Away we go!

So, yesterday we cleaned and said goodbye to 104 Hillside Ave and our wonderful roommate, Adam. 104 was where we had our second date, first kiss, and made our first home together. We made countless masterpieces on the beast of a stove, I soaked for hours in the claw foot tub, and we gleaned quarts of raspberries from the park across the street. We sang old country songs and nursed beers on the front porch, played badminton on Sundays across the street and walked the doggies through all manner of weather in the park just outside our front door. We loved our time there and will always remember it fondly.

Then we drove out to Byron to stay for the night. Did a few last minute adjustments to Harvey (hello bike rack and kayak!) and raided Laura's fridge one last time. This morning we got a bit of a late start because woah, sleep deprivation. We've caravaned with Pat most of the way today, and made decent time despite a few adjustments to the kayak (it is strapped to the roof with ratchet straps. Some of said straps are stronger than others.) Now we're in Indiana dodging a storm en route to Chicago to see my buddy from Bread and Puppet, Megan. We'll park in her parents' driveway for the night and tomorrow it's on the Minneapolis! 

Ahh!

This is what the inside of Harvey looks like right now. Holy goodness give us patience and organizing prowess! Yikes!

How about everything breaks at once?

So, this week I finally undertook a repair on my car that I'd been putting off for a year. Since I am selling my car to Nick's brother, I wanted to make sure he gets it in good condition. Felt good to check that off my list.

Then Thursday, about an hour and a half before our POD was supposed to be delivered, Nick went to take the trash out and heard a telltale hiss from the front passenger tire of Harvey and watched as he sank closer and closer to the ground. Awesome. We kicked it into high gear, jacked that thing up and after some struggle, got the tire off and to a local mechanic. Turns out, instead of a new tire we just needed a new valve. The rubber had dry rotted and simply needed to be replaced. I'll spend $20 over $200 any day.

Phew! Got the tire back and on Harvey in time to move him so the POD could be delivered in the driveway as planned. Yay!

Then, when I was moving my car (we have alternate street parking on our street and our driveway was full with the POD and Harvey), my breaks decided to almost not work at all. Seriously, I was pushing my foot all the way to the floor before they would even think about engaging. That's not scary when you're about to ask your common law mother in law to drive your car all the way across the country in two days!

Upon further inspection, we found my right rear break line was leaking something fierce and in all likelihood needed to be replaced. 

So, yesterday, I was up at 7 calling for a tow and arranging to have that fixed. Then we spent all day (seriously, y'all, wr were at it until after midnight.) packing the POD and doing as much cleaning as we could as we went.

My girl buddy Anastasia stopped by to add some much needed color and conversation to the day, and Nick's mom Pat made a surprise appearance and helped with some kitchen packing as well as vacuuming and mopping our ENTIRE upstairs. That was (understatement of the year) was completely unexpected and amazingly helpful. Thanks Pat!

Today, our POD got picked up bright and early (bye bye stuff! See you on the homestead!) and we picked up my car whose breaks are working great thank you very much Monro! Now, we're finishing up at 104 (why don't I clean the bathrooms like this on the reg?) My uncle Dave arrives tomorrow morning to pick up Nick's car so he can road trip it west for us (which is awesome, thanks again uncle Dave!) and our walk through is a bit after that. We'll say goodbye to Hillside Ave once and for all and spend the evening out at Nick's aunt's and then the open road calls us bright and early Monday morning! I can't believe this is all really happening. Super excited for the next phase of this adventure!

Yep. That's a flat tire. 

Jacking him up.

Oh yeah, we took the microwave out too since we never use it and it was adding a lot of weight and taking up a ton of space! Hello storage and home to soon to be acquired toaster oven!

Adulthood Tetris champ. 

"I just like how he's always leaning. Against stuff. He leans great." 

($10 to whomever names that quote.)

sneaky peek

Home is where the dog portraits are.

more pictures!

