#149 Nomad Diary. 26 August- 1 September 2023. Last Full Week in Alabama. Family Times. Gluten Free Mayo Biscuits. Baby Quilts. Nomad Notes: Do You Miss Home?
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| Folding Pad with a Small Pillow I Made From "You Are Loved" Henry Glass Fabric. Designed by my Friend Dawn Rosengren. |
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| My Sweet Friend Amy Reavis Made This Lunch to Serve to Her Church Work Group. We Were Guests, and Have Been Her Guest Many Times Here Since First Meeting in 2008! |
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| Owen Saying Hello to Dog Hank and Neighbor Jeff Saturday. 26. Today we stayed inside our house and worked on computers. I sewed on my last two quilt projects which are still in process. We did some grocery shopping. Dinner with Eric and Erin and a couple walks with Owen around his neighborhood. Sunday. 27. Today was a full day with friends. We begin with our morning routines: exercise, breakfast, coffee. We step outside our house and there is purse sitting on our porch. Hmmm? Darrell unzips it and looks inside, then zips it closed and puts it down. I take a picture and send to our airbnb host. We go on to church. I enjoyed meeting so many more people who are new to me as we are coming into the Bible class. After class and worship, we were invited to lunch with one of the work groups to the Reavis house. We’ve known the Reavis family since we moved to Madison in 2008. Their kids have grown up since then, and we have become grandparents. Lunch was really nice and especially the kindness to include us as we are visitors now. I enjoyed talking about our travels to people at our table and listening to their goings on too. Because our travel nomad life is so unusual there are usually some questions that people ask. Today the question that I remember was from Shirley who grew up here and all of her brothers and sisters still live here. She asked me if I miss home, or get tired of traveling and being away? I’m going to ponder this question with my answer in my Nomad Notes below. We stayed around after lunch and visited with Keith and Amy for a while. We talked about retirement and travel, and they talked about getting to travel more especially with Keith’s job now. Then we went to Eric and Erin’s to take a walk with Owen, hold Esther and have dinner together. A very nice day. |
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| Another Sewing Project from "You Are Loved" Fabrics. This One is Going to My Friend Sylvia Pollard in Maryland. Monday. 28. Morning routine. I go to my last stretch therapy appointment during our time here. I’ve enjoyed the sessions and hope to do some more when I’m back in the area next year. I went to the grocery and picked up a few more items. Back at our house, I put some food gifts for Eric and Erin into the freezer and they will go into their new freezer later today. I made some gluten free biscuits. Eric eats gluten free and I’ve been wanting a biscuit. So I remembered my mother’s favorite biscuit recipe from my teenage years and I made some pretty good biscuits. https://www.melissassouthernstylekitchen.com/mayonnaise-biscuits/ This recipe is really good. It uses less butter than my mom did. Mom melted a stick of butter in a 9x13 baking dish and then dipped and turned her cut biscuits in the butter just before baking. I went with the less butter version this time. |
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| My Craving for More Veggies is Satisfied with Cauliflower "Rice". Recipe from the Back of the Package. |
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| Samuel Came for Dinner at Eric's and to Visit His New Niece Esther. Tuesday. 29. 1pm online Bible class with English church. I cooked dinner at Eric and Erin’s and Samuel came over and visited and saw Esther, his niece for the first time. A beautiful sunset sky. Finished a baby quilt for Paige. Her mom Sylvia shared a book she wrote this year on getting through grief with faith. Quilt will go in the mail to Sylvia this week. Wednesday. 30. Finished my last baby quilt project. Return Erin’s sewing tools, and look to my packing for 8 months in a suitcase and a backpack!! Evening Bible class. I cry some in anticipation of leaving on Tuesday. Leaving our grandbabies, and children. Not wanting to stay in grief or miss out on my enjoyment for today, I think about my gratitude and all that I have right now. I am full, content, pleased, happy for God’s care in my life and all He is letting me experience. Erin cooked dinner. |
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| Eric and Owen Walking Back from the Playground with the Beautiful Sunset Sky. |
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| My Final Sewing Project is This Baby Blanket Made from a Piece of "You Are Loved" Fabric and Backed with a Soft Fabric Brought Around For Binding. |
Thursday. 31. Spend time with Owen, Esther and dinner with Eric and Erin. Owen’s birthday gift arrives in a big box. We will look at it in the morning.
