I just know I love it.
Winter has taken hold in the Pacific Northwest and to top it off, we’re working on retiring and moving across the country. All this to say that our trailer trips have been thwarted by our schedules, attic cleaning out, finishing up work, and crummy weather. We are most definitely suffering from trailer trip withdrawals! We can’t wait to hit the road! We’ll be taking an epic road trip in our trailer for our move across the country. I can’t wait! It’s helping my attitude to have this to look forward to. There’s a funny t-shirt that says something to the effect of “RV Parks – the only place where you can have a conversation with a stranger in your pajamas while holding a bag of dog poop.” It’s funny because there is so much truth to it. I can’t wait to be on the road again where I can see in-person some of the very best of America and its great people. I need my RV people fix!
Next Trailer Girl Blog – A Glimpse from our Epic Road Trip
This blog post is kind of a re-run. I am finding this 2020 Holiday Shopping Season to be particularly difficult. What does anyone need? I live in a state where restaurants are closed. Theaters are closed. People are working from home. No one is really going anywhere where they want something to wear that’s fun. Shopping is a challenge! Here are some ideas for RVers or your fellow campers. These have continued to be our favorite trailer items over the years.
Camping Chair – One of the best parts about camping, no matter how you do it is hanging out outside on a nice day or evening. It is 100% necessary to have a great camping chair. I just got my new, fancy zero gravity reclining chair from Camping World for my birthday this year. It is super comfortable. I tested it out on a 40 minute phone call with one of my Trailer Girls while at Camping World. I’m pretty sure the people who were shopping there thought I was obnoxious. (They may have been right!) My husband now has chair envy. Guess what he’s getting for Father’s Day….(He told me not to get it for Christmas because he won’t be able to use it on our winter trips in Washington.)
Weather station – we love our Lacrosse Technology Wireless weather station. We call it “The Guy” because there’s a little guy on it that tells you what to wear…. like you couldn’t figure that out for yourself. At any rate, we love “The Guy” and when our first “Guy” died, we replaced it with another Guy. Very important! I found one on Amazon.
Games – We have two favorites. The first is Bananagrams. We have to play this Parents vs. Kids so that it’s sort of fair and so that all of the tiles fit on the dinette table. If you have my daughter on your team, you’re sure to win! Our other favorite game is called, “Smart Ass.” I’m not kidding – that’s really what it’s called! It’s a board game we found while on a trip with our friends. It’s a blast! You can find it on Amazon. Other than the word “Ass” in the name of the game, it’s totally family friendly. I would say it’s best for 15 and up. It’s sort of an easier and more fun version of Trival Pursuit. I feel a lot less dumb after playing this game than Trival Pursuit!
Smart TV – This might be my husband’s favorite thing! We bought a TV that has apps for Netflix, Amazon Prime, etc on it. If you have decent Wi-Fi in your RV park, you can keep up with your Netflix shows, watch movies, etc. It’s great for nights when you just need to flop out!
Trailer Slippers – Mine are fuzzy on the inside with hard rubber soles. My husband thought I was spending frivolously when I bought a pair of slippers on a trailer trip one time. Then, guess what… He got slipper envy! By about 2 trips later, he had trailer slippers too! When I asked my son what I should put in this blog post, Trailer Slippers were at the top of his list too.
Trailer Coat – This might be best saved for a trailer trip purchase. We got ours at the top of Hurricane Ridge in Olympic National Park. There are a lot of tourist places that have cheap coats for people who forget bring theirs for about $30. They’re nice and warm and shed water. They’re great for trailer use! In fact, when my first trailer coat that I paid $27.99 for, started to disintegrate after 10 years, I found a new one in Cannon Beach for $28.99!
Headlamp – If you don’t already have one in your rig, get one! It’s the best stocking stuffer! We often set up in the dark and it’s a huge help! There are all manner of these available at Home Depot, REI, etc. It all depends what you want it to do, if you want LED, etc.
Acrylic Wine Glasses – Mine are stemless because I’ve been fired from drinking out of wine glasses with stems in the trailer. My family says that after I have 2 sips of wine, I start talking with my hands more and the stems are dangerous for the person sitting across from me! My favorites came from Crate and Barrel. The acrylic part is super important because actual glasses would break on the road.