Here's the saga of the floors! We had two boxes of beautiful wood that my momma and Greg had given us, but after a whole lot of research and youtube video watching, we decided we didn't have the time, expertise, or tools necessary to tackle such a job. We decided to go with a vinyl pergo (yep, fake wood, y'all), because we could install it using just a utility knife and a lot of patience. We sacrificed some beauty, but it is a much better fit for our needs in Harvey (it's waterproof!)

The floors took two days, with the trim taking a couple more. Nick was on install duty, while I was queen of the chop saw. With all of these projects, there has been a noticeable learning curve, and we improved considerably with practice. It has been fun to put into practice all of that knowledge I got from my momma (queen bee of building/making/fixing) growing up! Also, this whole process has provided ample opportunities for Nick and I to practice our communication skills. (Ahem.) But it just about made my heart burst last night when we were just about to leave, he went back inside and just sat down at the table. I sat there with him and we were home.

painted the ceilings to match the walls! bright white!

This is about how far we got day one.

Y'all. My boyfriend is the best.

Vinyl tape in the corner we were thinking about for trim, but didn't end up working.

all hail the spray foam! love this stuff. by the time we're done, Harvey will be held together with spray foam and silicone caulk. (shout out to auntie Kathy! silicone caulk fan club!) We put peel and stick tile over the step, since we finished the floors with only one board to spare thanks to Nick's excellent spatial skills.

Patch on the back rear; this was a saga... both the local RV places wanted to charge us $1,500-$5,000 to repair. Ouch! but! we found a local body shop who did the job for $300 and it looks great! Got to love local guys!

Hey there pretty trim and peg board!

Lady loves power tools.

Yay! 

D-I-why?!?

Y'all. I had grand ambitions when I started this blog. I was reading so many RV rehab blogs with beautiful multi picture posts detailing each step of the demo and renovation. That, obviously has not happened. It turns out, it takes a lot of energy to do this, and I haven't had a lot to devote to updating you fabulous people on how it's been going. Now that we're almost done, I can say: AWESOME!

But! it has been a process. There were some weary moments early on, while peeling scraps of shiny vinyl wall paper off the walls, or  even two days ago making a cut 6 times for trim on the floor and STILL having the wrong angle when the thought crossed my mind: "Why are we doing this?"

And now that pictures and curtains are starting to be hung I can definitively say: because it makes it so completely ours. Every ounce of stress and energy has been absolutely worth it.

In addition to all the lovely interior work, Nick and his uncle Doug have been checking and tuning up all of the mechanical bits and machinery. Guess what kids? Everything works like a dream! Fridge, check. Freezer, check. Generator, AC, Heat: check! Pretty stellar.

We're planning to leave in 10 days. Tomorrow we re-seal the roof and we're pretty much ready to move in! So thrilled to finally be at the fun part!

And now, your little virtual timeline of all the pictures I had intended to show you along the way. All at once. Think of it as binge picture viewing.

weird accordion doors? out.

detail shot of weird shiny vinyl wallpaper of my nightmares.

whomp whomp. water damage.

hahaha, I thought I could sand that down. silly girl. 

this guy.

yeah, see all that mauve? that was the headboard. 

(also bathtub sans similar accordion shower door.)

so. much. caulk.

ripping out all the wood. he found some wet wood everyday for a week, and by the end of it, we had trashed pretty much the entire loft. sad panda. 

ripping it up smelled like black mold and sounded like baby pterodactyls.

yes!

love me some power tools!

wow! that awning looks great!

*no pictures from the week of wall cleaning, priming, and painting week. it was exhausting and I forgot my phone a lot. 

pretty and white!

hey, look ma, no carpet!

then we took a break, and went to NYC to visit my fabulous sister before we head west! 

we went to the museum of natural history. things got silly.

highline!

d'aw.

This week we have done floors, trim, and finishing, but I don't have those pictures off my phone yet. Promise to start updating more consistently!