Our Life On Wheels :: July 2012 :: RV Must Haves

If this is your first visit to We Choose This Life -- Welcome!
Starting June 2012, a monthly blog carnival, Our Life On Wheels will be held here.  Fulltime travelers will come together to share about a variety of topics. If you want to learn more about the carnival head over here.

Make sure you scroll to the bottom of the post the link up or check out others "RV Must Haves".  And don't forget to check out last months blog carnival, "A Day In the Life Of..."  

**If you have previously added the Our Life On Wheels :: Blog Carnival button, please head over here and use the updated button, the old one has a dead link. Thank you! **

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Our Top 5 RV Must Haves

Our traveling family has been on the road for almost 3 years.  We've had two RV's, both travel trailers.  Over the years we've come to find many things that are MUST HAVES for this life on the road.  Let me just tell you it was ridiculously hard to decide which RV must haves we wanted to include...when you fulltime RV most everything you have with you is a must have :)

Here are our TOP 5 (in no particular order):

1. Lightweight Non-Breakable Dishes: We chose BPA Free, Melamine dishware.  Our Laurie Gates dishes were purchased at Costco (4 place settings for around $25).  I loved the color that they brought to the table, add in the fact that they are lightweight, inexpensive and unbreakable, we have never once regretted the purchase.  When the time comes that we are needing new dishes I think I will go with Zak Designs, I am particularly fond of their Confetti Recycled Melamine line.

2. Magnetic Spice Tray & Magnetic Knife Rack: Besides my Vita-Mix, these two magnetic kitchen items are a MUST HAVE.  For the magnetic spice tray, I purchased a metal tray from a antique store (also can be found on Ebay) and then magnetic spice tins from Bed Bath and Beyond (you can get them at World Market also).  The magnetic knife rack was purchased at Ikea.  Just an FYI the spice tins nor the knives are removed for travel, also both the spice tray and the knife rack were installed with regular screws and a drill (or screwdriver, can't remember which).  

 

3. Mini Broom & Dust Pan:  Yes, an RV is a small space, therefore easier (and quicker) to clean than a house.  But we are EIGHT bodies coming and going, eating, making messes, we have to sweep & vacuum frequently. I've found that a big broom and dust pan just take up too much space, not to mention they don't work well in the small areas, like the bathroom, around beds, etc.  We love our mini broom and dust pan and for $1.99 at Ikea, you can't go wrong.  We use it MULTIPLE times a day.  It lives under the kitchen sink for easy access.  Plus, an added benefit, even my 3 year old can sweep up crumbs from lunch or sand from the playground :)

 

4.  Portable RV Waste Tank: If you plan on staying places that don't have full-hookups (which include many Thousand Trails, state & county parks) and plan to be using a dump station, you have got to get one of these.  When your tanks are full, you no longer have to hookup your trailer and pull it around to the nearest dump station.  Just fill up your 22 Gal. Original Tote-Along, hook it up to your hitch and drive the portable waste tank to the nearest dump station.  You could also have your 8 & 10 year old try to tote it over, that makes for quite the entertainment.  When not in use our rides on our back ladder attached with some strappy tie downs (technical I know).

5. RV Stabilizer and Leveler Blocks:  Long gone are the HEAVY chunks of wood we use to haul around.  For about 18 months we've had the Lynx Leveler Blocks .  We use them to under our tongue and stabilizer jacks and to level the trailer side to side.  We have two sets of 10, they are lightweight, easy to store and very useful!

*This post contains affiliate links* 

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Thank you for joining us and come back next month for  

Our Life On Wheels :: Blog Carnival :: "Meals on the Road".

August  2012 :: "Meals on the Road"  How do you cook in that tiny RV kitchen and fit your food in that tiny RV fridge?  What are your favorite on the road meals?  How often do you grocery shop?  Do you have a favorite recipe or kitchen item you couldn't live without?  We want to know about it!

--Please have your post ready to link up by Monday, August 6.  Check out the guidelines for Our Life On Wheels :: Blog Carnival if this will be your first time participating or if you have any questions.

Our Life on Wheels :: Blog Carnival

Once a month this summer (and hopefully beyond), this blog will host a series: Our Life on Wheels.   Fulltime travelers will be joining together to share on a variety of topics.

We start June out with - "A Day in the Life Of".  If you are interested in participating please see below.

And I hope you are interested in reading and seeing what a typical fulltime travelers daily life looks like, please check back here on Monday, June, 4 --- I will have my post live by then and others will be linking up.

