We made it home safe, but not without work to do.

We are finally home safe and sound. We flew home on New Years Day. I didn't think that would be a problem, but I don't think I will ever do it again. We went to bed at 2:30 AM and got back up at 4:30 AM. The drive to the airport was slow but good. Our flights out were very uneventful. On both flights the kids and I were together, but Brian had to be quite a few rows away. The first flight was only about two hours, but it felt much longer. I was very tired and every time I tried to nap the kids would need something. I got about 10-15 minutes of sleep. We had a layover in Minneapolis, which was just barely over an hour. We had enough time to locate our next gates, buy some sandwiches and go to the bathroom. The second flight was much shorter, just barely over an hour. I got another 10-15 minute nap. Brian fared much better as he was able to be without the kids and sleep as much as he could. Angela got to sit up in the pilots chair and see what it would be like to fly the airplane. She seemed to really like that. Fortunately, all of our luggage made it on this trip. We left the airport, shopped for some groceries, picked up the dog and made it home. Then the work started....

Living in the camper has been a bit of a stretch in many ways. First, just learning to live someplace so small. We had to condense our belongings greatly. Secondly, figuring out how to keep everything properly maintained and running. Lastly, learning to accept that we chose a very unconventional way to live. It has been humbling (and embarrassing at times) for me to tell people that we live in a fifth wheel trailer. Due to that fact, there have been times in the adjustment period (which, I believe, is still happening) when we would get upset at each other as we were learning all the quirks of living here. Not so yesterday. We got home to a freezing cold camper. Our thermometer was offline. It does not go offline as low as my parents, but at 32 degrees. We don't truly know how cold it was, but we could see our breath and we all had cold noses and fingers. We realized that the propane tank had run out and the water had frozen. Also, some soda pops had froze and exploded, the bag of potatoes froze and then gooed, and most anything else in the house that was liquid was frozen (ie: oil, lotion, canned goods, plants). This would have been perfect fighting material, but we all kind of just laughed and then bundled up in layers with hats and gloves. Brian got the propane back on and the house warming up. I was doing the happy dance that the temperature was 36 degrees. Above freezing, woohoo! We had a dinner of tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches because, they were warm and did not take water to cook. By bedtime the camper was a comfortable 66 degrees. This morning most everything that had frozen was back to normal, except for the plants. Brian unfroze the water pipes and we had water. Then we noticed that the black and gray holding tanks had frozen solid. We are in the process of unfreezing these and praying that there has been no long term damage done.