Before our departure from Lancaster, California this last Monday, Mitch and I were treated like a king and queen. My darling husband, the king of my heart, received a temporary crown on Friday. During the super bowl, trying to floss out all the deliciousness of snacks and hot wings, out came the majority of a tooth!
The New Tooth Fairy
Fortunately, there was just enough to salvage it and put on a crown. If only there were real jewels to go with the price it costs to get one!
Angel and Taylor
Angel spoiled me for two days in a row before we left. Celebrated my birthday early, took me shopping, got me balloons, and just made a wonderful fuss over me.
Pre-birthday party time
I felt super special, so grateful and just can’t express to her and Kaelen how much it meant to me!
Sissy goes all out for a party!I even got to wear a sombrero at Domingo’s Mexican Restaurantand I got to wear my birthday desert when the owner smeared it on my face for funThere was a live Mariachi band that played, and Mitch danced with me
It was hard to say goodbye, but we have plans for the next month and had to head north.
Last weekend was family time. Who knew papa was a pool shark, landing the 8 ball in the corner pocket like that. He and Mitch’s Nephew Tuston beat Mitch and me at a game of pool.
We got to have some quality time with Tuston who stayed with us for a few days.We had a bowling and billiards day.
Superbowl at Angel’s was super fun and so many yummy snacks. Everyone had a great time, and having the Seahawks win made it that much sweeter. Angel had a few games for us to play while watching the game, and even gave out prizes. When we first arrived she gave everyone a string of beads and said the words we weren’t allowed to say were “yeah, go and touchdown”.
Papa before he lost his beads
If you accidentally said one of the words, whoever caught you; got all your beads. I was so happy to be one of the winners and claimed myself a Starbucks gift card at the end of the game. Yahoo. Thanks sis for such a great time!
Angel with Larry ‘s ashes (their dad) and wearing his glasses. He was a huge Seahawks fan.Family photo after the big gameYes folks, that’s a Seahawks poncho Mitch got in Mexico.
Before Tuscon headed back home he treated us all to a homemade breakfast. It was so delicious, as you can tell by Mitch’s face in the background, wanting to know where his was. Who knew toasting the bread in the bacon grease would give it such an amazing flavor! Yum.
The secrets in the bacon grease
Soon enough the winds will carry us further north, into even cooler temperatures as we head towards Portland to celebrate this ol girl turning 40. Where’d the time go?
It all began when we first arrived on the BLM land of boondockertunity.
Our second spot while boondocking on BLM land. Can you see our place?
Let me tell you, there has been one gals website that I’ve been following since the day we decided to travel. Her writing style, the beautiful pictures she takes, the vast knowledge and insight that she’s provided for full time RV travels is awesome and invaluable. She’s become somewhat of a role model, a person with skills that I’ve come to admire and look up to.
Wanna be my buddy?
It was just by chance, and to my overjoyed excitement that she and her husband were boondocking here in Yuma when we arrived. I was really looking forward to meeting them, bought a bottle of wine and sent her a comment through her website saying I would love to meet her and say thanks. A day later, after much anticipation she finally replied, and basically said, “busy for the rest of time we’re here with friends and appointments, but if we’re outside you can come by.”
finding the beauty in the fine print
It was to my utter surprise that she didn’t come running over and give me big hugs and proclaim her admiration of me too. I joke! I was thankful that she replied and was open to the idea of having strangers come visit. But what she posted on her website that same night made it clear that she wanted privacy and space.
same plant from a distance
That night, I pondered all my options, wrote and re-wrote a response to her about being in her “boondocking bubble” and being one of the 5 RV’s that was in the vicinity, but in the end I decided not to write anything. Honestly, my feelings were hurt, I felt rejected and all that hope I had for months about someday maybe meeting her, was tainted. My thoughts of the experience left me feeling sad and insignificant.
Then, the most amazing thing happened. I stopped thinking about how I felt and tried to understand her perspective.
shining a new light on the story, a beautiful desert sunrise
She’s become somewhat of a star in the RV world, with a thousand plus followers, all of which, when I started to read comments want to meet her. It’s not like she knew me, it really wasn’t about me at all, it was her situation and how she was feeling. After some real soul searching I realized that it was her loss, it wasn’t meant to be and darn it, I really like me.And from that rejection came a replenished sense of self love and acceptance that I really needed. I had such a peaceful night’s sleep that night.
I have all I need in life, everything else is just gravy!
It’s as if she had just done me a huge favor and reminded me that I am enough without knowing her. I prayed about it and left it to fate.
