Shakedown cruise

The majority of the work is done!  Only touch ups left and serious cleaning.  But we needed a break.  Tara needed someone to deliver our table to a customer in Ft. Morgan.  We wanted to camp.  God blessed us with unexpected money again.  Enough to make a short trip to Jackson Lake in Wiggins, Colorado.  So we offered to deliver the table for some gas money and camp at the same time.              

You can get only so much helpful advice before you realize, at some point, that the only way you will learn to tow a trailer is to tow it…

Bill and I loaded the trailer and hooked it up like a pro!  We were pleased as punch to say that we had successfully achieved lift-off.  We slowly pulled away from the curb with the cat hanging out in the trailer and the dog, three kids and two nervous adults stuffed in the cab.  Would our little truck pull the trailer? Had I loaded it down too much? Would the brake controller work? Would we wreck the whole thing before pulling out of Keenesburg?  I obsessed.

The DH slowly circled the block, setting the brake controller (just in case you need to stop the trailer and not the truck) and practicing his turns.  Only one little curb check. Then we decided to brave the highway and head out on our first adventure.

He accelerated up to 65mph and I held my breath, watching the temperature gauge hovering at 50 percent.  We made it to the lake without a hitch and parked our trailer at a dry camp.  Since we were boondocking, it was an excellent time to test out all the systems, including the animals and humans.

We survived our first trip!

We swam at the lake, roasted marshmallows over the campfire and cooked breakfast over the stove.  Rode our bikes (which were hitched to the back of the trailer), got eaten alive by mosquitoes and walked the dog.

After a brisk swim, we packed up camp and dumped the tanks.  This was DH’s first experience, so I did that yucky job… Then headed down the road to deliver the table. 

After we got back home, we compared notes.  The first item on our list was making the trailer functional.  I hadn’t had a chance to fully settle in before we left.  The battery lasted two full days and the propane tank kept our refrigerator running beautifully.  It all worked beautifully.

Our beautiful house

     Since we are on a tight budget, we decided to sell our house without a real estate agent.  This journey we are on is God-inspired anyway and we believe he promised us a buyer, so why not?  A walking-on-water faith.  A crazy-faith walk means that we trust him no matter what.
     We signed up at bigbrick.com and created a webpage for our house.  It allows you to upload numerous pictures to craigslist and provides a sign with the web link on there.  This was also an opportunity for Bill to showcase his ability to produce rockin' real estate pictures.  I think he did a fabulous job!
     Our plan, eventually, is to produce income utilizing our writing/photographic skills and whatever else God decides to bring our way.
      Here is the flyer for our house:

$179900 / 4br - Beautiful 2 story home on quarter acre (Keenesburg, CO)

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Date: 2011-07-02, 10:00AM MDT
Reply to: your anonymous craigslist address will appear here

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Beautiful 2 story home on quarter acre 150 Lambert St, Keenesburg, CO 80643	$179,900 Type: House Beds: 4 Baths: 3 Sq. Ft. 2480 Lot: under ½ acre Garage: 3 car
Beautiful 2 story home on quarter acre lot sits in the middle of a quiet country town minutes away from downtown Denver. You get all the amenities of a big city and all the advantages of country living. This four bedroom home, built in 2001, has a complete master bedroom suite with a walk in closet and full bathroom. There are three additional bedrooms upstairs and bathroom. The spacious living room flows into an ample kitchen with like new appliances. A custom built pantry provides lots of storage, while the butcher block counter hides a spacious nook underneath for larger items. The bonus room features a gas fireplace and a powder room located conveniently off the kitchen. The laminate flooring is brand new and there is fresh paint throughout the entire house. The three car garage is big enough to hold three vehicles. The third car garage is already framed in with metal studs for a workshop, if you desire. The unfinished basement is 600 SF, with a large spare room already enclosed and framed in, and W/D hookups. There is central heating and an attic fan. The large back yard is completely fenced in. Three raised garden beds in the back corner will let you get started on your country garden right away. And the basketball hoop out front lets you play all summer long!

Towing

     Ok. So our house is done, but how are we going to pull the trailer.  Since we only get paid every two weeks and we are paying for it all in cash, we could only go so fast. 

By June we were able to get the hitch.  Thankfully, my brother-in-law wanted to upgrade and was willing to install his old one if we went in half with a new one for his truck.  He also helped me install a brake controller and the wire harness for it.   

     Though it took an entire week, we got the truck tow ready!  Now if only I knew how to tow…

A very long work

      Most of April, May and June have been taken up with getting our house ready to sell.  Which would explain the very long break between posts… But not excuse them…

Slowly, but surely I pared down our belongings to the necessities.  If I could use something in the trailer, I set it aside.  If I was desperately attached to it (ahem… my books), I placed it in a box and set it in the garage. 

     Towards the end of April, I began selling furniture and such on craigslist.  We knew that every penny back into our pocket would help.  But there was so much to do, I felt overwhelmed at the work load.  God came through again. 

     My friend, Tara Dreiling, owns a consignment/resale store in downtown Keenesburg (all two blocks of it…) and emailed me about some furniture she saw posted on craigslist.     We ended up negotiating a price for all the furniture in the house and she paid me in chunks over the next couple months. 

     I cleaned up different pieces and took it over to her shop as she had room.  While I didn’t make as much as I would have on craigslist, it drastically cut down on my workload. 

The kids and I stayed in the trailer at night and Bill slept in the house.  

     Slowly, the house came together.  We painted every wall in the house, including the basement.  Long tedious hours spent taping, prepping, painting and re taping finally paid off when we stepped back and saw how beautiful it looked. 

     In the midst of the painting, we also worked on the main floor flooring.  It took a week to rip out carpet, linoleum and bust out tiles.  Bill took a week off to work solely on the house.  Except I tried to be a lone ranger and haul a crate of tiles out to the garage and that was the last straw for my back.  Having been pushed to the limit, I finally killed it.  Could barely walk, sit and stand.  Laying down was my only relief and only if I didn’t move too much. 

      I called Mom right away.  She suggested an ice pack and lots of pain-killers.  Lots of rest and gentle stretching.  I managed to get back on my feet within a few days, but that left Bill alone to work. 

      Lesson learned…

No water

     What to do when the well runs dry.  Fill it up again! What happens when the pump won’t suck?  Call the help desk.   There was a point when the fresh water tank ran out of water.  Maybe I wanted to see how long it would sit at empty or something. 

     After the pump made a funny noise and stopped pushing water through, we refilled the fresh water tank. Except no water came through the faucet. I didn’t panic. I called my DH out to help me.  After all, he was in the Navy and worked on submarines and surely he could fix it.

     After a quick look see under the fridge, he discovered there was no water in the pipes and we’d have to prime the pump.  Meanwhile, I had been frantically hunting down the number of the help desk and reading through the manual…  I got through to a man in India who told us that when they install the fresh water tank, plastic shavings fall into the tank where screws go into it.  And when the tank is empty, the pump sometimes picks those shavings up and clogs the filter.

      Bill pulled the filter off and what do you know? Little white plastic shavings fell out… He cleaned the filter and primed the pump. Water! 

     We did a victory dance. One more system figured out.