I was texting with one of our buds, Fel, the other day trying to coordinate the parking situation…and ended our convo with “really loving this vanlife – I don’t think I could ever go back living in a house.” This is our new normal, not so much new, but just normal!
It’s been a pretty amazing 4 months for sure. We spent the last couple weeks housesitting and while it was awesome to have a kitchen to cook in, a shower and a TV to binge watch law and order, I missed being in the van and sleeping in our van bed.
In 12 days I will be racing my first half Ironman! 1.2mi swim, 56mi bike and 13.1mi run. I’m feeling pretty strong and fit – my goal is to finish the race! I have 8.5 hours to do it! Can’t wait to get it done and take a break from training! We are heading to Hawaii a couple weeks after so not sure how much of a break i’ll take from training since I need to still fit in my bathing suits 🙂
My consulting business is doing well, have a few clients and it’s definitely keeping me busy. I have a demo interview tomorrow with a company I’ve been talking to for a bit – it would be a remote job (which is perfect and what I’m looking for) and the gig itself is pretty cool, working with clients on engagement, training, matching the right solutions, etc…hope it works out! I’ll keep consulting on the side and grow that over time.
Terence is finally home after being gone for 4 days. I played solo mom for the weekend and it was pretty easy (thankful my father-in-law took Teren for the weekend) other than driving the little misses around, can’t wait till she starts driving. Our friends, Sara and Andy, gave the thumbs up for us to park at their place, and of course I got the chance to cook dinner: poke bowls, beers and strawberry shortcake. I spent Sunday with a long training session, filled the van up with water and dumped all the tanks…and made it home in time to enjoy a cocktail. The only downside to managing the vanlife solo is when we use up the power during the day to charge our laptops and to run the air purifier and it turns out to be cloudy so our solar panels aren’t fully charge…the stuff that needs constant power, which is really one thing, our fridge, will start beeping to let us know it’s going to shut down soon if we don’t do something. That something usually requires us to turn the engine on for a bit to get everything recharged. Which isn’t a problem, except for when we are parked close to our hosts windows and neighbors doors, the engine could be heard, which again isn’t a problem but we are mindful of it especially when it happens at 4am. In the span of 3 hours, I had to turn the engine one a few times to get enough of a charge. Usually Terence does the waking up but he wasn’t here so it was all me. Boo.
If you are in the Seattle area and have a big enough driveway and street to park both VANessa and Zac, let us know! We’d love to be neighbors for a day or two! Plus I’m a pretty good cook and will treat our hosts with a 2-3 course dinner! We are also open to housesit for you too (we are booked all of July and August) so let us know!
I’m working on a couple of more blog posts but if there is something specific you want to know/learn about van living with kids or just curious about vanlife in general…let us know! We only have 4 months under our belts but feel like it’s been forever!
Ava, Andy and Sara! Endless bag of thank yous!
Kids playing outside, better than inside😎
Poke bowls. Yasss.
Really need to get Zac organized and our bike rack in order. I actually took this photo before handing over my keys to the valet at Snoqualmie – couldn’t bear to think I wouldn’t have any proof my bike was under the blanket…so I took one for safe measures…not sure it would have made a difference but it was for my peace of mind!
Weekday dinners are not as fancy but it works.
And when you are heading out the door for a doctors appointment but can’t find your shoes, slippers are the next best thing. We did find his shoes in Zac.
And finally, my office. Thank you Rimando fam for the driveway!