Count Your Blessings

Cyndie and I are stuck inside on a cold, blustery day. We're doing some real estate work, working on some travel plans, and generally trying to stay warm and dry (and hoping that Tim's game this afternoon is moved inside the dome instead of being outside in 50 degree weather with 25 mile per hour wind and rain).

On a day which could be a bit of a drag where we're limited to 300 square feet (or the local coffee shop), we are choosing to count ourselves blessed. Looking around our little house on wheels makes me so happy. I am literally smiling as I write this. We are living the dream! Is it everyone's dream? No way. But this is something we've been excited about for a while. We have a lot of flexibility to pursue those things which are important to us (travel, experiences, family). We have almost all of the things we really enjoy in life with almost none of the negatives. And more exciting things (overseas travel, catamaran!!) are on the horizon.

What is the moral of the story? Pursue your dreams. Push your limits. Make goals for yourself. Set steps toward your goals. Execute them. Everyone has different priorities. Pursue what you value. Don't let someone else tell you that your dream is dumb or unachievable. Don't get stuck living life the same way you always have just because.

Our society likes to tell us what should be. Don't accept that. 

Think outside the box. You are worth it.

So a thing happened?!

 Yes, it's been a while since I posted. Bad me. Life is great. We are loving RV life and I can't fathom how I ever worked a job given our busy we are?! We've spent the last several months doing lots of exercising, watching soccer, visiting family, meeting new people, and exploring the upper/western side of the Midwest. It's been great.

And now we did a thing.

*not "our" boat, but the same year and model

There is a fairly length story behind it, but we are on contract to buy a Leopard 44 sailing catamaran!? This has been a dream of ours for a while and the fact that it is so close to reality is insane. There are still a lot of steps (get the boat to the US, do a survey and sea trial. Oh and learn to sail). But the biggest one of finding the boat is complete. More details to come!

These pictures actually of "our" (soon to be) boat.

Work gets in the way of Play

So it turns out that working is not as much fun as playing! Emma is on spring break this week, but I still have to work*. And in the case of yesterday (and today), I have to drive into the office because I'm testing some software with a hardware device that is there. Suck! Oh well, that's life (in both the big city and the country apparently). I'm hoping to get done early enough today to make it back to Lake Geneva for the Spring Break in Lake Geneva events ... a movie (Horton Hears a Who - I think) and time at the arcade.

*I have a bit of a bone to pick with our way of working here in these United States ... shouldn't we get to be retired when are kids are around to enjoy it with and when we have the energy and health to fully enjoy our retirement?

Yesterday the Caspari kids came up for a visit while Dave and Amy had the "one year checkup" on their house. I think that they had some kind of 1 year warranty, so this was their last chance to claim any defects or something. Anyway, they played a bit and then went to the library for storytime and a craft before hitting McDonalds on the way home.