As soon as we got back from camping Memorial weekend, we were burning the candle at both ends preparing for our next trip! And by “preparing,” I mean doing the things that we couldn’t leave undone. Not packing. Not actually preparing. We weren’t prepared at all. It hit us like a dump truck full of compost.

Wait no, that’s actually the first step to my no-dig, no-weed garden!

On Saturday, the day we left town, we started our morning by having my family come over and help us create a garden. We started with a grassy yard and a pile of dirt, and 2.5 hours later we had a fully planted up garden. My brother, the mastermind behind the whole scheme, advised us on how to lay down cardboard then pile on rows of weed-free compost.

We shoveled dirt into wheelbarrows and turned it out into 6″ deep rows. Then as we were planting seeds, Atlas woke from a nap so my family planted most of it without me. That turned it into a surprise garden! They also helped add bug netting. Kyle had bought a garden hose timer, so we set that up and crossed our fingers that the garden wouldn’t die while we were away. Isn’t it beautiful!?

Then they all went to get cleaned up for an afternoon wedding. We stayed home and packed for a two week trip of epic proportions. I think it goes without saying, we did a terrible job. On our way to the wedding, I remembered at least six critical things that I’d forgotten, including the power cord to my laptop. We missed the wedding, but made it to the reception before anyone else, so we enjoyed the lovely day. Atlas finds grass distasteful, so he touches it as little as possible, which looks like this.

After the lovely reception, we headed to my brother’s house to spend the night. I was absolutely dead. This was way too many things in one day. Complete insanity.

The following day we hit the road for real. We were driving our ginormous truck, with a stiff suspension meant for hauling heavy loads. With no load, I-96 felt like washboard. We actually pulled off the freeway so I could do an internet search for “shaken baby syndrome.” It was that bad. Kyle talked me down off that ledge, and after we got off I-96 our trip went much more smoothly. Of course we had extra rest stops so the baby could burn off some energy.

Just one night at a hotel, and then following day we made it to Kyle’s dad and step-mom’s log cabin in North Carolina. We hadn’t seen the cabin in over two years, and they’ve made some amazing changes! One thing that stays the same: the porch is the best place to hang out.

The true purpose of our trip was to retrieve our new adventure vehicle, a 31′ travel trailer!

I’ll have to do a post with a tour of it later, because for these few days we were in full work mode, getting it ready to haul home. We had some issues with charging while hooked to the truck, and issues with running the fridge off the battery. However, with temps in the high 90s on our way home, there’s no chance we will be boondocking – we’ll need full power every night to run the AC!

Getting anything done with a baby around is much, much slower. But we swear we brought a different baby home than we left with – Atlas changed so much on this trip! Time spent watching him grow is time well spent!

In Michigan, we rarely see snakes. So it was a bit surprising when I walked out and saw this one! Living in SC has given me basic skills for identifying venomous species, and this one looked harmless, but I still let Ken know that it crawled right up into the wheel well of his motorhome. (It’s a harmless eastern kingsnake.)

All too soon, it was time to hit the road. We planned a very slow, comfortable trip home. Our first day was only two hours of travel time, which meant we had to leave early afternoon so we didn’t check in too early. We both felt the “pre-passage jitters” that we used to get from doing new things with the boat. Also when the one big thing you have to do is GO, it’s really hard to sit and wait for the clock. You just want to GO! We ended up leaving a little early, but everything worked out great. We made it to our first campground!

They put us in overflow parking. I wanted to get out and really document our first night of traveling in our new camper, maybe fly the drone for a full view of the RV park, but instead it was 95°F and I hid inside the camper until nearly dark. I had to at least get one photo, so I took the above pic and then I wandered down to the river for a quick shot. The bugs almost carried me away.

Our next day of travel was the one we expected to be the hardest, going through the mountains, plus it rained all day. Instead everything was fine, we even had dry weather for our travel stops. We arrived at a KOA, where we were mere feet away from our neighbors in a parking lot with no shade. The AC kept the trailer down to 85°F. It was HOT. We planned two nights there, the next day we only left the trailer to do a quick swim in the kiddie pool.

Our next travel day was the worst, we mis-timed a couple things and learned some lessons in planning. However, our travel days were planned to be short so that if things went wrong we had plenty of wiggle room, so even though I got a little grumpy, it all worked out fine. Everything so far has been going well, it’s just so hot. We were at a huge county park, with tons of things to do, but it was too hot to be outside. Bummer!

The next morning we packed up to leave and…there was a motorhome blocking the road. I wanted to give them the benefit of the doubt, maybe they arrived late and couldn’t see the trees well enough to back into their spot. I knocked on the door and the gentleman who answered looked very rough, he told me he arrived at 3am. He was at least very apologetic and moved out of our way. I’ve got to say, of all the problems I anticipated, this wasn’t one of them!

We arrived in Indiana, to spend some time around Kyle’s mom and her family. Kyle’s uncle has an RV spot with full hookups, so we were camping in style. We had absolutely gorgeous weather while we were there, we spent all the time we could outside to make up for the previous few days. Atlas also got to enjoy more pool time with Grammy!

As always, Kyle’s mom made us some amazing food while we were there, including these smoked “pig shots!”

The forecast threatened 97°F with a heat index well into the hundreds. We’d gotten our fill of hiding from hot weather, so although we wanted to stay longer, we decided to run north and away from the heat. We packed up, by now we’re old pros at retracting the slideout, hooking up to the truck, unchocking, etc. One last day of driving, one more rest area to play and picnic.

I was excited to see my garden again! It looked great, although our garden hose timer stopped working when the battery got low. The other flower beds had some surprises too, with more things in bloom. And best of all, strawberries were now in season! I drove to the local farm and picked a couple pounds while Atlas napped, then raced home before he woke up. All that effort and…he refuses to eat strawberries. More for me, I guess!

Our doe showed off her new fawn in our backyard.

It seemed like as soon as the weather turned nice, we left the state. We’re finally back, so we’re enjoying all the outdoor projects we’ve been putting off, like teaching Atlas to drive the VW bus.

Oh, I also flew the drone at a blueberry farm, which was really exciting. The farm has such a beautiful layout that it is really visually pleasing from an aerial view.

For the most part, we spent the last week of the month recovering from all that madness. We tried to take it easy on ourselves, but a thousand miles with a new camper and baby is no easy feat. We’ve also got a lot of projects to catch up on, like some house renovations, and now we have a camper to renovate as well! We’re expecting a much quieter July, but eventually we’re taking this camper and hitting the road!