We moved spots a couple days later and never met. In the end, not getting to knowing her, helped me to get to know myself better!
Learning to embrace myself, spots and all!
The couple we bought our trailer from had been on Mitch’s mind lately and so a few days ago he sent them a text seeing how they were doing. As fate would have it, they were in Yuma visiting friends. That afternoon Tom & Vicki came out for a visit. We had a great time catching up with them and spending time with such quality people. As we visited, Vicki asked me what books I’d been reading (because I had made a statement when we bought the trailer about wanting to read more).
Visiting with Tom and Vicki
“Not a darn one, and I couldn’t tell you why” I replied. After they had left, I said to Mitch, ” how funny is it that we have all these books and haven’t read a one?” The next day, we pulled out a few books and started to read. Mitch read “To Heaven and Back” by Mary C. Neil, MD and is in the middle of “I Dare You to Change”. I’ve read “I Dare You to Change”, written by Bil Cornelius, “Talking to Yourself Learning the Language of Self-Affirmation”, by Pamela E. Butler and a book I picked up for Mitch’s Son Elijah “The 7 Habits of Highly Successful Teens” by Sean Covey. As you can tell by the titles, it’s been a bit of a self help week, and boy has it helped. Thanks Vicki for reminding us that we had all these books to read!
Self reflecting is so enlightening, I feel more centered… ahhhh
I took a long walk last week, went to a mountain top, sat down and meditated…. For a minute. Then a fly landed on me, I tried to re-direct myself to only focus on my breathing and then it landed on me again, so I called it good for the day.
View from my meditation spot
We went to Los Algodones, Mexico on Friday the 24th of January. No problem getting in, a long line to get out and talk about pressuring sales tactics! I caved in on buying a few things just because its so fun to get them down in price. You can really only get that kind of fun banter in Mexico now a days. But also, the constant bombardment gets annoying very quickly.
After a while, since they felt they had something that I needed, I knew that I too had what they needed. So as each one came up to me, I would say “no thank you, Jesus loves you” and give them a huge smile. It was really interesting to see their reaction, most just looked at me with wonderment and then would go back to trying to sell me wherever they had.
Sunrise day before we left
Our goal of 14 days without dumping didn’t happen. We ended up going into town and dumping twice and moving to different spots each time, which in the end was really cool because we got to experience more of the land that way.
At our last spot a couple days before we left for Lancaster, CA, we came up with a really fun game we titled “Rock Wars”. We dug shallow spots in the ground, gave point value to difficulty and distance and would play to fifteen.
Our rock war layout
In the end, on our last game, the winner would be titled Rock War King, the winner was Papa!!!! Since we have been traveling, with all the places we have been and seen, playing this simple game was one of the best times we’ve had together!
On our journey back west we decided to stop and enjoy the warm Yuma weather.
up on a mountain top
Oh, so liberating it’s been to and stay on BLM land away from the masses. We found this place thanks to Nina, and her website wheelingit.us.
We arrived Monday evening, with the sun setting and daylight fading, we didn’t find the most optimal location initially.
The full moon in the distance
After a few days of scouting out the land we found our own private spot and resettled yesterday. With no other RV in sight, we can yell out into the universe as loud as we want without having to worry about bothering the neighbors!
It gets really windy out here, especially on top of a mountain. Yes, that’s my hair blowing sideways!
Our goal is to stay out here for the allowed 14 days of free camping without running out of water or having to dump. It’s a lofty goal since we usually only last 5 days, but no one says we can’t strive for it!
You go left and I’ll go right
Since we’ve arrived we found gold, which turned out to be fools gold. We found a meteorite, and felt like Joe Dirt, ” me and you meteor!” And like Joe Dirt it wasn’t a meteor, but thankfully it wasn’t a peanut speckled ball of airplane poo. It’s just a rock that caught our attention because we thought it was dog poo!
can you spot the “meteor” in my pretty rock collection
But the things we have found is the freedom to sing as loud as we want from the tallest mountain,
wear whatever strikes our fancy,
Wow dad, that desert sun has gotten to you! Says Mr. Milo from bottom left
and the sense of wonderment that flowers are blooming here in the desert in January!
Papa turned 73 on Thursday, we made him carrot cake cupcakes and his favorite dinner; burritos.
Happy, happy Pappy!
The search continues for all the precious metals and out of this world treasures, but we’ve found our true treasure!
Wide open space and the calming effect of solitude.
So as I send this post off into the cosmic world of cyber space I am soaking up the sunset for everyone who may be in colder climates and want to have a desert reprieve.
Goin' Road Trippin' 