Sharing is caring!

Today I want to share a peek into my life. A side of living in a RV you might not understand unless you are living it. I will share the good, the bad and the messy…. Here is my RV life behind the scenes.

Living in a RV – RV Life Behind the Scenes

RV Life – The Good Part of Living in a RV

I won’t lie living in a RV is mostly good times. As in about 80% and that’s what keeps me going. So I want to start by sharing the good aspects of living a fulltime RV lifestyle.

Family Time

Doing the 9-5 thing was killing us as a family. Then on the few off days we did have we were running around getting things done then one of two things suffered, either the house maintenance would suffer (things like cleaning, landscaping, and the lawn) or family time would suffer. We were always running and never feeling like we connected enough. Especially when my husband had to be at work at 3 am then the next day didn’t get home until after the kids were in bed. We were DONE!

The amount of family time we get now is just something we can’t overlook. Do we get annoyed with each other? Of course! Do we fight? Yes. Do we still need time apart to do our own things? Absolutely. But being able to experience something like Niagara Falls with our kids is unforgettable! Watching your husband’s face light up when he gets to experience the Baseball Hall of Fame, something he has wanted to do since he was a kid is something I will never forget.

Our Own Schedule

I can’t tell you how much I LOVE not being on anyone else’s schedule! It is one of the best things about living in a RV! Days when one of us doesn’t feel good,  we can stay home and be lazy. We can change our plans for bad weather or even when one of the kids are having a bad day.

If we see something we want to do, we can do it we don’t have to be rushed to get something done. Some of the best things we have seen are places we have just stumbled upon or have been told about by the locals.

Like this wine slushie from Grapeful Sisters Winery and Campground. Little known historical places, places with amazing views and more!

Roadschooling

I love being able to homeschool on the road. We can view the things we are learning. We can travel the Civil War Trails as we learn about the Civil War. We can school with Little House on the Praire and go and see the houses and locations. We can also change our schooling to match what we are seeing. Like when we visited Colonial Williamsburg we were able to teach the kids about colonial times, and do a mini unit on it!

 

RV Life – The Bad Part of Living in a RV

Now living on the road isn’t all peaches and roses. We have our days where nothing seems to go right! Like when we were driving down the road singing along to the radio on the way to Ohio to visit family. We get flagged over by another car to tell us our trailer lost a tire.

Yep, so we pull over and check it out, sure enough, we lost a tire. And not just it shredded, but the whole things came off and went flying and apparently almost hit another car…. So as we are sitting on the side of the highway, I remember we have travel insurance. Problem solved right? Nope! We call and it takes them over 3 hours to find a tow truck then the guy backs out at the last minute! We end up having to find our own tow truck, and they didn’t cover any of it! Needless to say, we now have Good Sam Roadside Assitance!

If you ever need help in the Cleveland / Akron area, I HIGHLY recommend Interstate Towing! They went above and beyond what we needed to get us taken care of and into their office safely!

Well after we were back on the road and going again we got to Ohio and had a slew of issues. We had a crazy scary incident of someone approaching my oldest daughter in the store and sent my mom instinct on overdrive, then our car died. Like a hard and horrible death!

That is our car being towed away to get it fixed. Marks step brother is a kick A$$ diesel mechanic and was able to bring the tank back to life (HUGE THANK YOU TO HIM!!). So off we went again. Our next stop, we ended up with a flat tire. Then at the next stop, some wires and our propane line got shredded. We are EXTREMELY lucky nothing more happened. So now we get to deal with insurances and getting it taken care of.

We had arrived at campgrounds after travel days and had doors fallen open, wine bottles broken, and more. It’s always something!

RV Life – The Messy Part of Living in a RV

We live in 250 square feet. 6 of us and a large dog. Stop and think about it.

That means 6 people’s worth of clothes that have to be washed, dried, folded, and put away each week. We take our clothes to a laundry mat and wash everything at once and dry it all at once. Then we have to put it away because in the process of sorting it all our bed always looks like this. Yes, it has to be done weekly too because we only carry enough clothes to stretch MAYBE 2 weeks per person. There isn’t room for more.

That also means we have 6 people’s worth of dishes to clean PER MEAL! Sooo we took the easy way out and use paper plates, but we still use quite a bit of dishes. There are always dirty dishes floating in our sink. Our dish drier is always full of dishes drying. It’s a never ending circle because *most* RV’s don’t have dishwashers!

That means 6 people (and a dog) to destroy 250 square feet. This picture was taken while my kids napped before I picked up the morning mess. Yes, all this was from 1 morning, about 5-6 hours. The flip side? It takes me no more than 30 minutes to get this all cleaned up, the floors cleaned, and to do the dishes. While kids nap, I can work or relax. Then they wake up, and if we aren’t going anywhere after naps the mess is made again, dinner is made kids go to bed, and in less than 30 minutes mess is cleaned up, again.

Is this the norm when you come to my house? Well, that depends, if I knew you were coming then no the RV will be in order and ready for you, I might even have a nice candle burning and some snacks ready for you! If you surprise me, then this is probably what you will be getting!

Another thing that adds to the chaos, at least in my world is the unfinished projects. That picture is of the area NOT painted behind the toilet. See we set aside time to paint the RV and we got 3 of 4 rooms painted, and then I got sick, and the touch ups never got done, and the wood work never got done…. So we are 50% painted and have 100% no time to finish in the next few months. Any volunteers to help me out?! I didn’t think so.

So as you can see, my life isn’t much different than yours. We are still just a family of 6. Yes, we travel, and it looks great on social media but think about it. When you go on vacation, you only post the good stuff. You don’t post the toddler meltdowns and issues you had. The pictures are the good memories. It’s the same way with the RV life.

We have the same issues as many of you just in a different way. Think of the tire falling off as a foundation problem in your house. The wiring problems could happen in a regular house too. A flat tire is equivalent to the locks on the doors needing to be changed. It’s easy to do but a pain in the butt, costs money, and takes time.

Our mess looks worse because we are in a smaller space but they made the same mess in a sticks and bricks house too it was just more spread out and took me longer to clean up!

The moral of my story: Yes we love our RV life and to travel, and it IS fun, but don’t think it is the fix all to anything. You will still have problems, and if you have problems in your relationships it will put it under a magnifying glass and either make you or break you, and fast! Always have an exit plan because at any point it can become too much. Have worked lined up it can easily drain your bank account. All the problems we had up there happened within a month of each other. OUCH!

I love my life, living in a RV and wouldn’t have it any other way, but I’m just like you, except my house, has wheels 😉

Sharing is caring!