Our Miss Abby

I had a different post planned for today, but I fear some of you might not survive until you hear the Abby story - and we sure don't want that! So I'll table my original plans for a later day and tell you about Abby instead!

Ryan and I first fell in love with RVs just over four years ago, when we were traveling home from my niece's wedding out in Kansas. It's funny what an 850 mile road trip will do to you! We came home and I immediately began researching them. And for the last four years, I've watched YouTube videos, read a gazillion blog posts, taken webinars, and followed a bunch of RV enthusiasts on social media to learn as much as I could about both full and part time RV life.

And for all that time, we've known we one day hoped to have one of our own, but until now, it hasn't been feasible to purchase one. (We had no desire to take out a loan to purchase one.) Also in that time, we did all kinds of research on what kind of rig we would want to find for ourselves. We very quickly ruled out any kind of towable camper, because the truck we have is just a little guy, and it isn't big enough to tow. We definitely couldn't afford to purchase a new truck AND a camper. Plus, I'm not comfortable driving any vehicle towing something, and Ryan wanted me to be able to drive whatever we got.

It's just the two of us, so we have sort of a less-is-more mentality. We didn't want anything super long, because the bigger the RV, the more costs we would have in fuel and maintenance, so we set out to hunt for a fairly small home on wheels - for someday.

When we sold our house and moved for our new job, we decided the time was right to look in earnest for an RV. This came up on the blog a few days ago, but I'll revisit it here again to further explain our decision. Since we live and work in the same building, when we have our weekend days, we're still here in the thick of everything that is going on. It's not a bad thing by any means, but there are times when we find it a little tempting to get caught up in working on our days off, because we're still here in the middle of work. And since our weekends can be true weekends (usually, anyway), free of yard work or house projects, we have the freedom to get away for self-care if we choose.

As a side note, self-care is heavily encouraged in this line of work. We're still new enough that we don't feel overrun with exhaustion, but we've been admonished to learn to practice it from the beginning, because it is the key to being able to continue a live-in social work job for the long haul.

We prayed extensively about purchasing an RV, made lists, weighed pros and cons, and concluded that an RV would be a great way to allow us to get away on our days off (in non-freezing weather). We can continue our 92 county tour quest this way. We can go visit friends (especially those with yards or driveways we can park in!) this way. We can go visit family and still have our own space at the end of the day. And when we travel 850+ miles to see my sister, we'll have a bathroom on the road!

So that's the long back story of how we came to hunt for Abby. We've been asked how we came up with that name, and here's the answer! We heavily considered purchasing an RV that was named Abby (by the previous owner). She had been so very loved, and we dearly loved her, too. Unfortunately, we couldn't justify her price tag for our budget, so we had to walk away. But we decided that regardless of what one we ended up buying, we would name her Abby, in honor of our almost-first-RV.

Our Abby is a bit older, because that's what is in our price range, but she's in good shape! (We were cautioned about buying an older rig - and we appreciated that advice! We feel good about where she came from and the checks done on her and the improvements made to her prior to our purchase. She's not perfect, and we know that, but she's in good shape.)

Miss Abby is also a bit dated on the inside, but you know us! We love paint projects! LOL!! We have plans to spruce her up a little bit in the coming months - some paint here and new flooring there - and she'll be all gussied up in no time!

She's little. Not quite 24 feet long - which still feels like a charter bus to me when I drive her, but I can drive her. She's got quite a bit of storage for her size, and she has absolutely everything we need to be comfortable in her. I've got so many dreams for her tiny bedroom, her little kitchen, and her little living room. We've got a mental theme of a bright and airy beach-feel for her, and we can't wait to make it happen.

We are so grateful for the chance to have this dream come true for us, and we can't wait to adventure with Miss Abby. And who knows! Maybe someday we'll travel in her full time - which has been another dream of ours for a few years!

Here are a few pictures from the day we picked her up. It just so happened to be National Coffee Day so our very first activity was to drink coffee in the RV! Perfect, right??

I can't wait to have some good before-and-after pictures for you! :) All in good time, right?