A long look back

It appears they're doing just fine without me!!

I was reading through our old blog entries the other night – feeling nostalgic and missing my boys – and I came across our list of projects we HAD to do before we left.  We completed a huge amount of work, but I found it quite funny that many of those projects are still unfinished 3 ½ years later.  So this post is for those people who aren’t quite sure if they’re ready to leave.  I think this is timely as it’s getting close to the end of hurricane season in North America and many are preparing for the Ba-ha-ha in CA (the yearly migration to Mexico) or for heading south here on the east coast.  My advice, Just go.  If it’s important, it will get done. 

Just for fun…Here’s our list from 2010 and the CURRENT status of those projects…it’s actually a pretty short list now that I look back on it.

Galley Remodel

Lucky for me, this was complete and has made a world of difference in our comfort level.  We expanded our fridge and added a freezer.

Extend bed, new mattress

While we did get a new mattress (love it!), we never extended the bed.  We just switched which way we lay our heads.  And now that I’m stateside in a real bed, I find myself sliding down to the end so I can hang my feet over and hugging the edge of the bed (normally the wall on the boat, so I give Andy more room).

Single Side Band “stuff”

We did install the modem but it took a good year after being out to finally figure out how this thing worked.  In the end, we bought a new radio (and still took an additional six months to come up to speed).  This is an area that still seems to need chicken bones and voo-doo dolls to make it work.  One lesson learned for us though…we bought a huge, expensive antennae and drove it down to Mexico for better reception.  It never worked properly and literally broke off into the water shortly after purchasing it.   After duct taping it back together we now use it to hold the very inexpensive 30 feet of wire needed for proper reception.  Most of the time, it works like a champ.

Lifeline netting

Installed and very helpful for keeping toys on board.

Deck box for compressor

Never did this.  The compressor has a permanent home in our head on top of the engine cover.

Configure cockpit for shower curtain so we can have some privacy while bathing

Never did this.  We still shower outside but have decided it’s not that big of a deal.  The way our cockpit sits, I don’t’ think anyone can actually see anything.  I wear my bathing suit top anyway just in case, but overall, cruisers aren’t really that concerned with your showering habits (I do have to watch out for tour boats in Palau though…learned that the hard way).  Jake forgoes the shower altogether and just jumps in the water naked, using soap when forced to do so.

Now here’s a list I did find useful…

• ·       Quit Job/ Retire/ Leave of Absence (my favorite)
• ·       Get all checkups, shots, teeth cleaning, eye doctor, hair cuts, etc.
• ·       Beef up the first aid kit for long term/remote travel
• ·       Put together ditch kit
• ·       Establish residency in homeschooling, tax friendly state.
• ·       Sell Car/Truck
• ·       Provision – a few times.  I find that I am always thankful to have too much, rather than not enough.  Many people disagree with this advice.  It depends on your relationship with food….we love food, therefore we never leave home without the essentials.
• ·       Last but not least…Plan a party!  Say goodbye to friends and family, relax, have fun.  You’re just getting started…

Good luck to all those leaving this season!  Maybe we’ll share an anchorage one day.

Some of the latest from Palau....

Not sure what the toilet paper is about...I'm usually the one
that brings that

I seems the one good thing I'm missing is all the
crappy weather they're getting.

It looks like he still has enough left to lick off the bowl!

Advise (or philosophical ponderings) on preparing for your crossing

It’s that time of year again, where boats from all over Mexico, California and Panama are thinking of doing the Pacific crossing.  I’m part of a group on facebook where we women can chit chat about all of our questions, worries, and experiences and I’ve been seeing a lot of questions pertaining to provisioning lately.  It’s made me stop and think about what I’ve learned over the years, not only about provisioning but cruising as well.  I’m much more comfortable than I was when we left Mexico, yet and I can hear myself asking these same questions just a few years ago.  I’m going to try desperately not to repeat what I said last year, but in an effort to help out with those still reading, I thought I would post some of my own findings over the last few years.  Remember, I’m not a writer and I tend to stray from my original thoughts…hopefully you can stick it out to the end.

There are people who live to eat and there are people who eat to live.  Those of the latter, will do fine with stocking up on whatever you need for a few weeks and then take the over used advice of “everyone everywhere has to eat…there’s always something to eat.”  Ramen noodles are cheap all over the world and surprisingly popular in the south and west pacific.

