My Trailer Redo - Days 185, 186 - Insulation Finished

  For the whole blow by blow of how I arrived at the process, see the link below. For those of you that know the drill, here is the completion of insulating the whole trailer. This shot is looking at the kitchen end.

Green foam board on the bottom layer, white polyethylene (closed cell foam) around the curve.

More green board on the ceiling. More white foam on the curve with contact cement. Then the top finish layer of polyethylene, as seen in the picture above.

As expected, there were some oddly shaped pieces. But I have to say that this 1/2 inch foam was very adaptable and there was less futzing with it than I expected to have to do.

I did the same two layers around the door, but there is going to be something else over that. Stay tuned.

And, I almost forgot to finish the walls below the seating. I had started it long ago. Anyway, same deal... green foam, fiberglass batting stuffed in at the top where there is no way to glue board in...

...then white. These were much easier to do than I expected, although I did have to be something of a contortionist to work in the spaces.

In other news: This was actually almost done yesterday. Today, I finished a volunteer project that allows me to cross off a BIG ONE, did 3 small items, and worked on the cushions. 16 BIG ITEMS to complete or drop- (46 done). Tons of small ones to do (44 done). I'm not even going to report how many small things to do. At this point I'm just writing down any little thing I need to remember. 8 days to go.

See Insulation and Ceiling

Last Bell Choir for a While

  Here are today's performances. You get half of a decent technical product. The framing is good, and the sound is pretty good. For some reason, the camera (which was on the right setting, and on autofocus) decided not to focus. Sigh.

We played "Be Still My Soul" for the prelude. More accurately, Becky Sopha played this beautiful arrangement on the piano and the bells accompanied her. But it sounds good.



And for our primary piece, the camera again refused to focus. But I'm really glad we at least captured the sound for this one. It's the theme from Beethoven's 9th symphony, Hymn of Joy. This is the most difficult piece we've played since the turnover a couple of years ago when several of the ringers retired and we gained some new people and Carleen became director. And, I think we did a pretty good job!

There was one measure that I'd only played correctly once in all the rehearsals, and I got it right-- and didn't mess up anything else either. Just on a personally selfish thought, right when the tempo changes and we begin using mallets, if I didn't hit the first couple of notes correctly it could throw everyone off. And it was tough to get them right. But I'm really happy to tell you that I did master that measure.

Honestly, it's not about whether I get it right. It's about enhancing the worship experience, and good music is such an important part of that! PTL!



I have lots of old and new friends at the Methodist Church, and many of them were wishing me well on this crazy adventure I'm beginning very soon.

In other news: There is tons of other news. I get to cross off 3 BIG ITEMS today. Monica came over in the afternoon and we worked like maniacs. After she left, I stayed in the trailer and finished one of the three. I'll have to blog about it tomorrow because I wanted to share this music.

17 BIG ITEMS to complete- (45 done). Tons of small ones to do (40 done). 9 days to go.

See October Bell Choir

Stocking the Trailer Pantry

  Five years ago, Marie and I started using this method to make evening meal prep in the trailer easy. The link below talks about it, and also shows you the inside of the trailer before I did anything except make curtains. What a difference!

Anyway... I wanted to start this adventure with some of these meal bags on hand in the trailer. Here's how it works. I buy shelf-stable products that can be made into a meal without adding much- maybe some sauted onion, or extra veggies. Originally, I put in a can of fruit and maybe some crackers. But we found that we always had some crackers open, and usually ate fresh fruit rather than canned. So now, each bag just has a main course. You can see the bags are labeled.

Here is one example. It has a box of Suddenly Salad Sweet Basil Pasta. The items added on the bag in lower case are things that could be added: tomatoes, cheese, etc. You can add meat to these as well. They are designed to be refrigerated and eaten as a salad, but they are also good as a hot meal.

Some of the bags just have cans of soup. Some have a sauce packet, some carb (rice, noodles, etc), and a can of meat (chicken, tuna, vienna sausages, etc). I ended up with 21 meals. My first helper, Sue, is comfortable with cooking without this level of preparation. That means these won't be used up in the first 21 days. And these kinds of meals are easily replaced at the grocery store. Some on my support team are not as confident of the kitchen tasks, so this kind of setup relieves them of figuring out meals. The bags store nicely in a box in one of the under-seat bins.

I usually have yogurt for breakfast, and lunch for me will be crackers with cheese and peanut butter, some vegs and a treat. As you know, the snack packs are already made up.

My needs for the evening meal are simple. Fill me up, give me carbs, maybe a cookie at the end. I love having a big salad for dinner, but we've found that lettuce doesn't keep all that well in the cooler. We might treat ourselves to a bag of mixed greens sometimes. Then we'd eat it all up quickly enough.

I bought a lot of discount stuff across the street over the last month as I saw things that would work for these meals. Last night, I organized my pile and made a list of things I need to add to call this job done. That is four cans of stuff. They go in the bags with the white tags. I'll get them tomorrow. So, I can't cross this one off yet (it's a BIG ONE), but I'm showing you now because there may be another BIG ONE done tomorrow too.