Friday. 1. After breakfast we go over to Eric’s house, open the box with the wooden play gym for Owen. We spend about an hour putting it together. It’s tedious with lots of screws. It’s cool looking, but Owen definitely has to get used to it. They also need to get a suitable non-skid flooring to put under it and keep it from sliding or scooting.
Darrell goes out to lunch with a friend. Mail gift baby quilt to friend Sylvia. Dinner out with Samuel and Wes.
Nomad Notes.
Question to me:
Do you miss home or get tired of traveling and being away? Answered below.
It’s been 3 years since we downsized most of our “stuff” and sold our house. It’s been 1 ½ years since our complete “retirement” where we shifted living on our working incomes to living on our savings and Darrell’s pension. 1 ½ years ago we also gave up our second vehicle, downsizing ourselves into our truck with our “stuff” fitting into crates, boxes and suitcases in our truck.
We were glad to live for a year and a half without our house and our stuff while we practiced living in furnished short-term places mostly airbnb’s in the US. I call it practice because we learned about available rentals, contract details, and our personal likes and how much this cost us. It’s all in comparison to our former traditional way of owning a home and paying for all the things to go with that including: mortgage, taxes, upkeep, furnishings, utilities, and more.
We decided not to own an RV or a storage unit. We went smaller as our way to be flexible in traveling outside the US. We enjoy having our truck and our “stuff” in the back when we are in the US and road tripping or living in airbnb’s or with family.
In the last year and a half we have lived 3 months on cruise ships; 6 months in England, left our truck in storage and with relatives for months on end, visited friends and family, made new friends and revisited them, attended many different church congregations and Bible studies, worn out 2 pairs or more of shoes walking many miles. We lived 3 months in Alabama, 6-7 weeks with son Jeremy’s family split between Washington state and Portland, Maine, 6 weeks in Texas near Darrell’s aging parents and his sister who they live with. We’ve taken beautiful road trips on US and Canadian byways along coasts and mountains and plains through Georgia, Florida,Tennessee, Pennsylvania, New York, Maine, Louisiana, Texas, Kansas, South Dakota, North Dakota, Michigan, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario, and more!
Our next adventure is mainly about getting to New Zealand by cruise ship, staying for 4 months, cruising to Tasmania and Australia then returning to the US by cruise ship. This 8 month plan is beginning on September 5th. There is a lot of dreaming about doing this that has brought us to this time and experience now. Now this is where I refer back to that question at the beginning of these Nomad Notes…
Do you miss home or get tired of traveling and being away?
Yes. I get tired. Yes I miss my perception of ‘home’ and my family and loved ones. I use the word perception because my experience of home and family has always included me moving from place to place my entire life. I leave one home and all that is included there, move to another place and establish living in my new situation. (with my birth family, as a single person, with my husband and children, and now with my husband)
There was a time that I realized that my experience of moving about made it impossible for me to ever have that experience of so many people I know who grow up in one house and live in one neighborhood their entire life. I will never have that experience. I remember grieving during one move because I couldn’t have that stability and community in that way. Once I finished being sad over what I could never have for myself and sad over the loss of the current move with goodbyes and closures of relationships, I was able to enjoy my unique life and look forward to the positive changes and opportunities that I had ahead.
In our current goodbye and move from Alabama next week holds with it a sadness for what I am leaving. Two grandchildren who are a pleasure to be with along with their parents are deep in my heart. Owen is almost 2 and Esther is a newborn. I miss them and the time I will not be with them before I have set to leave. I cry at the thought of good-byes. I love them and I enjoy being with them day to day. I know that I am choosing together with Darrell to follow our travel dream. It’s a difficult choice and so sweet to have a choice at the same time. For now this is the way I am going, the way we are going. The phone, gives us some connectivity hearing our voices and visiting about highlights of our lives across the miles. When we return, the children will have grown and we will love on them and share meals and walks and playground time again.
My perception of home is being with family members, my husband, my children, my grandchildren. I also have a few friends and original family members who I feel connected to relax with my feeling of home together. Tending to their needs and schedules, relaxing with tea or walks together, making and enjoying meals together. Having a restful space for myself and a time and place to come together with news of our day and reflections of our lives with gratitude for each other.
These feelings of home, rest, and care are everywhere for me. I find friends and meals and shared faith and joy. When I have a longing for a particular person like my mom or grandma, I thank God for them and all the love that is still in me from them. I focus on their goodness that they shared with me, and I rest and I am generally ok where I am.
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