Then there are those of you who live to eat.  These are my peeps.  While it is true that everyone eats, what they eat varies greatly from what you’re probably used to eating.  You will find some dishes that are absolutely fabulous (poison crue comes to mind for me) and then you will find some stuff that you’d rather not try again (pig knuckles anyone?).  Aside from the what, is the how much.  Mexico (and from what I hear, Ecuador), is the cheapest food you will find until you reach southeast Asia.  I went on a rant about this earlier in Pohnpei so I won’t repeat the whole thing, but if you know what you like to eat and they have it in Mexico, stock up.  Particularly in meat, specialty items (roasted red peppers, sundried tomatoes, olive oil etc.), and booze.  Not because they don’t have them where you’re going, but because they will be twice as much, if not three times as much (I just paid $13 for a small bottle of olive oil in Micronesia).  And once you leave French Polynesia, in most cases, it gets more expensive.   Not to deter you from going, oh my, no….it’s totally worth it….just plan ahead if you like to eat.  There are places along the way where you can stock up again…Tahiti (you just spent weeks crossing the pacific and cruising the Tuamotos, you’ve saved up), American Samoa (best place we’ve been for provisioning, other than Mexico), and the list goes on….just be honest with yourself about what you can live with both food wise and budget wise.  That meat place in Buceria sounds expensive now, but it’s a bargain once you’ve crossed the ocean.  After saying all that, stock up on recipes for bananas, coconuts, fish and breadfruit.

One thing I’ve looked back on and realized about myself as well as looking at some of the newbie questions, is that if you’re new to cruising, you tend to ask questions about and try to figure out how to recreate your life on land, on the boat.  I’m not sure that there’s anyway to avoid this as experience is the only way some of us learn, but my advice would be to just be open minded.  You won’t have as many friends as you do at home (or in Mexico).  But look at it as an opportunity to explore new interests or get closer to your loved ones on the boat (did you think that was possible?).  If you’re used to shaving your legs every day, blow drying your hair and smelling good…well, get over it (or have a powerful watermaker, generator and lots of bug spray on board). 

If you have soft skin, toughen up.  I found that once we crossed, we met more foreigners than not and well, not everyone has the US filter distributed to us at birth (yes, believe it or not, I have one).   They say what they mean and it’s refreshing.  Don’t get offended, just listen.  You’ll find yourself looking at things you thought you had a handle on in totally different ways.  I got fired up in Mexico more than once.  I can remember a conversation in Suarrow that I wasn’t sure either of us was going to get over.  But now, years later…I get it.  I don’t agree with a lot of it, but I can appreciate a different opinion.  You’ll be amazed at how many experts there are out there about your country’s culture, politics and how you should change (I know this to be true for the US, but I’ve seen it happen to everyone).  Just smile and nod.

I asked Andy to contribute his two cents and he said “Spare no expense.”  If you’re not on a quest to rid your life of all of the nice-ities of home…movies, gadgets, generators are your friend.  They are expensive elsewhere.  Spare parts…hard to get, sometimes impossible.  Your dinghy is your car.  If you drive a Mercedes…you might want to get a good outboard motor.  If you don’t mind pushing your Pacer down the road to get it in gear, then rowing might be your thing (just remember, sometimes you’ll be rowing to shore against winds and waves…might want to have a tiny motor on hand or a good workout program).

OK, obviously, we’re not purists.  Never claimed to be.  But we think we’ve struck a nice balance between comfort and reality.  Reality being that everyone doesn’t get to live the way we do in the US.  We’ve earned our lifestyle and worked hard for it, but I think it’s important that we stop and remember that it’s not a given.  There are people all over the world living a much humbler existence and they are no less worthy than us of a good life.  We’ve learned to put things into perspective.  Air condition is a luxury, as is a washing machine.  Living together every day, being in charge of my child’s upbringing, getting close to others…that’s why we’re out here.

So maybe this wasn’t an advise column after all…I got a little too philosophical.  But after reading my Facebook for the last week or so, I had a lot on my mind that I felt like sharing.  Hopefully, you can take a word or two and get some use out of it.  Overall, just know, that you’ll grow and it will more than likely be for the better.

