Trying Times

I never would have dreamed it would be so hard to buy a couple of acres of land. We have been looking and looking and looking, to no avail. Every time we find a spot that looks perfect, turns out there is a problem, too much land, not enough land, floods in spring, to close to water, to far away from water, and on and on and on. We have decided on a builder ( I think ) and a floor plan. 

This is my favorite floorplan, you have garage for the car and rv and cozy living space.
Thinking of adding a loft, since the ceiling will be so high, great place for storage. We are thinking we would be outside most of the time anyway, so I would want to expand the patio area. If we could find the two acres we need!  I just don't see it happening this year. The summer is almost over. The only thing we can do is keep looking.

43 years, oh my

We celebrated our forty third wedding anniversary last week.  We decided to have a night on the town.

 I don't understand why buy we never go into the city (Chicago) when we are home.  When we travel we are always out and about visiting different restaurants, museums and shows. But here at home hardly ever. We went to the Apollo Theatre  to see The Million Dollar Quartet. 

It was a sweet little theatre in the Lincoln Park district of the city.  We had great seats and enjoyed it so much.  Before the show we went to a great Italian restaurant nearby Sapori Trattoria.

It was a great evening and I hope we don't wait another year to do it again.

Rain,rain go away......

I swear it has been raining ever since we got home.  Thunderstorms, humidity, yuck, yuck, yucky weather.  Where was our spring? We went straight to hot, humid summer.   I thought about doing a recap of some of the places we spent time this past winter, but I think I will start fresh with what's going on now. And I promise I will try to be a better blogger going forward.   FYI I did update the other blogs with resorts we stayed at and restaurants we visited.
I do have something to get excited about. Our niece is getting married in PA. on July 13. After that we are going to Traverse City , MI for two weeks.  It will be good to get on the road again.  I love living in the motor-coach!   The wedding is going to be so much fun, my sisters and their families are also going. We have rented an entire B&B for two nights and everyone (except Jay and I ) are going to stay there. I think it will be like one big pajama party!  
We only get to see my two nieces and their babies once a year at best. Both of them have boys, two and one, and they are adorable.  I hate that they live so far away. They post lots of pictures and videos on facebook, which is great, but it is not enough, they are growing up so fast. 
We are looking for land, but so far no luck. It will happen, I know it will. God will lead us to a place and it will happen when it is supposed to.  I have told J I will be willing to stay at one of the yucky places around here while we look if he just wanst to go ahead and sell the house now. 
There are lots of things we have to figure out, one being a mail forwarding service. I have to do some research, I don't have it figured out yet. 
But let's face it, of all the problems we could be facing at this point in our life, mail forwarding is a very small thing.
Hope you have a good week, hope it stops raining.  

How Time Flies

For the last six months, every day after I finish reading all my favorite blogs, I think I need to do a posting. And then I don't. I think I have a problem finishing, I am a great starter, always ready to go, so excited, full of ideas.  But I am not so great on the follow through. We have had a wonderful time the last seven months, been so many places, had great meals, great shopping, met wonderful people and I let it all fly by with no blogging. Even though we are home now and there won't be as much excitement I am going to try to get back in the routine of blogging again.  Maybe I will post about some of the neat places we visited this winter. We are determined to find a place where we can park the motorhome somewhere around here  The minute we came in the next door neighbors daughters came over I said "if you are going to sell you house please give us first shot". She and her boyfriend are apparently set on having our house.
Now all we need is a place to park the RV when we come home to visit my family. That is the stumbling block.  We can't sell the house until we find some place to park.  Since there are no RV parks around here at all, we are thinking of buying a piece of land, putting a building on it and making it large enough to park the RV and have a living space. 
So that is the plan for now, find a piece of land and price buildings. 
Wish us luck.

I have a new addiction.....

I few months ago our Dish Network introduced a new channel, GMC, it shows reruns of family friendly TV.   I am addicted to re watching all the Seventh Heaven and Judging Amy reruns.   I tape at least five episodes a day and watch the in the mornings when J is out riding.   I love watching real families interact, not Reality families.   I love that there is no swearing, no nudity, no violence. 
I actually feel offended by what is being shown on TV now.  Before I started watching these reruns, I think, like everyone else, I had grown numb to the horrible stuff that is on our TV now.
After watching these shows that taught you a lesson, showed real love, I am now shocked and ashamed  of what we have been watching. 
We have made a commitment to stopping watching some of the shows we had been following. 
That decision had made me start thinking about the types of books I am reading.  I have always been a mystery reader, that was my favorite genre. 
 I do make myself read a non fiction or biography every four or five mysteries.  But what started as a fondness for crime "chick lit", you know J. A Jance, Sue Grafton, those types of mysteries has developed into reading Jonathan Kellerman , James Patterson, and their books are much darker, much, much darker.
  So I think I am going to take a hard look at my reading lists too.
It is so easy to get pulled into things, desensitized, causing us to involve ourselves in things that we know are against our core beliefs.
I have to be more on guard against what I allow into my life. 
FYI, today is a good, good day. I have found a great company to come and detail the inside of the coach.  I am going to try to find a company like this in all the big cities we visit.  
It is impossible for my with the fusions to get into all the nook and crannies and it really bugs me.
Can't wait to know we are going to have a spanking clean, dust free coach at the end of the day.
Yesterday we went looking for chairs for our dinning room table.  When did we stop making furniture in our country?
Even the chairs at Pottery Barn and a fancy furniture store in Palm Springs were from China!
We are going to wait till we get home and try looking there. Do any of you know of a furniture company that stills builds in the USA?