Silicone Dish Scraper – Sounds boring right? NO! Best thing ever … where doing dishes is concerned. If you’ve washed dishes in a rig, you know there’s no garbage disposal. So, you have the gross job of scraping all the goo off of your plates and into the trash before you wash them. I got mine at the Container Store and went back and bought one for my mom. I wish I could find the same one to show you all because, as she pointed out, the packaging says, “Fun to use.” That may be an overstatement, but it beats using a bunch of papertowels or filling your sink up with floating grossness from your plates.
Rolla-Roasters – Everyone that roasts marshmallows with me gets Rolla-Roaster envy! You put your marshmallow on it and there’s a little thingy (that probably has an official name, but who needs to be that technical?!) that you can turn with your forefinger and thumb to turn your marshmallow so they cook evenly. I love s’mores, so this is one of my all time favorite camping tools! You can get them at REI.
The best things about RVing really aren’t things, but the time together with family and all of the great places you can go and see. The things mentioned above are things that might make that journey a little more fun and comfortable. Below are some pictures of my favorite things! I posted links above directly to some of my favorite things. Happy shopping! My next post will be about getting ready to roll, I promise!
LaCrosse Weather Station with “The Guy”Acrylic stemless wine glasses are one of my favorite things. Maybe this dish scraper would be fun to use like mine.One of my all time favorite camping things! Rolla Roasters!My favorite camping chair is on the left. My sister in law (another Trailer Girl) says my husband’s chair on the right looks intimidated!
We were headed out on a quick two-nighter trip. It was going to be easy! The RV park was across the street from a major supermarket. We wanted to get out of Dodge quickly after work so we decided we’d just buy groceries when we got there. What could possibly go wrong with our plan? This is the trip when we learned we should always pack a can of soup.
We were headed to Leavenworth, WA which is about two hours from our house. I think we even left while it was light out, which isn’t always the case. We may have even had some idea that we might be able to set up camp while it was light out. Our trip plans included some hiking, visiting some friends, browsing the cute shops, and dining at some favorite lunch places. We didn’t really need to pack a bunch of food, right? I’m not sure we packed any food other than some ice cream and some dog food. Sure, there were a few packets of oatmeal in the trailer, some spices, and some coffee, but we didn’t really pack anything of substance because we’d shop when we arrived. Best laid plans….
Our truck was only about a year old. We were driving on the downside of a mountain pass when we heard a huge pop and bang! My husband pulled off to the side of the road. As it turned out, we had blown out a tire on the truck. With it being a new-ish truck and with a trailer attached, we decided it would be best to call AAA and get some professional help.
It was dark … very dark as a matter of fact! My husband, “Mr. always prepared” was instructed by AAA to take the trailer off the hitch. So, he set out about doing his work while I hung out with the dog inside the truck. He, of course, had flares and set them out. He loves flares! He came back to the truck momentarily saying how dark it was and that he was wearing a dark colored jacket – a bad combination to be sure. The dog has issues. She doesn’t like it when the truck changes speed to a slower speed or stops when she doesn’t get to get out. She began to fuss. I turned around to comfort her when I noticed my husband’s hi-vis vest sitting on the back seat near the dog. Duh! The next time he came back to the truck, I handed him the vest. This must have jogged his safety brain because he remembered we had some orange cones in the storage hatch of the trailer. He put those out too. Things were brightening up outside.
After about an hour, the AAA guy showed up and gave him a hand with changing the tire. As it turns out, having a AAA guy change your tire the first time out on a new-ish truck is a really good idea. The instructions in the owner’s manual for how to get the spare out aren’t real clear. The demonstration was a huge help. Once the tire was changed, my husband, in all his high visibility, hitched the trailer back up and we were on our way.
Once we arrived at the RV park, we quickly set up the trailer and made a bee-line for the supermarket. It was probably about 9 p.m. We broke our own 8 O’clock rule (See my 8 O’Clock Rule Blog Post), but it wasn’t really our fault. We were thinking up what we might like to cook up really fast for dinner. A steak perhaps. Maybe a pasta dish. A nice salad on the side … it was going to be delicious!