Helpful (I hope) tips onshore and offshore

Through reading a number of books on cruising and provisioning as well as talking with other cruisers, I’ve learned a number of tips over the last few months that I thought might be helpful to others getting ready to sail, already sailing or anyone who wants to make their food last longer.  I’ll try to post them as they come up, but here are a few…

Did you ever want to buy that huge 5 lb block of cheese at Costco but just not know how to keep it from going bad without stuffing your family of four full with cheese at every meal?  First off, if you don’t open it, it’ll last as long as you need it to.  But after you open it, wrap it in a cheese cloth (a paper towel works fine too) soaked in vinegar and put it in a plastic container.  It also helps if you wipe down the inside of the container with vinegar.  My cheeses are lasting at least three times longer now and I don’t have to cut any mold off or give them the sniff test.  The vinegar doesn’t seem to affect the taste at all either. 

Down here in Mexico, limes are super cheap and they have all kinds of uses.  However, we never manage to use all of ours before they turn brown and/or get hard as a rock.  Wrap them in tin foil.  Yup.  Tin foil.  I did this on half my limes.  The half I did not wrap went bad in a week.  The half I wrapped are still in my galley (2 weeks later) bright green and juicy.  If you put them in the fridge, they’ll last even longer.  I just don’t have room in my itty bitty fridge for that.  I’m not sure if this trick works on other citrus fruits as well.  Stay tuned because I intend to try it.

This tip may not be so useful for those at home unless you have access to a local farm, but did you know that if you get eggs straight from the chicken, never refrigerated, you don’t have to refrigerate them either (maybe I’m the only one who didn’t know this, but remember I’m from Atlanta and we didn’t raise chickens)?  The first time I saw poop on an egg down here I was a little grossed out.  Now, I look for the poop and if it has a few feathers on it, even better… I know it’s fresh.  If you’re not sure if one is rotten, put it in a glass of water and see if it floats.  If it floats, it’s rotten.

The last one probably isn’t new to anyone, but I swear it’s the first time I’ve tried it.  Good, fresh garlic is hard to come by down here (old, black, yucky garlic is not hard to come by), so when I find it, I buy it.  I put this last batch in a clean jar and covered it with olive oil.  Now my garlic not only lasts longer, I have garlic flavored oil for cooking.

I’m trying a recipe now for preserving lemons but the jury is still out… stay tuned.

11/9/2010 - Mazatlan, here we come

Mazatlan, it’s a 2 ½ day, 240 mile trip for us.  It’s been at least a month since we did an overnighter and not since the beginning of our trip have we had to do 2 nights, so we’re long overdue.  I’m considering this my training and part of work ups to our soon to be much longer passages across the Pacific.

Using that line of thinking, I decided to prepare a little better this time.

I took my seasick pills a full 24 hours ahead of time.  They tend to take a long time to get into my system and don’t always work the first day if I wait to late.  I’ve tried all types of things from Dramamine to wristbands.  The only sure thing I’ve found so far is Scopamine. You can get it in Mexico really cheap.  I think I 50 pills cost me $5 in LaPaz.

Another thing I did this time that I should have done before was to make some meals ahead of time.  Again, being prone to sickness, spending time in the galley doesn’t usually work for me.  But, I also hate to eat leftover’s and make ahead dinners always seem like leftovers for me (I know, it’s not the same thing).  This time, I made Tamales so all I would have to do is steam them.  I made enough for one lunch and one dinner.  Then I saved the leftover filling for us to put on Tostadas for lunch the other day.  I’m not very creative when it comes to lunches so I was pretty proud that I won’t be serving any sandwiches on this trip.

For Jake, I had grand plans of making sure we continued on with his schooling during this passage.  But plans are meant to be changed (or so my husband keeps telling me).  I’ve learned not to get too stressed if he ends up watching a few movies or having to play by himself more than usual.  It’s temporary.  I’m not a bad mommy.  We tried to get him involved today (i.e. get outside and away from the Star Wars) Tonight, I let Jake look at the radar and tell me if any ships were coming.  He asked me “Do we have our port and starboard lights on mommy?”

“Yes, sweetie. We do.”

“That’s good.  It’s important to have our nabigation lights on, right?”

“Yes, very important.”

“I wonder if Darth Vader’s Death Star has nabigation lights?”

