Follow us on our FREEDOM journey in our RV, Ruff Road, with our dogs! We like looking at freedom!
We shared how we recently went through Ruff Road evaluating our space, purging and reorganizing. https://ruffroadrvlife.com/together-again-and-one-year-purge-a-versary/
Follow the link below to our You Tube channel, Ruff Road RV Life, to hear what we did to purge and reorganize our RV.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jMJF0T7fsbU
Month eight of RV living has brought out the creativity, especially in Gary. What about me? Well as our RV becomes overrun with backpacking gear and Appalachian Trail prep, I couldn’t take it anymore. Things that have not been used just had to go and our RV, Ruff Road, was in need of some better organizing.
As you may know, Gary is a musician and a very talented one at that. He plays the guitar, bass guitar, and piano. No we don’t have a piano in Ruff Road but we do have multiple guitars. Comment below if you need or if you have guitar storage ideas!
Creativity! This month he has been busy writing lyrics and music to songs. We needed a theme song for our very young YOU TUBE channel. He has now cranked out three songs and the instrumentals will be used for background music on our channel. No music copywright issues here!
We will be posting more on our YOU TUBE channel. Right now, we have a couple dog videos up just as a test plus one campground review. The dog videos are short and funny. Our YOU TUBE channel is RUFF ROAD RV LIFE, https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHRpIFHJItKn3X_7DKY77Mw?view_as=subscriber
Having the freedom to be creative through music, writing, singing, and photography has been a bonus of retirement. We are loving having the time to use our right brains to create.
This month’s challenges were an overstuffed clothes closet, clutter due excess gear clutter on top of the regular clutter and an ineffective dirty clothes receptacle. They say if you haven’t used it in a year, it has to go. I think in a small space like an RV you need to assess the clutter more frequently.
Gary had already gone through his closet and made a donation pile. He was ahead of me. I faced my clothes closet- it contained the remnants of my walk in closet from my big house life. It seemed I was always cramming, and I do mean cramming, my clothes in any nook or cranny I could fit them in because my cute little organizational square clothes totes and other containers were overfilled. In addition, unstuffed items would fall out when I opened the door. Now I probably wouldn’t have jumped right into this project just yet but in addition to this I now have backpacking gear taking up space. This caused me to re-evaluate the other items, especially items that seemed ineffective, unnecessary or unused.
I took everything out of my closet. Next, I went through each clothes container and pulled out items I haven’t worn or wasn’t planning on wearing. I did accumulate a small pile to donate along with some of the baskets and an old drawer I was using for storage containers. They were not the best use of space. So not only were there too many clothes stuffed in my closet but I did not utilize the space effectively. In the small space of an RV, optimizing space is a must!
Organizing Tip: Make a diagram of your closet. This will help to quickly see where infrequently used items are stored.
Next, I looked around my bedroom and the items taking up floor space. I had tried a tall Thirty-One double hamper for awhile. It came from the big house but was too big so I gifted it to my daughter. I then tried a smaller Thirty-One tote I had on hand as a hamper. It wasn’t working out either because of the location being hard to reach. I discovered that it was a perfect fit for my closet. This tote became the holder of my bike shoes and equipment getting them off the floor and out of yet another tote they were housed in. Now I had the most effective storage in my closet to hold all of my clothes except underwear and work out clothes which are stored above the bed. As a result of reorganizing this area, we gained some much needed floor space in our bedroom.
What about our laundry though? We now store our dirty clothes in store recycle bags. Gary has one in his area. I have one hanging up on my purse hook. We have a third one stored in the shower for any nasty laundry. This is a new system so we’ll let you know how it works out. So far so good.
Let us know if you have any laundry solutions. Share on social media and subscribe to follow us on our journey.
Follow Sharon’s Appalachian Trail prep and hike on our Backpacking and Hiking page: http://ruffroadrvlife.com/appalachian-trail-section-hike/
Ruff Road RV Life in month seven has been busy. This month was dedicated to clearing out brush and trees, fixing our fence, and final to dos so our home can be appraised and sold. In addition to all of this busy and physical work, we have both made sure that all doctor and dental visits are up to date, including Terra and Luna’s shots. Finally, Appalachian Trail prep has taken over Ruff Road making it seem just a little smaller.
