So... we had planned to move back to UT and sell the motor home. However, what we plan doesn't always happen.

The RV didn't sell...​

Back in September I took the bus back to CA to sell the RV. My car was waiting for me. I did a really good deep clean on the RV and fixed a few things in preparation. Well short story – I found a buyer at an incredibly low price, they gave me $500 down as a deposit and then I needed to get it to pass smog, which took me a few days to get that to happen. Once I had the smog certification in hand, I called them up and set up an appointment for the following day to have them come pick it up and finalize the sale. That was the last time I heard from them. I called and texted a lot and got no response, I waited as long as I could before the campground kicked me out, and even slept in my car two nights just to give them some extra time to contact me. So Mary… if you read this, I’d love to find out what really happened. It feels weird to have had them just disappear, but what can I do?

Goodbye Little Honda

I put the RV into storage and went to UT for a few months – and then it was time to move back in. Having two cars with the RV was nuts – we had to go back and forth to get the other vehicle every move which didn't make sense for a family on the road.  So we sold my Honda Civic car and have the family van.

Getting back to California...​

We were left with a dilemma – everything we had except a few small dishes I used as a bachelor pad in the RV while I was "selling" it had been packed into a moving truck and hauled off to UT. We needed to get at least our bedding and some essentials back to CA to live in the RV. We had several options to do so:

• Rent a moving truck again: $600+ (rental, gas, etc) and drive down two vehicles.
• Get a trailer hitch for the minivan and pull a small trailer. Tamsyn's dad said he had a trailer hitch that would fit a Dodge van and we thought this would be a good option.
• Pack very lightly and just buy everything we need again

Or... there was one other option...

We are pretty tight on money right now, so we ended up just going hill-billy style and tied stuff on the roof. We borrowed a roof storage box for the roof from Tamsyn's parents, and a canvass carry bag from Michael's parents. Plus we tied two plastic totes on the roof. It looked quite crazy and was just missing the rocking chair on top.  We were quite a sight!

Thousand Trails Cabin​

We get a free cabin week each year with Thousand Trails, so we used that while we moved into the RV (plus it would expire)

Anyway, check out the quick video showing the roof rig. And a quick tour of the cabin. (It was filmed at night when we arrived so it's dark, it doesn't really do it justice.)

I had this wonderful idea of doing 100 blog posts.  I did fairly well.  It was hard to do daily posts, but I did it!  But then, I did something very typical of me, and I misplaced my camera.  Yeah, you get blurry phone pictures for this post.  At the same time, other events came into play and our family has decided to sell our RV, move to Utah for a few family events, and then purchase a different RV that will better meet our needs.  So much for 100 days of camping!  I was going to go back and edit all of those posts, but I'll leave them up as a reminder of a good idea.  And to remember how awesome Thousand Trails' promotion is this summer.  Look up the hashtag #100daysofcamping on facebook and you'll find a lot of awesome pictures submitted by other TT members.

So here's our update.  In the picture above (I'll share again below so you can see the whole thing), you will see the old fashioned RV similar to what some of Michael's ancestors used to travel to Utah.  The painting was created for a Pioneer Day celebration at our stake center.

You may also notice that some of us are kinda, well, bald.  That's because we shaved our heads.

We discovered that we had an infestation of lice.  This has absolutely nothing to do with living in an RV, our hygiene routine, or anything of that nature.  Lice don't care if you're rich or poor, bond or free, male or female.  They just care if you have hair and a warm head.  Shaving was rather melodramatic, yet it was completely effective, and with everything going in our life right now, I really didn't want to spend a lot of time, well, nit-picking.  (You know where that term comes from, right?).  Plus, I read this post a couple of years ago, and I somehow got it in my head that shaving was a smart solution.  At least for the boys.

After spending some 15 minutes picking eggs off Peter's head, he was happy to have his head shaved and have it done with.  Patrick didn't want to shave at first, but after we discussed with him the reasoning, he agreed.  After watching her brothers, Helen was in tears when we told her that we didn't think having a girl shave her head was the same as a boy and that we could treat the lice with a hair straightener, a lice comb, and some chemical treatments.  She was very upset.  And since she did have lice after all, why not?  And after Michael tried to find lice on my head and completely failed to find anything, with all due respect to my husbands other amazing skills, I lacked faith in his ability to properly pick them out.  Plus, he doesn't have time.  I don't have time.  And I don't spend that much time in public anyway, and that's what hats are for.  So with my daughter having a bald head as well a my sons, I shaved my head too.

I'm not really sorry either.  I hated my hair.  Well, I thought I hated my hair, I really hated the lice.  But even now that I've realized the difference, it doesn't change how I feel about my head.  Those pesky pests are gone now, and I'm happier with my head.  Plus it's so hot right now, it feels rather nice.  That, and we're about ready to move in with my in-laws for a spell, and I didn't want them to have to worry about their heads.

So yeah, there's our update.  We're moving to Utah and we shaved our heads.  Nothing much.