It was an Earthquake!

My First Real Earthquake


Yesterday I was in the motor coach with Izzie just putzing around when the whole coach started to rock and shake.  I thought maybe the wind had really picked up, I have felt the coach move in really strong wind storms, but I looked outside and it was totally calm.
I went out and checked the jacks, thought maybe one had failed, but no everything was fine. I just thought "how strange" and put it out of my mind.
This morning I read the local paper (check link above) and what do you know it was a 4.7 earthquake. Now I have officially experienced California. 
I found a new blog to follow.RVGoddess, their home base is at the resort right across the street from ours. Lots of suggestions for things to see and restaurants to try. That's what I love about blogging.
She mentioned a cleaning service that did the interior of her coach so I called them and set up an appointment for  Friday.  I am so excited I have been trying to find someone for the longest time. With the fused knee and ankle I just can't get in all the little spaces, like behind couches or windows behind the couches. And the shower it is impossible to do it if you can't bend.
So after Friday I will have a sparkling clean coach, all the dust from the desert will be gone. And then we head back to AJ and it will get all dusty again! Oh well, I will try to find someone when we get to Bella Terra in Gulfport.
We called Red Bay yesterday and made out appointment with Brandon. Jay is having a lot of things replaced like batteries and things I don't really understand. So we have get busy and find a carpet we like and ship it too him. I have a feeling J and I will have an argument when choosing a color.  We always do.
We also need to find some new dining room chairs, I really dislike the ones that came in the coach. We saw a really big furniture store yesterday so I think we will check it out today. 

It's a beautiful day...........

The weather here is so beautiful. It is a little mind altering to be able to go to an outdoor market and buy things that were picked fresh that morning.
They had all kinds of wonderful veggies, unfortunately they were mostly green in color, which Jay has a major problem with, anything green I mean.
But I did find some tomatoes and the most beautiful strawberries I have ever seen. They were so sweet, so juicy and so big.

They also had artichokes, I love artichoke hearts, but am too intimidated by the process to cook them. I have watched them being prepared by lots of TV cooks, but......   It seems like everyone trims differently. I wish I could watch someone prepare them in person, standing right there peering behind their shoulder.  Have any of you ever cooked artichokes? Can you give me some hints? Can I come to your kitchen and watch?
I think we might hit the pool today,not sure yet, as I said before the weather is amazing.  This is our weather forecast for the next week. What more can you ask for.

TodayMar 12

90^°F

57^°F

Sunny

CHANCE OF RAIN:

0%

 

WIND:

NE at 5 mph

Details

WedMar 13

93^°

60^°

Sunny

CHANCE OF RAIN:

0%

 

WIND:

NE at 6 mph

Details

ThuMar 14

96^°

61^°

Sunny

CHANCE OF RAIN:

0%

 

WIND:

NE at 6 mph

Details

FriMar 15

95^°

61^°

Partly Cloudy

CHANCE OF RAIN:

10%

 

WIND:

WNW at 7 mph

Details

SatMar 16

92^°

61^°

Mostly Sunny

CHANCE OF RAIN:

0%

 

WIND:

NNW at 8 mph

What

Sunday Praise

"Let every thing that hath breath praise the Lord. Praise you the Lord" (Psalm 150:6).

What can I say, it has been almost three months since I posted last.  I don't know why. We have been a lot of great places, eaten at a number of really fun and interesting places. For some reason I just didn't want to blog, didn't want to share. I faithfully read all my favorite blogs every day.  And every day I thought, I should start blogging again, but just couldn't talk myself into it. Tonight I told Jay I had posted some pictures of the places we had been recently ( we are in Indio, Ca.) he said "oh, on your blog" and I said no I don't blog anymore, he said " why not" and I didn't have an answer.  I think maybe when I went through my physical problems last year I felt I had shared to much.  When I started this blog it was to share RV Resorts and Restaurants only.  I think I got cared away and shared to much.  I have had always had problems with pain and have always played it very close to the chest, never shared, just sucked it up and went on.  The blog got to be just like talking to my best friend Judy, it was so easy to bare my soul on it, after she was gone.   I think I have decided I am not comfortable with that, need to dial it back and keep this as a RV Resort and Restaurant blog.  I have a lot of places to post concerning those topics.  We are at the Indio Outdoor Motor-coach Resort in Ca., beautiful place, really beautiful.  We have been here for a week today and plan on staying three more weeks.  We have been so many neat places, I will try to start update tomorrow.