Sunday, August 29, 2010

trash can and more purging

the boys and i went thrift shopping this week. my big score was this trash can holder thingy for $10. 1 less plastic thing we will need in the bus!


i've had this stuff boxed up for one of steven's co-workers that had a baby a month ago for like 4 months. hopefully, he will actually give it to them now that the boxes are blocking him from opening the door.

here's our pile of stuff we are getting of so far. i think we are going to have a yard sale. i'm unsure. on one hand, we might get a little bus money. on the other, we have to keep this crap in the house until it's all collected.

almost starting!

busy weekend!

on saturday, steven started taking out the front driver's side heater. it was GROSS. filled with dead mice skeletons. ew. we took a break after a while because it was stinky. steven wanted to come back this morning by himself with a face mask.


while he was getting the heater started, i painted the doghouse with rust converter.

afterward, we went to get a drill, a pressure washer and a couple other tools.

we also went to the aquatic center in havasu and to late lunch at black bear diner for my birthday :D (steven got me a shiatsu massaging pillow and a bottle of disaronno. thank you!)


today, we dropped steven off and i took the boys to get some paint and to play at the park. when we got back, steven had finished taking the heater out and cleaned up a bit.

we started pressure washing the inside. it's made a HUGE difference. finally, an end to the filth is in sight.


i painted the doghouse blue. nicholas REALLY wanted it purple. i'm going to take that little can of red that i used to paint the wringer and dump it in for the next coat.

steven started pressure washing the underside of the bus. noah helped.

i cleaned off/organized our work bench/future kitchen.

all clean!
getting there!
steven ground down a few screws that were poking up quick before we left.

Sunday, August 22, 2010

dog house

we went over to the bus this morning. first time all week. it's been SO HOT. today was overcast so we went over.

steven took off the dog house. the underside of it is a little rusty but not too bad.


we also took off the front heater behind the door. more anti-freeze. ick.



i vacuumed out underneath when he pulled it up. there were a million candy wrappers from the 70s. mmmm peppermint jellybeans :P

it was really humid so we didn't stay too long. we were just going to go home but nicholas asked to go to the splash pad.

Saturday, August 21, 2010

beginning the purge

i was doing some living in the bus daydreaming while looking at some living-on-the-road blogs when i came across this post.

i've been trying to keep getting rid of stuff in the back of my mind on purpose because it's overwhelming. we have a lot of stuff. a. lot. of. stuff.

but reading that got me to face the fact that we aren't going to be able to bring a house's worth of stuff onto a school bus. most of which i don't even want anyway.

you know when you move and you get to the last couple hours of packing and there are little odds and ends everywhere? you are SO done with organizing so you just throw it in a box and forget about it. we have a lot of that. we've moved 5 times since i got pregnant with nicholas. with approx. 2 odds and ends buckets per move.... that's a lot of junk we don't want.

and with having small kids, people are constantly giving us stuff. we had to limit the grandparents to 1 gift per kid because one christmas there was so much that it literally didn't all fit in the car to come home. they have more clothes than will fit in their drawers.

so it's time.

time to shed the unwanted, unneeded, unnecessary STUFF.

our (my) goal is to get rid of 60% of our stuff.

we started last night by going through the blankets and sheets. we went through the linen closet, and 1 tub of baby blankets. we got rid of 1 bags of garbage, and 2 bags for donation. we kept 1 tub full, 1 small zipper bag of sheets and 2 blankets. (not counting the ones on the bed already.)

the clear bin wasn't gone through because they are heirloom quilts that steven's old tyme relatives made. the space heater is on the top shelf.

today, we started in the garage.

yikes. that's where the majority of our stuff it. it was so bad that you literally couldn't walk in there without standing on something.

it's a start.

we went through 7 tubs/boxes. most of them were half full. i scooped stuff up off the floor and threw it in them to fill them up.

this is what is left after throwing stuff in the trash, donating and putting stuff away that should have been put away when we moved in.


a sampling of stuff we got rid of:

Tuesday, August 17, 2010

noah's first haircut

steven got the driver's seat out with the grinder on sunday. he also ground off the rest of the conduit. i got off 4 of them with the pry bar. i wish i would have thought to use the grinder earlier!

side project: i made myself some safety goggles. i used this tute and some lenses from an old pair of glasses. steven wasn't nearly as excited about them as i am.

oh, and noah got his first haircut.

Saturday, August 14, 2010

bye, bye, heater.

the big project today was to take the rear heater out. the actual removal was easy enough. steven used the prybar and popped the heater off the floor. we moved the heater to the middle of the bus so the hoses were slack.

then we went to the engine and shut off the valves.

back inside, steven cut one hose over a bucket and i lifted it so the anti-freeze would pour in. then he cut the other hose and i lifted that hose. then steven lifted the heater to the ceiling and i jiggles the hoses so all the coolant would pour in the bucket. he took the heater right out to his truck to put it in the dumpster at his work.

the other end of the hoses are clamped up so we can deal with them tomorrow.

i'm refinishing the cabinet that was in there. i'm going to put the sink and stove top in it, i think.