We got to the supermarket and low and behold, it was closed! What supermarket closes at 9 p.m.? Aren’t they all open until at least midnight?
Okay fine! We’ll head to one of the many restaurants in Leavenworth – no problem. Guess what – closed! Yep! It was still the “off season” for tourists. Why stay open past 9 p.m.? It probably isn’t cost-effective. Ok fine! We’ll drive through McDonalds. No problem, right? They have to be open! We got all the way to the place where you place your order and the girl got on and said, “Um, we’re closed. We had to close because our cash registers went down.” Really? How is it possible that there is no food available in the whole town after 9 p.m.?
We headed back to the trailer. Surely, I’d have some emergency type food in the cupboards, right? After all, we are Emergency Workers for our city on the Communications Team. We have go-bags for goodness sake! 3 days – 3 ways… We had a whole go-trailer, right? Wrong! Our team leader would have been disgusted with our lack of preparedness! Not only was our trailer not go-worthy, but neither of us had a go-bag! The trailer had a can of diced tomatoes – not much you could do with that without anything to go with it. There were no cans of soup, nothing but milk and juice in the fridge … basically nothing. It was probably the worst food packing job we have ever done in the history of our RVing! I ate a big bowl of ice cream. I can’t remember what my husband ate.
The next morning when I returned from walking the dog, I saw groceries on the counter! There were eggs, sausage, biscuits, juice, and fruit! There was coffee in the coffee pot. I was a little surprised that my husband was up and had made it to the store and back while we were gone. He told me he was hungry and highly motivated.
Now, we keep 2 cans of soup in the trailer at all times … for emergencies. We haven’t had a food crisis since this time. As I’ve said so many times, pretty much everything we’ve learned about RVing has been by making mistakes. It was yet another mistake where we made a new rule. “Always keep soup in the trailer.”
Next Trailer Girl Blog: Holiday Gift Ideas for RVers – Some of my Favorite Things
This time of year is kind of the worst time of the year if you’re like me, a weekend trailer adventurer and you live somewhere where it gets cold in the winter. You start thinking about winterizing. You end up putting your trailer and your trips either on hiatus until spring or you’re limited to taking trips without snow and ice. Either way, it’s a bummer. This brings me to my blog topic for today … sort of in reverse. Lazy packing. If we have our rigs set up like second homes, getting away at any time of the year is easier. When it comes to packing for a trip, I don’t like to have to pack anything more than clothes and food. That’s part of the beauty of having a trailer! Easy packing. Here’s my list of what lives in the trailer and what I bring into my house as part of our winterizing chore. Spoiler alert … I take out almost nothing!
Kitchen:
My trailer kitchen is an edited version of my home kitchen when it comes to pots and pans, cutting boards, utensils, etc. You can read more about my RV kitchen in my BLOG POST about it. I leave everything in it year around. I also leave a certain amount of pantry items. For things like sugar, brown sugar, and flour, I use airtight containers and I have yet to have a problem with ants or rodents. (knocking on wood right now!). Here’s what stays and what comes in. Note: While I’m bringing items in, I make a list of what I’ll need to replenish or pack when we’re going out again.
Stays
All pots, pans, dishes, kitchen utensils, dishtowels, etc.
All appliances
Dry pantry items such as flour, sugar, spices, pasta, etc.
Baking soda – leave it in the fridge
Oatmeal packets
Water (unless you’re concerned about the bottles freezing and cracking)
Kitchen cleaners and dish soap
Comes in
Oils (Olive Oil and Canola Oil. I usually buy smaller bottles for the trailer so they don’t get that old oil funk)
Canned food. (Funny story, I didn’t used to bring this in until I found some while moving out of one trailer and into another that had expired 4 years earlier. Better to just bring it in and start over later!)
Anything perishable
Vitamins
Cereal
Chips
Anything with an expiration date of less than a year in the future
Anything with a smell that might smell worse when you come back to your trailer
Anything that attracts pests where you live
Anything in the fridge or freezer (except the baking soda and some re-freezable blue ice things)
Pet food
Wine – you’re going to need it over the winter!