Our home sits on approximately one acre. We have lots of trees and lots of tree saplings. I love the natural look so our back yard was like a forest with ferns, trees, saplings, cabbage palms, and all sorts of brush but beautiful in their own right. In preparing for a good appraisal and to have our fence repaired, the forest had to be thinned. It was a fun family effort with my daughter and her family. Bonus- Campfire every day! It was like camping in our own backyard. Our downsizing to sell list is now done! Well, except for the most time consuming scanning and copying of pictures and home videos.
It looks like February and March are our annual medical, dental, and veterinary appointment months. We wanted to make sure we were all up to date since take off time is quickly approaching. Our goal is to head west in August!
I continue to plan for my upcoming and final section hike of the Appalachian Trail. This will be my longest section hike which really comprises three sections. When I am finished this year, I will have walked every mile of the Appalachian Trail! Read about my progress on our Backpacking and Hiking page.
Stay tuned for more RV living updates. Share this on social media and subscribe to see more updates. Happy hiking, happy camping and happy fishing!
This is our first holiday in Ruff Road. It was almost one year ago that this dream began. My Facebook timehop popped up with One Year Ago today…my friend and I were taking pictures of RVs at a local dealership. This time last year, we had no idea we would be “looking at freedom” everyday. So here are our tweaks, tips, and trials at Month 5, as well as some general observations.
We are just days away from our first full time RV Christmas. The tree is up. The lights are hung. We are warm and cozy and happy. Peace to everyone.
Have a well thought out plan to transition into your new home.
Take stock of your needs, not your wants. For example, Gary wanted a full set of pots and pans, but we didn’t need a full set. I may have wanted to take family photo albums, but I didn’t need to take family photo albums.
That being said, be ok with parting with your “stuff”. Replace “stuff” with experiences.
Your wants and needs will change as you move from sticks and bricks to woods, water, and adventure.
Know your space. Diagraming every storage area helped us to know our RV.
Use a camping towel to mop up a lot of water. It will be dry the next day. I picked up two more at the dollar store. We had an issue with our residential refrigerator and had to manually defrost it every ten days. This super absorbent, quick drying towel was a life saver making quick work of the puddles of water or any other messes we made.
The thing that is a big deal today will not be a big deal in seven days and it will be a lesser deal in 30 days, a year from now.
It’s ok to take a zero day. A zero day in the hiking world is a day that no miles are hiked. A zero day to do nothing. It’s ok. Just do it sparingly.
Gary is amazed that I was able to get all of our “stuff” in here.
I am amazed at how comfortable I am living in an RV. I love cooking on the gas stove, sleeping in our cozy bedroom, and even cleaning- it’s quick!
We had to switch out our Pet Mate plastic dog crates we bought for the RV and use the house American Kennel Club wire crates. Our girls were just getting too big for ones we bought for the RV even though they were large. The wire crates have more room, more air circulation, and a lower profile. We put them on rugs to protect the floor. They have adapted well and it’s nice to have them right here with us. Poodle Phoebe is ok as long as daddy is near. She’s easy.
I have heard some say you need to get rid of your hobby items. This may contradict my wants and needs advice but in my opinion we need hobbies. I have waited years to retire so I can fully enjoy my hobbies. Storage is an issue though. In one month, I was struggling with this problem. Gary is a musician so he has guitars and amplifiers. We both love kayaking. I love hiking, biking, art, photography, crafts, and want to start sewing again. So you see my problem! That’s a lot of equipment, supplies. At one month, I’m still working on this one.
My advice- Just get rid of it. I ended up doing that with so many things anyway. The yard sale helped me to see what both families had to get rid of but I would not do it again. The work involved vs the return was not worth it. Donate and get a tax deduction. When it’s done though, it feels AMAZING!
Share your beginning experiences or any questions that you have about RV Life. Comment and share below.