Monday, August 9, 2010

a little progress

today as we pulled up to steven's grandparent's house, his dad was just finishing up cutting their lawn. nicholas loves playing with his grandpa. the boys got to play with him while i worked today.

steven was just getting there to pick up trash when we got there too. he and his dad looked at the engine a little to see if they could figure out why he couldn't get it started yesterday. turns out there were a bunch of loose wires and we need a new battery. we needed to get a new battery anyhow because that one is out of steven's car so it's not a purchase we weren't expecting.

i got a little done inside. i took off the corner angle thingy along the door side floor, which came up way easier than i anticipated. i also got the conduit rail off the top door side. i also washed the floor a little.

nothing big, but still progress :)

Sunday, August 8, 2010

almost doner!

i thought we were going to get to wash the bus out today but we didn't get quite that far.

we did get a lot done though.

we got the old electrical conduit off, the casing for the rear heater hoses, more rubber flooring, sorted reusable stuff and garbage, vacuumed more, and cleaned up all the little this and thats that were all over the floor.

i found a scorpion shell. i'd never seen one before so that was cool.



noah got FILTHY. haha

Saturday, August 7, 2010

registration pt. 2

so today while we were taking apart the kitchen, i saw a piece of paper laying on the floor after a pulled up a board. i picked it up and

IT WAS THE TITLE!!

so random! so exciting!

now we don't have to try to find the owner before the guy who sold it to us. woot!

we still have to get the official bill of sale form filled out but that's not a big deal.

almost done with the deconstruction phase!



woohoo! we got a TON done today.

we took the couch to the dump finally (and had to pay $10 for them to take it. grr). on the way back, as we were going around a curve a huge piece of steel flew off the bottom step. it looked like it was cut to fit over the rusty step. the rust on the bottom step is so bad you cant even step on it. i had to drive back in the van to get the piece that flew off. it was stinking heavy!

we also got the rest of the kitchen taken apart, the shower up, the toilet out, the box over the wheel well up, and more rubber flooring up. we have very little left to do inside. i'm hoping to get to spray it out with a hose soon.

i put a bucket of water up near the drivers seat and the boys played in it the whole time. tomorrow i'm going to bring a big tub. they really liked it.

steven show nicholas how to turn the air breaks on and off. he was excited about getting to pull the lever.

afterward, we went to the (fixed!) splash pad. we got them a couple supersoakers and they LOVED them. we had to go back to the store and get another set because steven and i liked them too :P

while steven ran in to get the 2nd set of supersoakers, i drove around the building with the boys. in the back, they had a bunch of pallets laying out and had an idea. i'm thinking about asking our neighbor (the front end manager at walmart) if they reuse the pallets. if they don't i'm going to see what i can do about reusing them as flooring in the bus. i THINK i saw someone else do that with old pallets. we'll just need to find someone with a planer that we can use. (MAYBE steven's grandpa has one. he does a lot of woodworking.) i'm hoping it works out.

it's been a great day!!

Friday, August 6, 2010

laundry score!

i've been thinking about laundry.

i saw a picture somewhere of someone that had a james washer on a drawer on the side of their rv. genius!

but $650? no, thanks.

so i decided that i want to build a james-style washer. i've seen ones that other people have built, no reason i can't too.

but i can't build a wringer. $190? still more that i want to spend on the whole project. i could go the bucket wringer route for $35 but that seems like way more effort than i want to put into laundry.

so i checked craigslist and found one for $25! woot! i called the guy right away and picked it up this afternoon. there is a little rust on the handle but nothing i can't fix. the rollers are somewhat discolored but in good condition.

team work!

Thursday, August 5, 2010

taking off until saturday.

we went over for a little while yesterday.

i got the cabinet across from the kitchen taken off and some of the rubber flooring from under the couch.

i also tried to take off 2 of the conduit rails along the roof. some of the screws were too rust for me to get off but i was able to see behind them. i think i'm going to take them off entirely and use actual conduit for the wires that we still need. a lot of them are for the small recessed lights that i'm going to take out anyway.

it's soooo hot this week. over 112 everyday. saturday is supposed to be 108 so we will go back then. saturday will also be good because steven can go with us. steven's grandma can't handle the boys even for a few minutes. haha

Tuesday, August 3, 2010

tools!

we didn't work on the bus yesterday but we did buy some new tools.

we got some wrenches, replacement ratchet pieces from the set we already have, hammer, googles, a screwdriver, sander, gloves, a bucket w/ toolbag thingy, a sander, extra sander pads and a grinder.
the grand total was $206. not too bad.

the grinder was 50% off because it was the display for last year's model. $50 instead of $100. awesome!
the sander is this guy. it should be good for all the grooves and bumps on the outside of the bus.
(remind me to buy tools on amazon from now on. the sander was half the price!)

Sunday, August 1, 2010

broken splashpad :(

didn't get much done today.

nicholas and noah looooove the splash pad and daddy doesn't get to take them often so he was going to take them over while i got to work uninterrupted for a while. the splash pad was broken though so they played at the park until they ran out of drinks. they were only gone for about a half hour so today's progress was minimal.

i got the kitchen counter and some of it's support beams off, vacuumed more, and popped almost all of the second rail off.

i started on the steps too. they are in rough shape. i needed a ratchet to get the rusted screws out. under the rubber is BAD. the middle step had a huge rusted out hole in it. we are going to have to redo the steps entirely.

depending on what the underside of the floor looks like, we might just have to re-panel the whole floor.

we were talking to steven's brother this afternoon and he was telling us about this stuff. apparently, you just paint it on and it turns the rust into magnetite. i'm not sure what magnetite is, but it's not rust and that's okay with me.