Still looking... and the beach!

We are still looking for that perfect Airstream, but we do have the PERFECT tow vehicle now, so we are headed in the right direction!
Our new-to-us 2002 Excursion is awesome. I wasn't sold on the Excursion until we saw this one, and it really has grown on me since our purchase even. We have gone on a couple 2+ hour road trips and have had no issues... it is fantastic!

One of these roadtrips was the beach at Port Aransas, near Corpus Christi. We had an awesome time! Here are some pictures of it. We headed over to Corpus to visit the Lady (USS) Lexington, a retired aircraft carrier... the kids loved it! And then the next day we went to the aquarium near the Lexington (can be done in one day, but with one that needed a nap and 100+ degree heat, we decided to split it up!), and the kids LOVED that. There were areas you could pet the stingrays, they all thought that was great. And they gave a military discount AND a partnership discount with our local zoo... so we only paid about 50%! That was great. Highly recommend escaping to the beach as often as possible. There at the Port Aransas beach, you can actually camp right on the beach... and I don't think it was too spendy. Just a thought if money is an issue.

We are still on the lookout for our perfect camper. Who knew it would take this long to find one close enough to look at and a good fit for our family! It will happen though!

Camping and living

Just some quick pictures to illustrate how we are spending our days. My parents came to visit a couple weeks ago, and we hung around Abilene. They got to see the oldest play some soccer, which was fun. 

Last weekend we went camping north of Dallas, at Ray Rogers State Park. We had a bunch of fun! Funny, our campspot was in between two Airstreams! Talk about fate, right! One was one of the little ones, and the other was a bit longer. Both still too small for our big family, but I can not wait to make one ours!

The kids and us really had fun fishing, and playing at the beach. We went on some long walks, and played in the water. The night before we were leaving, the littlest threw up in bed... yuck! But this seems to be a natural occurrence for us when we camp. Unfortunately! Then the next morning, we were packing up, and Kellen shut the front door of the van, and sent Soren sailing right into the back door he was trying to shut! He ended up with a big gash down the front of his forehead... which we deemed not stitch worthy, but almost! It has since healed quite nicely.

We are still on the lookout for our Airstream camper and nice tow vehicle. Still unsure what route we will go, but probably Excursion or Suburban... make it comfortable for everyone, right?

Hope everyone is having a great Cinco de Mayo!

We will be celebrating Tyler's birthday tomorrow with steak and cheesecake! Yum! The kids have been making him cards this morning (he is golfing!) and it is the most adorable thing. "You are my favorite dad. You are great" from Ayla's card... like she has more than one dad?!!

Colt cut out a heart ladybug and wrote happy birthday, Tyler. I love you. 

Both addressed it to Tyler. I thought that was pretty funny too! 

sidenote: The above stroller, my new to me Phil & Ted's Sport... is amazing! If I could do it all over again... I would have gotten this one many years ago! it was/is well worth the money that I spent, and I have only had it one week! I should write up a quick blurb on what i would do over again back at square one while having kids. This would definitely go on that list!! (And I have had a couple strollers!)

Let's set a few things straight

Well, it seems that our plans are being broadcasted about...  And without me actually updating this page... or really anyone. Sorry.
Life has been happening here. And it is good.
We HAVE NOT bought our dream Airstream. In fact, it is still in the works, but not top priority like it was. We are going to take our time and find the one that feels right for us. We have currently looked at only 3 different ones that were nearby, and although they all had good things (and bad things) none of them were just right.
Our expectations might be high, but we want to be sure we don't settle and make an impulse buy JUST BECAUSE.
So my summer of Airstream living is not happening... YET! I still can dream though, right?!
I got the hubby onboard with the Airstream, now to just find the one.
And it is a lot harder than I imagined!
There are so many for sale, but they are so haphazardly priced, it is hard to get a really good perspective on what they are worth. I think just careful consideration will go a long way.
I can't wait though!
To camp here in Texas with a little bit of protection from all the things that make it unpleasant to camp here... the wind, the heat, the snakes and scorpions! Did I mention the heat?!

Anyways, enough with that... life has been busy here. Just figuring out what we are doing for summer, while trying to finish up classes and decide on a plan for next year. We are most likely homeschooling the kids (well, me really since hubby will be gone half the year!). And you know, I don't want to hear all the negativity.
This is a fabulous thing. I get to spend time with my kids while they are young. And contrary to popular belief, I like my kids. ALOT! And this is how we have decided to spend this year before I start school full-time and possibly working full time.
We are completely comfortable with this decision, and the kids are in love with the idea also.
Early March, we spent some time with one set of the Grandparents... near Galveston, and it was fantastic.