By the way... I did add up all that I've spent on food for this trip so far. I have 56 days of backpacking food. That is 3 meals and 1 snack pack (containing 2 items) per day, an additional 336 snack packs for day hiking, and now 21 trailer meals. That's a total of 581 meals or equivilents. The average cost per meal/equivalent is $1.30. I'm very pleased.

In other news: I was working on things that count by 10 am again. Worked on the trailer all day because the weather was reasonably mild. I'm getting really close to done on the "construction" items! Stay tuned.

20 BIG ITEMS to complete- (42 done). 45 small ones to do (38 done). 10 days to go. Very soon, I'll offially drop some of the BIG ONES off the list, but I'm not dumping them just yet.

See Pretty Much Ready to Go

Singing I Go Along Life's Road

  Do you know this chorus?
Singing I go along life's road,
Praising the Lord, praising the Lord.
Singing I go along life's road,
For Jesus has lifted my load.

Sure, I need to have all these required things done so I can even go walking for 365 days. But there has to be some preparation for what I will do to make those days more than just a mind-numbing walk. There will be picture-taking, and encounters with people, and plant study, and sky watching, I'm sure. But I know there will also be singing.

Years ago, I made up a little book called the "No Frills Personal Collection of Songs for the Trail." It's a combination of Girl Scout songs and Christian choruses and hymns.

I made them for my core hiking buddies, and they were well used. Keeping it in a plastic bag most of the time preserved it in a still readable condition.

But this will be a long hike! I had a list of songs I wanted to add anyway, and I had the computer files, so I wasn't starting from scratch. I ended up doubling the size of the book. Edition 2! Can you tell how many more pages it has?

I added a lot of hymns. Comparing the Christian life to a walk is commonplace. Colossians 1:10 says "walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God"

But there are lots of fun songs to just fill a tiresome afternoon like "The Unicorn," "The Fox," "The Frozen Logger," etc. Many verses are a good thing on days like that.

No fancy bindings on these. The pages were clamped together, holes were drilled and cord tied through.

Since I'd first compiled that book, I'd also started collecting the music for the songs. I didn't really make note of how far I was on that project before I added so many songs, but anyway, now there are 207 songs, and I have the music for 166 of them. Not bad.

I'm taking my ukulele, and I got a tiny keyboard (a toy, really), but if it lasts a year of being bounced around in the trailer, that will be fine.

I'm hopeful that there will be lots of music in my life this year. I'll literally be "Singing I go along life's road..."

In other news. Well, I was up until 2 am finishing this project. But it means I can cross off a BIG ONE. I also get to cross off 2 small ones- one of which turned out to be pretty time consuming- but it's done now. Staying up so late meant I didn't wake up too early. But since I was awake at 3 am, I went internet surfing and found a solution for one of the big projects that may transform it to a small project. Today, I did errands and worked on the trailer all afternoon.

20 BIG ITEMS to complete- (42 done). 45 small ones to do (38 done). 11 days to go.

See A Book of Verses

My Trailer Redo - Days 181-184 - Upper Kitchen Storage

  And finally, I get to cross off that BIG ITEM I've been teasing you with. The Kitchen Storage Cupboard is done.

At least for this second upper storage bin I did not have to rethink everything. Mostly I was able to duplicate the rear storage bin, with a couple of exceptions. For one thing, it's not as deep. If it were, anyone standing there trying to cook would hit their head. This one is also truncated on the right side because it butts up to the closet wall.

Of course, it started with yet more of those annoying custom braces to be cut and fiberglassed in place.

But I did get them in the right place this time on the first try.

I cut the shelf (bottom) and fitted it to the grooved board my friend Jesse cut for me. Then cut the front. While these were being polyurethaned, I covered the trailer wall that will be inside the cupboard with green foam...

and white. Once again, I'm just showing you the funky shape of the foam piece.

And like the main ceiling, this was fastened with the double sided butyl tape. So much easier and better than gluing.

Of course, I was dry fitting everything multiple times before anything was fastened permanently. Once the polyurethane was dry, I could start putting the wood pieces together.

And, then the unit went in the trailer. Still needs the doors added. The tape strips are to help me align those. (Ignore the big white stripe- I'm just continuing to work on insulation between other things.)

These doors were a tiny bit trickier to hang because we decided these should open upward, so when you are cooking, you can just reach up and grab something. Success!

If you missed the blow-by-blow with more detail, you can follow the link below for building the back storage unit. It was just over a month ago that I finished that one. Here are the two of them... back sleeping/eating area (with the ceiling now finished) and front kitchen area.

In other news: I did some odds and ends of small jobs in the morning. Mostly things that aren't even on the lists. But I was again working on things that count by 10 am. It was chilly and snowy out today. I worked inside the trailer with the little heater going. It does really well. I'm sure it will be even better when I finish the insulation.

One big item done and good hope for another one tomorrow. 21 BIG ITEMS to complete- (41 done). 40 small ones to do but of course I need to add more. (36 done). 12 days to go.

I'm trying really hard to finish the trailer enough that I can start packing it early and have some time to think about things as I do that. If I can't start that until the last minute, mistakes are sure to be made. If I have the big stuff done, I can do the mostly mindless small things in the final days.

See Upper Back Storage