And so it goes…

As I’m about to end my watch, I’m starting to think about Thanksgiving (it’s sneaking up on us) and where we’re going to be, what we’re going to do, eat, etc.  And I realize that this year we have more to be thankful for than ever before.  Not only are we all healthy and happy, but we’re living our dream and experiencing things I never in my life imagined I would experience.  And we’ve just gotten started.  We’ve passed our six month mark, the time where we were going to assess and determine if we should continue.  I think the consensus with the crew is, yes.

4/24/10 - Finally Gone.

We finally did it. We finally set sail. It turned out to be a beautiful day. We left the Police Dock in San Diego around 8:45. We pulled up the sails around Coronado Islands. At first there wasn’t much wind but by mid morning we had 6 or 7 knots and lots of sunshine. Jake got his first taste of seasickness. Literally. This is the first time he’s ever thrown up so imagine his surprise. Yuck. Poor kid. But luckily, that would be the only time on this maiden voyage. We caught three Bonita. We threw two back and had the biggest one for supper the next few days. While I was cooking dinner we had dolphins swimming on our bow. Very cool. I’ve burned dinner for lots of different reasons but never because I got distracted by the dolphins!

I had my first night watch. I’ll write more about that later, but it went ok. The next day was not quite as sunny, but the wind picked up and we made good time. On track to make it to Isla Guadalupe on Monday.

Almost off the hard (cross your fingers)

Good news is the engine doesn't need a total rebuild (yet).  Not so good news is we're still on the hard getting the bottom painted.  It's taking a few extra days given the delay of getting it out of the water as well as finding some spots that needed sanding and new epoxy before repainting.  But it could be a whole lot worse.  I want to thank our good friends Eric and Nicole for letting us stay at their house (2 extra days, might I add).  Since Eric was out of town most of the time, I would especially like to thank Nicole.  When we stay with someone, we move in.  We take over the kitchen, do numerous loads of laundry and come with lots of toys.  Nicole has been very generous.  Eric came home today and he and Jake entertained us with an impromptu jam session.

As for the boat, the oil pressure loss turned out to be due to a kinked exhaust that created back pressure in the oil pan which blew out the dipstick and most of the oil.  We have a few more checks to do once it's back in the water but we think we're good to go.  We're trying to get a rebuild kit to take with us in case we have any problems along the way.  We know within the next year we're going to have to do something with it.  In the meantime, we'll just run on our port engine to be safe.  It's a good thing we have two engines!

The last few days have been spent running around for last minute parts, last minute shots and medications, getting visas and new military ids, etc.  Neither one of us feels 100% prepared but I don't suspect we ever will.  Emotions are on high.  This weekend we'll spend some time with family, last minute maintenance and then weather permitting, Wednesday morning we'll set sail for Ensenada.  It should be about a 12 hour sail.  The last time we were in Ensenada someone told me of the Global Mercado - about a 4 square block market.  But it was closed due to the Mexican Independence day.  I'm hoping this time we can make it there and buy any produce we might need and anything else I don't know I want, oops I mean need.  From there we're off to Isla Guadalupe to see the sharks (still without a shark cage)!

Once we head out I'll start the official homeschooling curriculum I bought.  I took a good look at it the other day and it looks like we'll sail through (no pun intended) some of it and strive to make the other parts interesting.  I don't see Jake sitting at the table for very long with lots of worksheets.  It does however, provide me with a cheat sheet of what I should be focusing on should I get lost.  There's lots of philosophies on homeschooling, most of which I can find some sort of validity in.  After we get a little more experience under out belts, I'll venture out and provide my 2 cents for anyone interested.

For all of my landlubber friends, take a good luck at the pictures here.  This should clear up any confusion on "what is a catamaran?"

Last minute "to do's"

It's been a while since I posted as we've been extremely busy getting ready to go.  We now have less than a week before we leave.  I feel like we're running a hundred miles an hour in slow motion.  We're busy doing lots of things but it doesn't always feel like we're making progress.

Last week was spring break here so there were lots of kiddie activities in the RV park.  I took Jake over a few days.  The highlight was definitely the bike races.  I have myself a little cheater.  Somehow, he always seemed to cut the trip to the cone just short enough to make a good show in the race (notice I didn't say "to win the race").  He did meet a few little friends and one family of four (yes, four) boys were extremely interested in learning more about living on a boat so we invited them over for a little play date.  All I have to say is wow, those are some brave parents.  The kids were extremely well behaved, but when you put that many boys under the age of 7 in a confined space, chaos is surely to take over.