Living area:
I leave this area pretty much totally alone. For every trip, I put my throw pillows in my dishes cupboards so the dishes don’t slam up against the cupboard doors while we travel. They stay there over the winter.
Stays
Throw blankets
Throw pillows
DVDs we have dedicated to our trailer trips (Office Space is one of our favorites)
Devotional books
TV Remotes
Games
Vacuum cleaner, Swiffer, broom, etc.
Rugs
Trashcan (make sure you empty it!)
Comes in
DVDs or games we think we’ll want to play at home. Sometimes we don’t even bother! This is how our trailer game and movie collection has grown over the years.
Bathroom
I have my bathroom set up so it’s ready to roll at any given time. When we first started RVing, it was suggested to us that we stock our medicine cabinet with cold medicine and things we might need. We found we ended up just tossing a lot of expired unused medicine. Now, we buy small sizes of things like Tylenol and only buy other types of medicines when we need them.
Stays
Towels. In fact, I have my towels not only stocked in my cupboards, but hanging on the towel bars ready for the next trip at any given time.
Cleaners, toilet chemicals, etc.
Hairdryer, hair tools, brush, comb, pony holders, etc.
Shower items such as shampoo, conditioner, bodywash, etc.
Tylenol, Advil, Tylenol PM (as long as the expiration date is far enough out)
Waste basket (emptied)
Comes in
Any medicine item that has an expiration date of less than a year out.
Bedroom
I am super lazy when it comes to packing. If you’ve been following my blog for a while, you’ll know this about me and that I also love my creature comforts. When I close up the trailer, my bed is made and there are clean sheets ready to greet me when I take my next trip. It’s like a hotel … only better because it has all of my creature comforts … and I had to do the work… I have a few items that always live in my trailer so that I never have to remember to pack them.
Stays
All bedding – I have dedicated trailer sheets, pillows, quilt, blankets, etc. I am way too lazy and into my creature comforts for things like sleeping bags or packing these things each time. I also have 2 sets of sheets so that when I change them, I can immediately make the bed and I don’t have a bed making looming over my head. Lazy and I hate having things hanging over my head.
Coats – I have 3 in my trailer. A heavy one, one for rain, and a fleece type jacket.
Slippers
Hats, scarf, and gloves
Electronics chargers. (We finally gave up and have an extra set of chargers for our trailer. Life got so much easier when we did that!)
Comes in:
I only bring in what I packed for the last trip for clothes. Everything else stays. I know people who have a full trailer wardrobe that they leave in their trailer. I live in and travel around the Pacific Northwest. I think our weather may be too bipolar for that. Also, I’m kind of typical in my girly-ness and like to pack for each trip according to what we’re planning on doing. It sometimes leads to packing more pairs of shoes than the number of days we’re camping!
We are getting ready for what will probably be our last trip for a few months. When we get back, we’ll do our winterizing chores. My husband does all of the important stuff that keeps plumbing and hoses from freezing. We learned the hard way that blowing out the lines with an air compressor is a really good idea. We walked into our first trailer after a few months of winter to find the kitchen faucet laying in the sink! It actually made me do a little happy dance because I hated the faucet and it was beyond broken! It could have been something worse! We’ve learned to follow our trailer manufacturer’s directions about winterizing. They just don’t have any instructions or suggestions for the inside of the trailer. I am in charge of all of the inside stuff. I set my trailer up as much as possible for the next trip (i.e. bed made, towels on towel bars, etc) so that when we go out and set up, my trailer practically says “Welcome back!” and we can start enjoying our next trip as soon as we arrive.
I always feel a little sad buttoning up the trailer for the winter. This year, our RVing was a little strange due to the COVID Pandemic, but it was still really great. We had a few trips cancelled due to temporary RV Park closures. After RVing in Washington State for 15 years, we were inspired by our usual haunts being closed to start going places we’ve never been in Washington. For instance, we’ve lived here almost 26 years and this is the first time we had never been to North Cascades National Park. We’ve camped for about 14 years in Port Townsend and had no idea that there are some really cool trails at Fort Worden. It’s high time we discovered these things that have been right under our noses all this time!