Picture this: A family of five moves into a house that is already full from 34 years of wonderful living with children, grandchildren, and grandparents. They bring with them an entire UHaul truck full of their household belongings, including furniture. All unwanted items from two households are stacked in boxes by the French doors in the dining room and spill out onto the large porch. If you can picture a maze to get into the house, you got it! ALL of these boxed up and unwanted items must make it to the yard sale tables ready for eager buyers to descend and purchase these treasures! I’m not sure this paints a picture of the massive amount of treasures we had to sell, but I hope you get the idea. We were overwhelmed by the “stuff”.
I’ll be honest. I’ve had a couple of yard sales years ago and didn’t make enough money to feel it was worth my time. We live off of the main road so visibility is one issue. We live on the quiet side of town and not much traffic here is another issue. Finally, we live in a neighborhood of working middle class folks, not considered high end which I know many yard salers avoid. I was hopeful because this time, we had more than ever and some really nice things. I know that we didn’t have the time to “present” items as we would have liked but they were grouped together in an organized way.
How’d we do? We had steady traffic on day one and a trickle of traffic on day two of the yard sale. We made some money and did get rid of some things. It was fun to see others excited about our treasures. But…there was ALOT left over. In fact, it looked like we hadn’t sold anything at all at the end of it.
Well, our clothes and shoes were so nice, barely used we were thinking, my daughter Michelle and I spent the next couple of weekends and hours and hours staging and photographing the clothes and shoes to sell on Facebook Marketplace. What did we learn from that? Just go ahead and donate and save yourself the time. We had to store these items. It’s Florida in August with rain everyday so we were combating moisture and mildew which decided the fate of many things that were ruined as a result.
So the next couple of weeks, I spent every day going out to the yard sale tables, taking the tarps off and sorting the items to be sold on EBAY or Facebook Marketplace, donate, trash, keep. I know what you are thinking! Didn’t we already do this? We did but consider this the final purge. Everyday the amount was less and less. Rain clouds would form and I’d retarp the area and wait for rain to clear or begin again the next day. Meanwhile, Gary made trip after trip to the dump and to donate to local charitable organizations.
I remember the day that the area had returned to its uncluttered state. That was a happy day! Inch by inch, anything is a cinch. Mile by mile, we’ll get there in awhile! We were making progress. We had purged our house of 34 years of “stuff”. We had purged our yard of the leftovers. We were living happily in our cozy little Ruff Road everyday. We were blessed to be Grandma/ Grandpa School Transportation to our grandchildren. We weren’t on the road yet, but we were happy. Life couldn’t be better!
We were making progress but there were still two sheds to deal with. The sheds were the next stop on our to do list. Inch by inch, this is getting done, too. Our goal was to be completely done by the end of the year and at this updated writing, we are almost there. The only things left to do at this point is sell off our EBAY/ Marketplace inventory or donate it and finish the scanning and digitizing of our photos and videos.
Even though I do not care for yard sales, I liked getting all of the “stuff” out of the house. Things that seemed so precious in the house lost their appeal on a yard sale table making it easier for me to say goodbye. We were able to move forward with the final clearing. It was freeing, just like when we purged the house. We felt lighter after the house and even lighter after the yard sale purge.
If Gary were doing this on his own, it would be a much quicker process. He’s not as sentimental or as much of an overthinker as I am. So if you are like him, you will get done in half the time or less than we did. However, if you are the least bit sentimental and tend to overthink things, then welcome to my club. I’m sharing because if I can let go and do it, you can too. Happy Purging!
If you have some yard sale reflections you would like to share, add them to the comments and share. 🙂
Here was the plan: My daughter, Michelle, and her family were moving back to Florida and planned to buy our house. We knew about when they were coming. My last day to work was June 30th. Then we get word that they would be here July 22nd. Yikes! That gave us about three weeks to downsize plan, box up and move into Ruff Road! Now I’ve watched many downsizing videos, but none of them started with the amount of stuff that we’ve accumulated after six children, several grandchildren, parents passing, and 34 years! We are not hoarders by no means but we did have…stuff! Lots of it!
Here is my system for purging which I affectionately call the 3 Step Purge System for Over Thinkers. It is a multi-step process which probably goes against what the experts would say, but it worked for me. Let’s start with clothes. I worked in the professional world and had a walk in closet full of professional clothes, which will no longer be required in my retirement life.
