#201 Nomad Diary. 24-30 August 2024. 1st Week of 4 in Limestone County Alabama, Near Athens. 10 Minutes from Eric, Erin and Grands Owen and Esther.

Morning Light View from Our Limestone County Alabama Airbnb

Playing with Owen and Esther at Their House 10 Minutes From Our Airbnb in Alabama

A Moth on Our Front Door. There Are Several of These Beauties Flying Around Here.

Esther (1yr) and Her Mom Erin at Their House.

Us Out for Breakfast in Downtown Huntsville

Darrell Playing with Esther

E-book I Bought This Week as Recommended in a Retirement Blog Darrell Follows and Shares with Me.

Meet Up with Our Son Samuel at This Taco Truck on County Line Rd. He's Sitting in the Sun and It is Hot Today!

Swinging Esther at Her Neighborhood Playground.

Grandpa Helping Owen on the Slide at the Neighborhood Playground.

Saturday. 24. Days of visiting grandkids and playing an hour once or twice a day. Shopping and cooking our meals is a pleasure after roadtrip days with restaurants. lol.

Sunday. 25. After church we went to a sandwich place and friends Jamie and Cynthia were there and we ate with them and had a good visit. 

Monday. 26.

Tuesday. 27. We went downtown to Huntsville and had breakfast at Canadian Bakin, a bagel and sourdough bread bakery. I do love sourdough bread!

Wednesday. 28. I purchased an e-book about being widowed and figuring out finances. It was recommended in a retirement and financial blog that Darrell follows and often shares with me. I’m slowly reading it. Definitely no one wants to think about losing their spouse, but it is a fact of living. We have a travel friend who was recently and abruptly widowed. She’s allowed me into her thoughts and her experience. I appreciate her sharing so much. 

Thursday. 29. Phone calls today and other days this week with friends totalling up to 4 hours or more. 

Friday. 30. Conversations with Darrell about our finances, our travel in 2025 and looking for unusual pet sits in unique places! Darrell keeps up a profile for us on trustedhousesitters.com He found a pet sit in north Washington state for a week and includes 13 rescued cockatiels. He applied letting the owner know that we would need training for such an undertaking. She went back and forth with him 3 or 4 times with different questions and information. We both agreed that we would be able to take on the challenge, and she has us down for the end of June through July 4th 2025 to care for these birds in exchange for living at her house. 

Nomad Notes. 

This week has been a great time to feel settled in a very nicely redone old and small farmhouse. It is just the right size for us with some of our favorite features. 

Our favorite features of airbnb’s that we look for: I like at least two bedrooms when we can find it. We sleep in one uncluttered bedroom and we use the second bedroom to lay out our suitcases and manage our clothing and extra packing trunks. While we have our truck in the US we have more items than just our 2 suitcases and 2 backpacks. We have a hard sided cooler, 8 stacking crates and 4 locking trunks as I’ve described in earlier posts. 

We also enjoy having an outdoor space to sit at a table. This house has a covered porch and a concrete patio with a table and chairs in each space. Having an entry with few or no steps and that is close to unloading our truck is very nice too. This house has 3-4 steps up to the covered porch and the entry with our truck parking a few steps away. There is a laundry room with a large washer and dryer and a door to close off the sound when the machines are on. The shower head is tall, good water pressure and a roomy comfortable shower. The air conditioning is quiet and comfortable. The house has a long driveway and is set back from the road. The road has few cars passing by. There is thick tree growth to one side of our house and also across the street and to the rear of the property. I describe all of this to explain that it is quiet here. I don’t hear highways. Once or twice a day there is one driver with a noisy car who likes to drive fast and noisily on this quiet paved road. The newer windows in the house also help with the sound padding and the indoor temperature. It’s all very comfortable. 

In the kitchen we have a dishwasher and and over as well as a coffee maker and a toaster that works. I’ve baked about 4 times this week. We would go over to Eric’s after dinner and I’d have a bag of something I baked and wanted to share like gluten-free cookies one day and gluten free yeast rolls another. (Eric eats gluten free) Owen would see my bag and immediately ask, “what did you bring?”

Methylene Blue, Sleeping Through the Night, Trying to Improve My Sleep: I’ve settled on 6 drops diluted in my first morning water. I’ve been sleeping through the night except one night recently. I think I woke up to use the bathroom because I drank coffee around 1:30 pm. It also may have to do with a snack I chose. I’ve been experimenting with eating a small snack around 8pm before I go to sleep between 9:30 and 10pm. For 30 years, most nights I have not eaten any evening snack after having an early dinner. This has made about a 12-13 hour fast for me. Recently I decided to try eating a small 8pm snack. I’ve tried different snacks over the last couple of weeks. 

My Best Current Small 8pm Snack: 2 tablespoons of avocado, 2 tablespoons of either hempseeds or walnuts, and 1 tablespoon of sliced greek olives. 

Sleep Apnea: I’m still snoring and I’m still doing Dr. Petkus’ breathing exercises most days. Now I’ve added suggested tongue exercises. I use a ‘tongue trap’ that helps but doesn’t always keep me from snoring. I’m going to reduce my coffee and limit it to breakfast time.

Daily Bible Reading: I like the electronic tracker on Bible Gateway. It will take me longer than a year to complete and that’s ok. I’m doing it most days.

Daily DDP Yoga: Been doing it for over 10 years along with Darrell. We have plenty of room in our living room at this current house. 

Worship with Capshaw Church of Christ: This congregation that we attended for years combined with the Harvest group. There are so many people for me to meet and get to know now. We are members here while we live here for a few weeks at a time and somewhere under 6 months per year. We are living transient (South Dakota residents) and not wanting to qualify as Alabama state residents.