Weekly Mileage #108 and RV Frustration

Ocean pet the farm dog. He's very cautious around bigger dogs, so this was a big step for him.

This week I continued working on some courses so I can learn new things regarding Instagram and marketing. I also planned out some future posts.

I made a couple of leather notebooks. One was to fill an order and the other is for the kids' music teacher. We've been taking lessons from her for almost 6 years now and I wanted to do something to show our appreciation for her.

Ocean insisted on sitting on the ground so he could watch the chickens eat

Thursday morning the boys and I went on a farm tour with their preschool. We actually did this tour last spring as well. The boys had fun feeding the goats and chickens, helping collect eggs, and checking out the mama pig and her piglets.

kiddos running through a field

Thursday afternoon was Sunshine's height weight followup. While she has gained a couple pounds and grown an inch, it wasn't enough to improve her percentiles, which have actually gotten worse. We're in that narrow window of time before puberty where something can be done if there's a reason other than short genes for her lack of growth. So she's being referred to a specialist (no appointment yet) to do some tests to see if there's anything specific that is wrong. She's not looking forward to the inevitable blood work, but she also wants to get taller....

Friday we were supposed to get hammered by a big storm: lots of rain, tornadoes, flash flooding, the works. County schools let out at noon, Mr M was off work around 3, the boys' preschool egg hunt got rescheduled for next Friday, and Sunshine's service activity that night was canceled. There was some heavy rain around noon, but nothing like what had been forecast- at least not in our area. It's one of those double-edged swords- to cancel everything or not.

kitchen cupboard and microwave removed

Saturday Mr M and I tackled the RV. It was damaged by a stick or branch sometime last winter or spring and it poked a small hole in the roof. That hole was enough to let water in, and there's water damage to the ceiling and driver's side wall. In preparation for this, I'd removed the window coverings (boxes and blinds) and the microwave earlier in the week. I tried to remove the cabinet the microwave was in, but the wiring for the light and stove hood held me back.

vinyl ceiling covering cut and peeled away, showing wet wood of ceiling panel

Mr M worked through the wiring issues (they didn't make it easy for people to remove this cabinet), and we finally removed the cabinet. We also removed the sofa since I plan on painting the walls, and I can't do that with the sofa in place.

trying to remove wet ceiling panels without doing more damage

After removing the cupboard and sofa, we tackled the damaged ceiling panels and wall panels. We figured they were water damaged and would be easy to remove. We'd both watched YouTube videos and looked up stuff online, so we thought we knew what to expect. Only it didn't work out that way. The wallboard above the slide was securely glued to the steel frame, and there's a good 4" behind the framework of the slide that's very difficult to reach. Mr M was able to remove a small portion of the ceiling, but he was afraid of cutting into something important, and the panel seemed to be glued to the styrofoam insulation.

as far as Mr M got- the outer layer of the plywood panel came off, but the inner layer is firmly glued to the insualtion above

After chipping away with such minimal success, we had to face reality. The slides need to come out in order to clean out and replace the damaged wallboard (there's damage above both slides and next to the stove) and we just don't have that capability.

I had a bit more luck removing the wood above the slide, except that I couldn't really reach the 4" or so below that wood-look trim (even after I removed the trim I couldn't get to it)

As much as we prefer to DIY and save money, there are times when we can't do it all, and unfortunately, this is one of those times. We did some googling and found a fairly local RV shop that has good reviews and I'll be calling them today to see what they can do and hopefully get a ballpark on the cost. We know it won't be cheap, and insurance won't pay to fix the damage, only to fix the initial hole. So stupid. How do you know there's a hole in your roof before the damage appears?

the culprit- smaller than the size of a quarter

After that frustrating experience, I went and hauled wood for a couple hours so I'd feel like I'd at least accomplished something. I'm almost done shifting the piles next to the RV, then there's a bit of chainsawing (and more hauling) that needs to be done before I start working down by the shed. Progress!

Ocean helped. Ok, not really. He caught a ride back up the hill after I emptied the trailer :)

We also did our Easter egg hunt. We hid eggs in the lower part of the yard for the boys and eggs in the upper part of the yard for Sunshine. Then Sunshine, River, and I hid eggs for Mr M in the upper part of the yard. No eggs for me this year since sugar and I are not getting along. I still ate a few pieces of candy, but I shouldn't have. The mental fog, fuzziness, and increased sleepiness are just not worth it.

I also spent way too long cleaning out my 18 email inboxes. Excessive yes, but I have several for each business as well as a couple non-business-related ones. I'm at or almost at inbox zero for all of them now. The trick will be to keep them that way. I've been unsubscribing from email lists the last couple weeks and that has helped the inbox situation.

Weekly Mileage
Thursday- 0.93 miles hiked with Sunshine and River (~.5 mile of that was run)
Saturday- 2.08 miles run with River (1.5 miles total run)
total- 3.01  miles

10 hikes towards #52hikechallenge
0 kayak miles towards #365milechallenge

42.88 outdoor foot miles towards #365milechallenge
11.15 indoor foot miles towards #365milechallenge
60.0 bike miles towards #365milechallenge
114.03 miles total