Departure Eve

Friday, December 29, 2017

Newdle eating a wormIt was another cold morning, 29, but another sunny day. We worked all day finishing up business for the LOLs, paying their bills, etc. Max also took the worms to Newdul and had a short visit with Aunt Jean. Newdul loves his worms. Otherwise we loaded freezer and refrigerator – love our new residential refrigerator. However, it takes a while to move everything because now we can just move our items from the house to FRED without having to repackage or determine what is going to be left home. We do have to make decisions on the freezer but it is so much larger and we generally fill it up since we keep a full freezer at home. Still need to hem a pair of jeans and get some sleep. We start another adventure tomorrow. Please pray for our safety. The forecast is still changing and quite different depending on where you check. Praying for NO SNOW OR ICE on Sunday! Check on your neighbors and family during these next few days. Its going to be dangerously cold.

Getting Closer

Thursday, December 28, 2017

Do y’all get tired of us talking about the weather? We start out with that because it is the first thing we check in the mornings because it effects what we will do for the day. This morning was 30 degrees, not too cold but still below freezing. However, it didn’t seem quite so cold this morning because we had bright sunshine. Love it!!

Preparing new travelling companions
Preparing our new traveling companions

We did some more work around the house this morning. We pulled some additional food items from the pantry to move to FRED. We also re-potted some of our succulents to get them ready for the trip south. Some we will have to leave for Juno to oversee for a few weeks.

Max's new attachment
Max’s new attachment

Soon we had to get ready to go to Cullman. Max had another doctor appointment to see what would be recommended for his hand that has been giving him trouble for a few months. We saw an ortho/sports medicine MD. He is an old friend from Anne’s days of practicing in Cullman and we really trust him. He looked at the hand with ultrasound and found that there is a torn ligament that has never completely healed. He also has arthritis in the joints of his thumb. There are a number of options some of which we have already tried. Worse case, he could require surgery but we certainly want to avoid that. For starters, Max decided to use a splint and/or wraps. It’s not like he can totally stop using his right hand but he needs to limit the movement of the thumb. We will see how this goes for a few weeks and then consider other options if needed. Prayers appreciated. We also made a Walmart run, stopped at the Court House to take care of some business there, the medical supply store to pick up the splint, and to check on Helen and Juno. Since Anne hasn’t been feeling very well it seemed like a long day. Anyway, back home for dinner and relax. Thanks for checking in. Hopefully things will be more interesting in a few days when we are really “RVing With a Purpose”

Getting Ready to Head South

Wednesday, December 27, 2017

Today was another mostly gray day. So much for the sun of yesterday. Our high today was 38 with cold north wind. It’s only 8:00pm now and WeatherBug says its already 30 with a wind chill of 23. We have had lows at or below freezing for four days and the forecast is for that to continue for the next 10 days. That is really unusual for this part of Alabama. Now I know we aren’t cold as compared to Wisconsin and Minnesota, but we are not accustomed to prolonged below freezing temperatures. It is not expected get above freezing from Sunday until Tuesday. We need to find warmer weather.

Staging area for loading outToday we worked on packing out FRED. Yes, we are going south! We use the guest bedroom bed as a staging area for all the stuff that needs to be loaded. We started today, of course, with our exercise, then multiple loads of laundry. Before long the staging area was full and we started making trips to FRED. We got in a lot of steps today. We haven’t decided when we are heading south. We had planned to leave January 1, but are watching the forecast. We may leave sooner. They keep throwing out that “S word” that is not a nice word around here. We have had snow once this winter and that is enough.

Max also took time today to clean the gutters. So many trees, which we love. But they make for so many leaves. This time of year, every year, we know we need to get some of the trees taken down. Some have gotten too large and too close to the house. Anyone know of someone in the area that does a good job with that?

That’s about it around here today. Praying for our northern friends during this dangerous cold weather. Also, we would as you to remember our friend’s son who deployed yesterday with the Air Force.

Back To Pine Mountain

Tuesday, December 26, 2017

Another cold morning today but the sun was bright. It was 31 by our thermometer in Tuscaloosa. We were up at 6:00 so we could pack up the remaining items on the counters. There really wasn’t much to do since we had only been gone 2 days, but there are always some last minute items and the checklist is the same whether out 2 days or 2 months. We just seem to get more stuff out the longer we stay in one place. We were on the road back to Pine Mountain by way of Birmingham at 7:15. We didn’t want to leave any earlier because we wanted to avoid morning traffic in Birmingham. Traffic was very light in Tuscaloosa, I-59 and in Birmingham. One of the easiest Tuscaloosa drives we have had in a long time.

After getting FRED parked, leveled and secure, we had an excellent ham and cheese omelet. We came home early because Max had a doctor appointment this afternoon. We were stopped at a red light en route and looked across the way and saw a large black SUV with a white and red tag on the front reading “COVERT”. We both read the tag, thought for a moment, looked at each other and just started laughing. We didn’t see the side of the car but wondered if there was a sign stating “invisible.” We both agreed that our nephew would have gotten a good chuckle out of that tag.

Before the appointment we went by Aunt Jean’s to inventory her supplies and visit a little. She has a cough again. They are giving her some of her previous cough syrup and hopefully that will help. Jean was low on lots of supplies so we did all the shopping so she would have a good supply before we leave. Unfortunately, we couldn’t find any red worms for Newdle. We went to the fourth store before getting the worms. There are now in our refrigerator and we will take them back to Trussville before we leave. Oh well, Newdle is worth it. BTW, we bought two cartons of worms this time. Anyway, no problems for Max at the dentist, we stopped to visit with Max’s Mom and Aunt Helen and then it was home for a very late lunch. Guess it was probably “lupper”. Got a lot done today. Tomorrow we will be working to load out FRED. The current weather predictions look nasty for next Monday, our planned travel day. We have decided we may head a little further south a day or two early. We have no intentions of driving FRED in icy conditions. Still several days for the forecast to change. Guess we will be watching the weather like we did when Max was still working. Hope everyone enjoys this “short” week. Sure did enjoy our family time this year.