Other topics to be covered are: How We School on the Road, Meals on the Road, How We Fit It All (Organization), Favorite RV Things, Our Favorite Place.  I am welcoming other topic ideas (whether you travel fulltime or not), so please comment or email me.

Interested in participating, here are the details:
My goal is to run a series of blog posts that connect all of us and our various ways of doing things, as well as giving fellow travelers, dreamers, family and friends answers to their most common questions.

The series is going to start with "A Day in the Life Of..." The post can cover your family doing ordinary and/or extraordinary things over an 8-48 hour time frame. The format is totally open, meaning you can use pictures, words, and/or any other variety of media to offer your readers a small window into your daily life.

The blog posts will be connected via We Choose This Life and your posts will link up at the bottom, I will also ask that you link back to the series (for now grab button below). My post will be live on Monday, June 4, so please have yours ready to be linked by this date. This blog series is going to be joined with the Group Writing Project on the Fulltime Families. 

:::COPY & PASTE TO GRAB THIS BUTTON:::

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Residency? Domicile? Or, How We Became Real Texans.

When we started traveling fulltime we stayed California residents, using our parents address as ours and a PO Box for our mail.  Once every two or so weeks sister would pick up our mail and forward the important stuff onto us wherever we happened to be.  We filed a private school affidavit that allowed us to homeschool the children.  This worked well, but it wasn't ideal long term.

We began to research what other fulltime travelers did for their mail, residency and homeschooling dilemmas.  We don't own land or a house anywhere, so that wasn't a deciding factor.  It came down to three states we were choosing from, South Dakota, Texas and Florida.  All three had mailing forwarding services that would fit our needs, all three were fulltime traveler friendly.  Out of the three Texas is the only state with no regulations on homeschooling, both Florida and South Dakota have moderate regulation.

There were a few deciding factors that led us to choose Texas as our new home state.  One, no regulations on homeschooling.  Two, low cost license and registration on our RV and vehicle.  Three, Texas is centrally located and has weather we wouldn't mind being in at any time of year (just because we travel fulltime doesn't mean we wouldn't ever have to have jury duty.)  The switch was pretty painless.  And it was only after we made all the changes did we realize we also have no state income taxes, so that was an added plus.

How we became Texans:
1. Became Escapees members and signed up for their mail forwarding service (we did this prior to arriving to Livingston, through the mail)
     -We were issued an permenant street address, not a PO Box.
2. Visited Livingston, TX
     -Got our Excursion and trailer inspected (at a local body shop)
     -Registered and licensed both, registered to vote,  received new license plates that day (at the Polk County Tax Assessors office)
     -Applied for Texas drivers licenses (at Texas Department of Public Safety)
3. Switched our insurance to Texas.  We were able to stick with our same companies, Ameriprise for vehicle and Progressive for travel trailer.  The switch took just a phone call to each company.  And our premiums went down dramatically from what we were paying in California.
4. Changed our address with employer, bank, insurance, cell phone, etc.

All in all we were running around Livingston for less than 3 hours to accomplish all of these tasks.  Which included some juggling of kids and ATM cards to get sufficient funds in cash.

A few need to knows:
 - Registering vehicles, applying for drivers license and registering to vote can only be done once you have a Texas mailing address. 
 - The tax assessors office (where you register and license vehicles and RVs) only takes local checks and cash.  We had not been residents long enough to have new "local" checks and our bank was not in town, so we had to make a few trips to the ATM.
- In order to apply for drivers license, all vehicles and RVs must be registered, so make sure you do this first.
-When you apply for a Texas drivers license they confiscate your old license and give you a temporary 8 1/2x11 black and white print out of your license which has to last you the 6-8weeks until your real license arrives (plus forwarding time).  We can say that this license even though this license looks as fraudulent as they come, Nick was able to fly from California to Arkansas and back with it.  (Although it was a little iffy on both legs of the trip if his ID was going to be sufficient.)  So I might suggest that if you are planning on doing any air travel make sure it is at least 8 weeks after you apply for your license :)
- From what I can gather, the licensing and registering of vehicles and RV's can be done through the mail.  Inspections must be completed within 10 days of entering the state.  I am not clear on how long you have to switch your drivers license.
- Yearly inspections are due on vehicles and RVs, however if you are not in Texas when registration and inspections come due, you can still pay registration.   You will then get vehicles and RVs inspected the next time you go to Texas, within 10 days of arriving back in the state. 

   Y'all we are Texans now.

 We received a lot of information on this process from the Escapees forums and  a document published by the Escapees RV Club called "How to Become a Real Texan", this is a newly updated version packed full of information.  The DPS and the Tax Assessors office were both very helpful over the phone, so that we could make sure we had everything in order before arriving.