43 and Counting

I know this entry is supposed to be about what happened Thursday, but I must take an ever so brief break to acknowledge the significance of today, Friday, August 29th.  Forty-three years ago Elaine Frances Houghtaling answered the biggest question in my life by saying "I do!".  This is the fourth anniversary we have celebrated since we began living full time in our 1982 Newell Coach.  On August 30th, 1971 we arrived in South Lake Tahoe for our honeymoon......and here we are once again in South Lake Tahoe.......5 children, two careers, and 43 years later.

A selfie taken August 29, 2012 at the 

Snake River Gorge in Twin Falls, ID

In some respects "43" seems like such an abstract number.......August 29, 1971 seems like a few lifetimes ago.  We are not the same people who exchanged vows 43 years ago.....we were both just shy of our 22nd birthdays the day we were wed, and were still maturing and becoming who we would become.  We managed to continue loving each other through all the changes and maturation process......that we were good friends prior to becoming romantically involved was the glue that kept us together through "thick and thin"....sometimes pretty thin.......but, today we are as "thick as thieves".   August 29th is also my father's birthday adds another level of specialness to this day.  Happy anniversary my "Lovely Elaine", and happy birthday Dad.....I know you are looking down and smiling right now.....I can just feel it.

Now, back to our regularly scheduled programming......what happened Thursday?  This was the second big day of putting stuff away.....while TLE took down the sunscreen and did some minor re-arranging in the through storage compartment I continued to find places to "squirrel" away more stuff in the trailer.  While I continued my "squirreling" ways TLE headed off to get a haircut, and do "small" shopping.  I removed the tire covers from the coach wheels, raked the large quantity of pine needles off the patio awning, and then raked the ground around the coach so we will track in fewer pine needles over our remaining 3 days.

 Keeping the pine needles at bay

 It may not look it, but it is almost ready for the VW!

No more sun shade

By 1 pm it was getting hot in the trailer, and outside too, so I decided to sit in the shade and read a book for a while.....of course that turned into another nap, but who's counting, right? Tomorrow I'll clean up the exterior of the coach, put a few more things away in the trailer (bikes, etc.), check all tires for proper air pressure,  put away the portable fireplace, and then we will be pretty much ready to roll Tuesday morning......early....I hope.

Thanks for stopping by!