We took the boat out yesterday with my parents.  Surprisingly, this is the first time the stars have aligned and they've been able to go sailing with us.  Despite local weather forecasts, it turned out to be a beautiful day.  We just toodled around the bay and had lunch on Coronado Island at a great pizza place right on the water.  It was also nice to get the boat out and force ourselves to stow everything away.  To be honest, I had doubts I could actually find a place for everything.

Andy has been doing lots of work on the boat.  He  refinished the countertops in the galley, head and navigation station.  They turned out great.  I'll post a before and after later, but basically we bought a product at home depot (around $250) that you paint/sprinkle on and it turns out to look like coriander.  It made a world of difference in the look and feel of the boat.

I've been buying stuff here and there for our trip but today was the first day I really got serious about provisioning.  For those of you that don't know us, we live to eat, not the other way around, so this could possibly be one of the most important parts of our preparation (second only to those really important "gotta have to get you across the ocean" things).  I went to Trader Joe's and bought all of the wine and some of the more gourmet things we think we can't live without.  Next stop was Costco for all things big and bulky.  Final stop was Ralph's (local grocery store) for everything else.  We should only have to make one or two more runs right before we leave to get our fruits/veggies and any fresh meat we want to take with us.

This part has been kind of an overwhelming experience.  How much peanut butter does a family of three really need?  I was told it was hard to find, so better to be safe than sorry.  Have you ever told a four year old there's no more peanut butter and jelly?  How far will three tubes of wasabi take us?  Can we catch that much fresh fish (with the amount of fishing gear we have on board, we'd better)?  And let's not forget the real reason we're going, to eat local foods right?  Is that why I have three pounds of pasta and four packages of Nori on board?  I don't think we're going anywhere near Italy or Japan for some time.  At the end of the day though, I found a place for everything (even if that does include lifting a floor board to get to it) and have no doubt that we'll be happy to have too much than not enough.  I'm sure as I get the hang of this, I'll learn what we seriously can't live without and what we'll find along the way.

Tomorrow we're taking the boat over to Shelter Island to get it hauled out and have the bottom painted (nothing like waiting until the last minute, huh?).  We'll take lots of pictures and share that experience later in the week.  I'm hoping it's extremely uneventful.

Party Time

Saturday we had our "Andy Retired and we're sailing away party."  Very fun.  I wasn't as excited about it as I should have been.   Over the years, I've always imagined Andy's retirement and our going away party on the east coast.  That's where all of our oldest friends are and all of my family.   I shouldn't have worried.  I underestimated the good friends we've made here in CA and how much they care.  We've made tons of new friends here at the dock and most of them were able to join us.  A few folks from Andy's command were able to come but the best part was having my parents as well as our best friend Eric and his wife there.  They mean the world to us and to be lucky enough to have them close by is more than we could ask for.  As an added bonus, our friend Chris from Virginia just happened to be in town for work and was able to come hang out with us as well.

One of our dock friends, Dave gave us a cocktail burgee, and he was kind enough to explain the rules to it.  For those of you that don't know, a cocktail burgee is a little flag with a picture of a martini glass on it that you raise up your lines when you want to invite folks over for cocktails.  Of course we'll need one of those.  Evidently, if you raise it right side up, you're announcing that you're providing the cocktails.  If you raise it upside down, your telling everyone to bring their own.  Thank goodness he told us this!  It would never occur to me to raise it upside down and I can just hear our conversation now...

"Well, that was fun.  A lot of people showed up"
"Yeah, and they drank everything we had"
"No kidding.  What a bunch of moochers."

And that would be the end of our cocktail hours.

So with less than three weeks to go, we're getting close to being ready to leave.  The list of projects is getting smaller (well, priorities are moving around).
- Finish getting shots (this is the worst for Jake)
- Store everything on the boat (this is my biggest worry)
- Get new mattress.  It's in, but hanging out at Andy's command until we pick it up.
- Get cards with our name and website on it.  These are kind of like social cards.  Evidently it's a popular way to keep in touch with the folks you meet along the way.  They should be here today.
- Finish countertop in galley
- Buy new batteries and build battery box for them.  We have 4 already but Andy wants two more.  Our solar panels are making oodles of energy and we've become electrically fat, so we need more ways to run our computers (and blender).
- Finish installing all of the navigational software on the computers and get the SSB hooked up to our practor modem (this is for weather information as well as email when we're not near an internet hook up).
- Make sure water maker works.  More than likely, we can't do this until we leave.  The water here in the bay is less than desirable for our first run.
- Call banks and change addresses as well as let them know we'll be out of the country for a while.  I don't want my credit card cut off in the middle of nowhere.

