Out of Hibernation!

Silver ‘Rita is out of winter storage – actually she’s been out for about a month, but we’ve been so busy, I keep putting off the task of updating the blog. So I will add a few entries in coming days to catch up.

We are really glad we chose not to spend the winter in our Airstream. Since we are still tethered close to Indianapolis until next May, wintering in the Airstream would have meant dealing with the Indy winter weather. This past winter was harsh, both in temperatures and snow fall totals – there were many times Tom and I looked at each other and said “I’m glad we’re not in the Airstream right now!” We chose to stay at the Staybridge Suites hotel in Plainfield, Indiana. It was a terrific place to stay. Although some questioned why we would pay the cost of a hotel, we counter with: no utility bills, free Wi-Fi, free laundry, daily breakfast, and dinner (with beer and wine) three nights a week. It really comes out about the same. And small-space living for four months is no big deal – it’s what we’re going to be doing from now on! If you ever need a place to stay in the Indianapolis area, either short-term or for longer stays, we highly recommend the Staybridge Suites in Plainfield, Indiana. In addition to a pleasant stay provided by friendly, attentive staff, we accumulated enough points to cover the hotel stay for our Hawaiian vacation planned for (about) fall 2016!

During hibernation (December 1st through first week of April) we concentrated on refining our requirements for small space living, and preparing ourselves for it. We reviewed what would be necessary – from clothes, shoes and kitchen equipment, to tools, entertainment and craft supplies. Upcoming entries will address these issues and what we decided to bring along.

I spent many hours finishing the photo/scrapbook project. All of our photo and scrapbook keepsakes have been scanned, photographed, or otherwise digitized and stored on the computer and backup drives. We have a digital photo frame with a flash drive containing all of our photos. We can view and share them anytime, anywhere. Goodbye to a whole closet full of photo albums and scrapbooks.

I did much the same thing with cookbooks and recipe files. I had over a hundred cookbooks in my kitchen, collected from travels, and handed down from relatives, and many of them had numerous dog-eared pages marking tried and true recipes. I scanned the pages I wanted to keep, along with newspaper and magazine recipe clippings. So now all of my recipes are available on my laptop whenever and wherever I need them. Goodbye to three shelves full of cookbooks and recipe binders.

During our hotel stay, we brought very few kitchen items with us. Most of it stayed in the trailer during the winter. I tried to make a note of every time I thought I needed a piece of equipment that I didn’t have. My plan was to check my list against the equipment in the trailer when we returned in the spring, and use that list to further cull items in the trailer galley that we didn’t need.

We got ‘Rita out of storage on April 8th, and took her to Indy Lakes Campground on the south side of Indy for the rest of April. Being close to town made the commute to work easier, but we were also anxious to take her out and about. We spent the first weekend in May at Brown County State Park with 15 other units and owner groups from the Central Indiana Unit of WBCCI, the Airstream Owners travel club. Weather was wonderful and we got to meet and share stories and ideas with many local Airstream enthusiasts.

Following the weekend at Brown County, we brought our silver home on wheels to Mounds State Park in Anderson, Indiana, for a two week stay. It was glorious to set up, knowing we would be here for two full weeks. The commute from here to Indianapolis is not very enjoyable, but once the workday is over we relish coming home to our Airstream. We spend a lot of time outside-most dinners (and breakfasts on the weekends) are cooked over a fire, or on the tabletop Holland, if weather is too gloomy. Today is Sunday and it’s been so nice watching all of the other campers pack up and head out, going home from their weekend adventures. Tom and I looked at each other and smiled- both thinking “we don’t have to do that – we’re living the adventure every day!”

Now that ‘Rita and I are both out of hibernation, I hope to add at least one entry per week, perhaps more. There are two purposes to this blog – to share our experiences as we prepare and embark on full timing in our Airstream (we’ve learned so much from others, perhaps others might learn from our experiences) and to keep family and friends informed about our adventures and whereabouts.)

Next two blog entries:
Everything we own is in here! – what we took, how we store it, and how we decided
And
Projects – things we’re doing (OK – things Tom is doing) to make Rita more “ours”