21 Months and I'm Still In love....

When TLE first suggested we remove the "sacred" sofabed back in Campbellsville, KY a year ago I kind of went along with the suggestion not wanting to get into an unnecessary argument.  It was the same feeling I had just before we left on our journey when TLE suggested we "dump" the old "club chair" (the one I sat in most of the time) that came with the coach, and replace it.   When "D" day arrived to take the club chair out we had nothing to replace it except a folding chair.  Well, we didn't literally dump the club chair.....I think it is still in the warehouse at my son'e office, so I thought if it doesn't work out we can retrieve it later.  My chair for the next 9 months was that transitional folding chair.  It was when we officially replaced the folding chair with my European Style recliner that TLE laid out the next step in her plan to remake the salon area of the coach.

Nevertheless,  I don't like too much change at one time, and there was no way to get around the fact that taking out the sofabed was a really BIG change.  At the time I just could not imagine how big a difference removing the sofabed would be for the positive in our quality of life inside the coach.  Even the day we officially removed the sofabed, Tuesday, I was still apprehensive, but there was no way to stop the incoming tide.

Now, 4 days later, with 99.9% of the work done (right, you got it, there is always that .1% which remains to be done) I have finally seen the birth of TLE's vision, and I like it a lot.  Here are some shots of the new salon area of our coach taken by TLE Friday evening just before dinner.

Ignore that guy the behind the curtain......look at the kitchen area!

All of the trimming that had to be done around the edges of the coach front to back has been cut in, and  a big part of the finish trim (quarter round, transition molding, etc.) has now been installed.  What is that .1% that remains......the new stair nose molding around the stairway and a couple of lengths of quarter round, all of which will be finished Sunday morning.

We are like a couple of giddy school kids who just unwrapped their Christmas presents.  The even more remarkable thing is the new simulated wood vinyl is almost a dead on match to the rest of the wood veneer in the coach.

Of course,  almost lost in all of the remodeling work which has transpired this week is the fact that on Friday we finished 21 months living on the road in our 1982 Newell Coach.  When I wrote above that "a year ago" TLE suggested removing the sofabed, it seemed so unreal to be able to say something happened "a year ago".  In just 3 more months we will be celebrating 2 years on the road, and we are STILL in love with this nomadic lifestyle!

Also, yesterday our friends Chris and Cherie (Tales from Technomadia), who have been a major inspiration to us to take up the nomadic life, just finished a two week stint in Sacramento clearing out a storage unit Chris had been renting for 7 years since he began his nomadic journey.  At the end of Friday I was watching a streaming video of their talk about the task of cleaning out that unit.  If you are interested in their observations about the process click here to see the Ustream video.....it is very interesting and informative.

Cherie and Chris

Friday night we headed into Dwyer and Lori's home once again for dinner.  I really look forward to dinner in their home each night, and Friday night was even more special with their son, Arthur, joining us, plus their daughter, Ingrid, and her husband of 2.5 months, Randy.  We had a typical Hockwald dinner where there are at least 3 simultaneous conversations going on at all times.....lots of laughing, interesting stories, and just general zaninous (is that a word?).

Our time is coming to an end here in the great state of Utah, and in a couple of days we will continue our trek home to Southern California to spend the holidays with our children and grand children, AND my brother Philip and his family......life is soooo good!

Thanks for stopping by!