Time's a tickin'!

More updates

More progress on Savannah... We finally got the little bitty part needed for our grill, so we're back in business there.  Although I will say, I managed to cook a pretty tasty steak on the stove/in the oven last week.

I've started a few sewing projects.  I shocked Andy so much, he took a picture.  I'm not very good, but as long as I'm sewing something that's made up of a few hems and straight lines, I can get it done.

Andy's air compressor came in yesterday.  He spent the afternoon loving, caressing and showing it off to our neighbor Scott.  Definitely a man thing... I scuba dive and all, but it seems like an ugly necessity, not a new accessory to display in the main salon (which is where he would put it if I let him).

The beloved compressor.

Our neighbors across the dock - Scott & Terri.  They were inviting Jake to go to a potluck with them, but he respectfully declined and chose to have pork chops with mom and dad.

There will be a day when I quit mentioning that I'm unemployed, but today is not that day.  I almost had an anxiety attack walking back from the shower the other day.  Normally, when I'm on my way back, I'm thinking of who I need to call, what meeting I need to prepare for, etc.  Monday, I had nothing on my mind.  That's when I panicked.  I had to actually stop, sit and calm myself down.  I'll have to find something else to identify myself with now.  Which led me to another thought.  I can't even imagine how Andy is coping with this.  Over the course of his life, he's been in the Navy longer than he's been out. Talk about identifying yourself by a job!

Now that I'm home, I find myself wanting to write more, but I'm not sure who is reading this and what you all are interested in hearing about.  So this is where we go interactive.  Post your comments about what you would like to read most (and sign up as a "Follower" while you're at it)....play by play accounts of what we're doing, boat projects, my intellectual pondering (not likely), preparation for leaving, what it's like to liveaboard/dock life....  for those that know me, I'm never at a loss for words, I just want to post words you want to read.

Jobless in San Deigo

The cat is out of the bag now. No more secrets. I officially quit my job. What a scary thing to do. That might top my list of things that make me nervous about this trip. Number two would be that I handed out the blog address to all of the people I work with so now they're seeing another side of me that I'm slightly uncomfortable with sharing. I should have thought that through. So for all of you work people reading, be kind. As you know, I'm not a writer, I'm project manager.

But woo hoo!!! I quit my job! Oh yeah, I said that already.

I've found that we've gone through several stages in our journey to "cast off the lines."  The first stage was the longest. Selling our house, setting the date, getting rid of some of our stuff, telling everyone we were ready to do it, and actually buying the boat.  This is where we started getting really excited.  People called us crazy and they doubted that we would actually do it (and at times, we did too).

I think the second stage started when we sold ALL of our stuff and moved onto the boat.  This is where we started to say "There's no turning back now."  This stage involved figuring out some logistics as well.  What curriculum will I use for homeschooling?  What mail forwarding service should we use?  Where do we want to establish "residency" (the gov't doesn't allow gypsies)?  How will we manage our finances?  We started some remodeling projects, made our big long lists of things to do and started thinking about our route.

We're now into our third stage...Andy has retired (well, almost), I've quit my job, we're down to one car, project lists are getting crossed off  both because they're complete and because we've decided they're not as important now as they were 2 months ago when it looked like we had a lot of time.  We're getting last rounds of shots.  Traveling back home to say good bye to people.  Now we're saying "There's REALLY no turning back now."

I'm anticipating one more phase.  It will be the last week or so before we leave.  We'll sell my car, go to the grocery store and buy everything we think we might need (knowing us we'll pack for a year), purchase last minute items and say goodbyes to all of our local friends and family.  Then we leave.  We've targeted April 18, assuming the weather is good to us.