Step 1: I ask myself: Do I love it? Yes or no? If NO-Box up to donate. If YES- Then it was hung up to keep. Of course, there is not much room in an RV so I knew that there would be a second purging.
Step 2: After a day or two, I returned to my YES clothes and I repeated the process. Do I love it? I found that I was able to let go of a little more this second round. It became easier.
Step 3: This was the final round. Do I love it? Yes or no? To my surprise I was able to let go of a few more. I did add favorites to a box for my family. Even though I counted this my final round, as I packed to take my clothes out to Ruff Road, I purged even more.
Bottom line: My clothes fit into the space I planned for them. I still have variety in my wardrobe. My purging system worked for me. Some may be able to do this in one round or even two. This worked for me. For the overthinkers of the world, the three step purge system is recommended.
Our home had four bedrooms, three bathrooms, kitchen, laundry room, dining room, living room, and two porches. Our brother in law was staying with us when this grand purge began so that was one room that he took care of, thankfully. How do you take all of the items, the books, the paintings, the décor, the STUFF and make a plan?
My plan started with sorting. I began to gather all like items in the living room. All of the children’s books go here. All of the photography equipment goes there. All of the fishing décor goes over there. Everything in the house was sorted, which began emptying out rooms. Of course, during this sorting process I was also following my PURGING process. We began posting items that we could sell on Facebook Marketplace. One half of our living room became our selling warehouse. That worked out well and one by one many items were sold. The rest was boxed for a giant yard sale. Anything we wanted to keep with us was considered carefully, space is a premium in an RV. Keepers were boxed up to be taken to Ruff Road.
So one of the bedrooms had become a scanning station for photos. We took down all picture frames and removed the pictures as part of our sorting process. All boxes of photos and photo albums were sent to this room and there is ALOT! I fancy myself an amateur photographer so just add that to the many family pics. I stood in that room for four days, morning to late at night, scanning and there are still boxes and tubs left to do. I finally had to just stop so I could get the sorting and purging done.
When downsizing, scanning your photos and digitizing your home movies are the two most time consuming things you will do. There is no fast way to do this unless you pay to have it done. That wasn’t an option for me. Later on, after the move, I ordered an Elgato to digitize the home movies we had on hand. I am sentimental and I love seeing my parents and brother again in the movies. It’s always fun to see the kids when they were little. If any of you have suggestions on how to get all of this done quicker, please comment and share!
Each day I had a TO DO list to keep us on track. We’d follow the list, adjusting as needed. I used a regular spiral notebook to keep my list in. I’d designate if it was Gary or me, cross off completed items and carry over what didn’t get done. We had a general timeline of what we wanted done by when so that’s how we prioritized the list. This was essential to us being ready to leave our house July 22nd. Anyone downsizing or planning a move, it is amazing what you can get done when you plan it out on paper and look at it every day.
Why yes, we did- well the majority! We spent our first full time night in Ruff Road, with pups, the night of July 22nd. We handed our house over to our daughter that night and haven’t looked back. We had sorted, boxed, donated and purged. We only had a few items left in the office, and closet shelves that I weeded out the following weeks. We had moved all of the things we were keeping into Ruff Road. This took several hauls and I organized and put it away each trip to make room for the next haul. Honestly, I am amazed at what we put in here and I was able to put it away neatly.
Ah, so now we could sit back, sip our coffee and relax in the comfort of our new home. We still had some selling to do and sheds to work on, but the biggest job was done.
Downsizing is what it’s cracked up to be. It is freeing to rid yourself of “stuff”. This realization began as I had to go in and clean out my mom’s house after she passed. She, like many who grew up during the depression years, kept everything. She lived with me her last few years but didn’t want us to do anything with her “stuff”. I discovered that all of that “stuff” had deteriorated, molded, it was of no value to anyone. And then, I felt the overwhelming burden of all of this stuff. It opened my eyes that at the end of the day, our stuff will not stay new, will get eaten and chewed on by bugs, will fade, will deteriorate. It weighs us down. You feel lighter inside with each letting go. Have any of you gone through a downsizing process? What system worked for you? Comment and share. 🙂