Over the winter, my plan is to scheme up new places to check out and explore that are nearby enough to visit on a weekend adventure. I’ll also work on planning our big summer trip. Usually, in about January, we have trailer withdrawals enough to un-winterize for a weekend and head out some place without snow or ice. This past season has left me with a lot of fun memories to build my future trailer trip dreams on. Hope you’ve had a great RV season and that maybe you even get to continue yours a little longer!
Next Trailer Girl Blog – Always Pack a Can of Soup … That One Time When We Didn’t…
If you were to talk to my kids when they were between the ages of about 10 and 17, you would have thought they lived with Mrs. Hannigan from “Annie” and were suffering a hard knock life. They were sure that no one on the planet had as many chores as they had. I’m pretty sure they were wrong. When it came to our RV trip, it was all about family teamwork and making sure that no one carried the lion’s share of the work. Here’s how we worked it when we traveled with our kids.
The Planner – That’s me. I am an OCD planner. I like to have reservations lined up, meals planned, some activities planned and booked, etc. It works that I took this job because no one else wanted it or loves this kind of thing. My husband teases me on a big trip when I show up with a folder full of copies of our RV park reservations, waivers for things like white water rafting, printed out recipes, etc. Once we’re at an RV park, I grab all kinds of brochures for local things to do and see and add them to the folder. I get called, “Julie the Cruise Director.”
The packers – It has always been my job to pack the food into the trailer. Everyone is in charge of packing their own stuff. We have collapsible crates that we use for packing clothes and such into the trailer. We bought our first trailer when my son was four. He helped me pack his crate at first, but by the time he was five or six, he did his own. I made the kids lists so that they didn’t forget things. After a while, they didn’t need the lists anymore. We did, however, have to stop a few times for underwear. One time, my husband and I reminded the kids over and over to pack their swimsuits. They did great! My husband and I forgot ours … after all of that kid nagging we did!
The Driver – That’s my husband. No one else wanted this job … or was old enough for it most of the time. I drove some with our first trailer, but only on straight, flat roads, and never backwards.
The backing guide – In the early days, that was me and a walkie talkie. When my son got older, he did this some too. When he was about 10, he loved standing on the tongue of the trailer and guiding my husband to the hitch and did this with tremendous and kind of hilarious enthusiasm.
The car clean-up team – This was a kid job. When we arrived at an RV park, their job was to make sure the dog got a little walk and clean up the inside of the car. By the time we would arrive at an RV park, our car was full of snack trash, drink cups, and whatever activity the kids did to pass the time such as movies or video games.
Outside trailer hook-up & leveling – This is also my husband. When my son got older, he helped with this some. Now that we’re kid-less, my husband is on his own … with his auto-leveling system.
The inside of the trailer setter-upper – That’s my job and I love it! One of my favorite parts of getting somewhere is setting up the trailer and making it feel homey and cozy.
The Cook – That’s me. I plan and shop for all of the meals. I love to cook. I love the challenge of cooking on the road. I love my trailer job!
My happy Sous-chef
The Sous-chef – This is the cook’s helper. Usually, this was a kid. The sous-chef does whatever is needed (age appropriate of course). Cheese grating is a big one because I hate grating cheese.
The table-setter& Dog feeder – That job goes to whomever isn’t cooking or the sous-chef. In our first trailer, when the kids got older, we were very short on room. This job often went to whomever was sitting near the dishes drawer at the time.
The dish-washer – This was and still is usually me and I don’t really mind. I think that comes from my kitchen cleaning OCD I inherited from my mother. It was my job growing up to clean up the kitchen. She was a stickler for shiny faucets, clean stove, etc. Kitchen clean-up is all part of the dish-washing for me.
The dish-dryer – This job was always up for grabs. My daughter got it more often than not. Sometimes, someone else would put the dishes away after she was done drying them. It was like an assembly line from the sink to the dish-drawer. It worked well – especially when our trailer was so small.
The dumper – Mid-trip, that could be anyone that could tell the black tank handle from the grey tank handle. Our first trailer needed the gray tank dumped on an emergency basis sometimes. We’d hear from someone yelling from the shower, “The water isn’t going down the drain!!!!” Time to dump the tank. The short straw went to whomever was dressed in something other than pajamas. At the end of the trip, this is my husband. He makes sure everything is done right, tanks are cleaned, and all the hoses are put back where they belong.