In all my excitement it's  hard to be sad about leaving.  In my experience, with moving around with the Navy and dealing with Andy's deployments, I've found that it's easier to leave than to be left (I think I'm repeating myself here).  But I've also found that it hits me hard way after the fact.  So for all of my friends and family that are wondering if I'm ever going to show the proper amount of sadness, rest assured it will come.  Picture me teary eyed at the helm while on watch one night wishing I could shop with my mom, gossip with Hunter, or drink my favorite wine with Jennie.  I'll probably write some sappy blog entry that I will never publish because I won't want people to know that everything isn't blissfully wonderful.  I think that will probably happen...but until then, I'll carry on with my permanent smile and no care attitude while counting down the days until we leave (57 in case any of you were wondering).  Thanks for your understanding.

Preparations

Now that we've made it through the storms here in Southern California (living on a boat has it's advantages during storm season...no flash floods, trees falling, or mudslides), Andy and I are ready to get serious on the preparations for leaving.  It can be quite overwhelming.  For those of you who may not be aware of what it takes, I thought I would share some of the list with you.

First there are the "projects."  You've already heard about the galley remodel (still underway).  We also need to redo our cabin, but I'm afraid we may not get to that.  At a minimum, we're going to extend our bed and get a new mattress.  The length is not a big deal for me since I'm a little vertically challenged, but Andy is having a hard time with it.  I am excited about the new mattress though!

We bought a modem the other day that's supposed to hook up to our Single Side Band Radio and enable us to get email, weatherfaxes, etc.  We have to install that and get it all working.  Initial indications are that this may take some time (evidently our radio is "fickle").

We just ordered the netting to go around our lifelines to keep kid and toys on board so that will need to be put up.

Andy ordered a new compressor for filling our scuba tanks and powering the new air tools he got for Christmas.  Evidently, it gets it's own box that needs to be installed on the deck.

Small, yet still important, is the need to make and install a metal ring in our cockpit to hang a shower curtain, since we won't be getting around to putting the shower in doors (yep, you heard me right).  While neither of us is obese or over the hill yet, I still think our cruising neighbors will appreciate a little modesty.

Install two new batteries and put in a new battery bank.

Fix the NEW Wind/Speed/Direction indicator (with a very fancy name I can't recall right now) at the top of the mast to work all of the time, instead of only when it wants to.

Install hand rails along the stairs on both hulls so we'll quit falling and Jake will have something else to hang from.

Go through hidey holes and clean out everything we don't need.

In addition to the little and not so little projects that we have less than 3 months to complete, there are numerous, tedious, administrative activities we have to do.  In no particular order:

1) Complete all checkups, shots, teeth cleanings, hair cuts, etc.  In my case, spend the next two months at the dentist trying to salvage all the work done when I had my jaw surgery.  Yes, I brush my teeth, but evidently 18 screws and metal plates in your mouth are hard on your bones.
2) Go through our first aid kit and fatten it up for long term travel.
3) Quit job or in Andy's case, finish all the crap he has to do for Uncle Sam to let me have him.
4) Set up mail forwarding service and get mail forwarded.
5) Plan and throw Retirement/Going Away party (this isn't really essential to us leaving, but I think the old guy deserves a party for 21 years in the service).
6) Establish residency in homeschool friendly state (I cannot wait to be one of the Californians that flock to Texas).  This one still has some unknowns for me.
7) Drive Truck to Oklahoma (special delivery) and Sell Car to Carmax (or highest bidder).  Must obtain car title from bank in VA before we can head on up to Carmax (we've procrastinated on this one for over a year).
8) Attempt to visit everyone in GA (you may only get to see me...we're soon to be poor, but I'm trying).
9) Make up provisioning list (i.e. grocery list) for 3 months worth of meals (For all of you that actually know me, this will involve a detailed menu with items sorted by category and whether or not they have to be refrigerated.  Then I'll have to make a map of where it's all stored for fear of losing it in one of our hidey holes) and then actually go buy the stuff and store it.  I'm sure I'll go into detail on this when it actually happens.
10) Last minute purchases....Jake is totally outgrowing his clothes, my flip flops are falling apart and Andy's shorts all have holes in them or fiberglass stains.
11) Schedule move for what little things we kept in storage to go to GA.

I'm sure there's more but my dentist told me I need to quit stressing for fear my TMJ/TMD will get worse :).  So by writing it down, I'm attempting to rid my little brain of keeping track and worrying about it.  I guess I could make a project plan.....