I am posting a couple pictures, I am not going to regularly posting pictures here of our lives... I am actually trying to not document every moment of my kids lives because I am not sure it is a good thing. I want them to have memories that they make in their mind... sure, we will have plenty of pictures... but not all on here for everyone to see.

well, that wasn't the plan!

We thought we had found the one we would own... we had been pre-approved for a loan, we had done our research on what our money could buy for us, and we found the perfect redone, modern Airstream!!

But... we found out, that doesn't really mean anything, until you can see it in your rearview!

The seller of the particular (awesome) Airstream hadn't yet changed over the title in to his name (he bought in 2007!!), and our bank would not go ahead with THAT particular loan without a verification of title being in sellers name. Totally understandable, but a deal-breaker too!! Bummer.

However...

We did get a chance to drive a couple hours from here and see 2 different Airstreams, and make some comparisons and such. The two we looked at were:

A 1970 28' ft Overlander, with a pull out in front and two twins in the middle and a rear bath. This one had been well taken care of, and I think we would have bought in a heart beat, if only it had been the longer model. If only, right?!

and a 1979 31' Sovereign, also with a pull out in front and two twins in the middle and a rear bath. This one had obviously been left sitting for a while, and had some obvious rust in places, and the seller had just redone part of the sub-flooring.

And the difference was big. That two/three feet of interior space is actually noticeable. The 1970 was actually in better condition than the newer one, but on both we would have to do a bit to remodel to fit these four kids of ours. We plan on doing bunkbeds and whatnot... still not sure exactly.

We learned a bit on this trip on what we are looking for and what we could deal with.

*a 30' camper will fit our family a bit better for a long term camping situation.
*the older models have an awful fake wood paneling that would eventually need to be updated.
*making an Airstream "shiny" is a lot of work! (the older one was being shined, but the newer one had been painted "silver". Shiny was definitely better looking!)
*The couches are awful in the '70's!
*The kids LOVE to find the little hidey holes located all over most campers. It was fun to see.

Today we researched some hitches for pulling RV's... still totally confused on that :)

There is a couple more we hope to take a peek at this next week.

We will hope for some planet's aligning to find that "perfect one".

Finding the right one

I have convinced the husband that my dream of owning an Airstream is a possibility... sooner, rather than later!
What got me started on this whole making the dream come true was our up-coming road trip to Oregon for the summer. To fly me and the kids out there was pretty spendy; and then when you add a rental car, or borrowing someone's car... it adds either more expense or just stress. So we I started thinking of alternatives. Here is some I thought of:

-Just not going. Staying here in Texas for the summer and then starting school again in the early fall. (with the hot temps, this does not sound very good to me!)

-Making a shorter trip, and borrowing a car. This was the original plan, but with the husband being gone for over 6 months, I wanted to stay longer to visit and get some support from family.

-Renting an RV for the 2-3 months that we were planning on being gone. I posted an ad saying we were interested in renting one for a couple months, but nothing has panned out yet.

-Buying an RV for ourselves.

As you can see, the buying one for ourselves seemed like a good choice. With all the camping we do as a family, put together with the unknown terrain and weather of where we live, having an RV seems like a good choice. And what better RV than an Airstream?

Seriously, an Airstream is just so.... so pretty. I have a hard time putting it into words, but the shiny bubble just looks fun and neat. Vintage. At heart, I am a complete hippy, so the vintage thing speaks to me.

So, now I have him (husband) convinced that it couldn't hurt to just look for one, and see if it was feasible. Look I did!
And I found some really nice ones.
And some really crappy ones.
The nice ones were/are mostly out of our price range, and the really crappy ones were cheaper, but would um... take a lot of work!
I kept looking. I just knew with enough looking, I would find "The one" (even though I have already found "the one"... he is my perfect match!)
We had to decide on how big of one we wanted that would fit us, the four kids and the dog and cat possibly. On this, we decided on either a 29' or a 31'. They usually sleep 4 comfortable, but we had planned on having to add bunks anyways...

Floor plans are pretty much the same in both... a pair of twins either in the back or middle (with the bathroom in the opposite spot) and a fold out couch in the "living room".

Well, we think we found the perfect one. It is only about 5 hrs from where we live, and I am so excited to go see it next weekend!! I will be posting pictures of this adventure as we get closer to the road trip and fully stocked... I think it will be fun.
Hubs still thinks I am crazy wanting to live in a 31' camper with four kids, a dog, and a cat while he is gone... but I told him: Life is an adventure. I am thinking of this as a challenge... and most of the time, I really like my kids and enjoy being close to them!

Wish us luck!