The trash taker-outer – This was often my son. It’s a good job for an 8-year old boy. In our first trailer, we didn’t think through the trash situation and only had room for a little wastebasket under the kitchen sink. 4 people and a dog = a lot of trips to the dumpster with little bags of trash.
The dog-walker – It depends on the time of day who gets this job. I get up in the morning and do the morning shift. After that, it’s up for grabs. Of course, if we’re somewhere where we can take the dog for a hike or out to whatever activity we’re doing, all the better.
The laundry boss – That’s me. I try my hardest not to do laundry on a trip. But, when we were traveling in a 25-foot trailer with two kids, it was often impossible on a two-week trip. When we ended up in a laundromat, the kids helped more. Most of the time, it was just me and the RV park laundry. On a two-week trip, the time spent in the laundry room of an RV park was often welcome quiet time.
Trailer-tidy – This is everyone’s job. In our trailer, everyone is to make their bed and are in charge of keeping their stuff picked up and out of people’s way. In our first trailer, our bunkhouse room was where all of our little trailer closets were. There were four bunks used by only two kids most of the time. The kids used the bunks that weren’t getting slept in as added storage sometimes (to my shagrin). My daughter was an avid reader and couldn’t go on a trip without a crate of books. How could she possibly choose two or three books to pack on a trip? She might change her mind! Her crate could be found on her non-sleeping bunk. If anyone’s stuff was in someone’s way, we’d say they were “oozing” and it was time for them to clean up. Did this always go smoothly? Nope!
Cussing day – That’s what we call sheet changing day. It’s always been my job to change the sheets. The name for this came about because, in our first trailer, changing the sheets was difficult, and painful! The queen bed was actually a short queen and the mattress was wedged into a rear slide out that was exactly the same size as the mattress. I scraped many a knuckle on the wall trying to change the sheets almost every time. Our bunkhouse room had all of the basement storage underneath it. So, it wasn’t a full height room. By the time we sold the trailer, no one could stand up fully in the bunkhouse. When the kids were little, it was perfect. When I changed the sheets on the bunks, I invariably hit my head on the crank for the antenna, scraped my knuckles on their walls, knocked the curtains down … you name it. Sometimes, a bad word or two slipped out. Now, we still call it cussing day, but it just means we’re changing the sheets. No cussing happens anymore because the sheets are much easier to change on our walk around queen bed.
When the trip was over and it was time to break camp, everyone was in charge of cleaning up their stuff. The kids were in charge of taking care of the dog and setting up the car for their ride. I cleaned up the inside of the trailer. My husband took care of the outside of the trailer.
On big trips, we tied a spending money allowance to the chores our kids did. This helped with the “enthusiasm” for the chores and some of the whining about them. Our trips and our chore system was far from perfect. Our chores at home were similar and were met with the same “enthusiasm” and whining. At home, as they grew up, we had them do more and more of their chores on their own – like laundry. It might have been easier to just do the darned chores ourselves. Where would the life lessons be in that? Everyone has their own tolerance for dealing with kids and every parent has to choose which battles they are willing to get into with their kids. In the end, I’m glad we stuck out the chore battle.
Here’s the thing. Our kids our now 21 and 24. As they grew up and got jobs, they were always very employable. My son liked doing things like yard work and odd jobs for people. He had a little business we liked to call, “Odd Job Inc.” People would tell us what great workers our kids were. When my daughter babysat, she was often the first sitter that anyone would call because she not only took great care of the kids, but the parents came home to a tidy house and a cleaned-up kitchen. Now, my son is a US Marine and my daughter is an EMT. I’m not 100% sure that all those chores we made them do taught them to be independent, but I’d like to think so.
When my daughter went off to college, during her first year in the dorms, she once said incredulously, “There are people here that don’t even know there’s a lint catcher in the dryer!” I said, “you’re welcome.”
Next Trailer Girl Blog – Packing The Trailer the Lazy Way – What Things Should Live In The Trailer
Trailer Girl's Guide to Happy Camping 