Wrapping up in FL

I know I've been awful quiet for a while...I apologize.  It's so very easy to get wrapped up in other things.  I know I owe you updates on a ton of states, the entire Mississippi River Valley as a matter of fact, but I'll get back to that soon.  For now let me tell you where we are and where we are going (kinda).

About mid-January we rolled into the tip of the panhandle of Florida.  I'll write a separate post about those stops, but for this particular entry, the important thing is that we were back in Florida.  We had almost completed our 7 month voyage and now had a real feeling that we could do this permanently.  We had 1 last stop, or milestone really, to put the icing on the cake...and that was the Fulltime Families Rally which was the beginning of February in Tampa.  I think the rest of the gang is going to write about  the rally too, so I'm just going to hit some highlights

We pulled in super early with our friends the Setzer's and basically began a takeover of a campground the likes of which I could only imagine.  It seemed like every day the families of full time campers just multiplied...and before you knew it there were more than 300 individuals in the campground for the rally.  We occupied an area at the end of the road that we quickly nicknamed "The Sac" and what a Sac it was.  There were literally scores of kids running to and fro, bikes and scooters and Barbie jeeps, batons and balls and nerf guns...it was a total blast.  We had a huge pot luck and birthday party out there and there were literally 5 or 6 long tables covered with foods of all kinds.  It was a blast and that was before the rally even began!

The rally itself was also a blast.  We started with a field trip to legoland...that was awesome.  Then there were the rally activities like awards, seminars, raffles, etc.  It all culminated in a dance that, although I'm sure it was a blast, we were unable to attend.  Stephanie came down with something nasty and then the rest of the family began to get it.  The joys of being back with people ;)

In the end, I think the two biggest highlights for me were watching the kids make friends and really just have tons of time to play, and meeting some other crazy adults who are willing to get out there and try this adventure with kids in tow.  As you might expect, we don't all solve our problems the same way. But we do all experience all the same problems...which is pretty comforting for me at least.  We now have a real support group...friends we can call if things aren't quite right...and people to plan adventures with further down the road.

After we wrapped up, we ran off to Orlando to empty the house and get it rented.  We spent about a week running back and forth between our campground and the house.  We moved truckloads of stuff to the storage unit, and cleaned up a few details at the house.  Once we had it ready to roll, we handed the keys off to our agent and they had someone in the house in 2 days...what a relief to get that off our todo list!

While we were in town we wanted to get some other things out of the way.  We changed our address to the new forwarding service, we switched our insurance to "full timers" coverage, and I had a dentist visit.  That was my downfall...2 root canals and 2 crowns...another 8 weeks in FL to get all the work done.  That was definitely not in the plan...but we worked it out.  I definitely feel better now and we got to hang in the Orlando area with some of our new friends.  

Finally we've got all of our Orlando stuff wrapped up and we are preparing to get back on the road.  The 15th is day zero of our next adventure...heading to the northeast...should be an interesting experience!

I'll try to get back on schedule with these posts.  I'll shoot for 1 per week and we'll see if I can keep up!

Thanks for checking in!