Merry Christmas from JAAR, otr!!!

This is our Christmas card this year!  With the craziness of work schedules, family visits and living in our 5th wheel, cards didn't get out this year.  It was time to do a blog anyways!  So Merry, Merry Christmas to family and friends and Happy New Year's too!

Looking through the calendar to see our events is helping me keep it all together.  Since the last time I wrote, my mom and dad have visited.  We had a great time with them here and exploring new areas with them.  We introduced them to Rudy's BBQ, which we still think is one of the best (and quickest) BBQ's around these parts.  Jason especially loves the ribs and the moist brisket.  The problem is with many of the BBQ joints, you end up walking out of there smelling of smoke and want to go take a shower!  Our next spot to take them was San Antonio where we explored the Alamo, riverwalk and Tower of Americas.  All of us were surprised at the Alamo, how small it was, and all the history that is revealed within it.  We also finally did some wine tasting in Texas hill country and ate at Salt Lick BBQ (a must!).  It was nice to enjoy a few of the sights, but also to hang out and enjoy each others company.

We have spent some time exploring little bits and pieces of Austin and surroundings, but pretty much hanging out and staying warm.  Actually, we have gotten through the crazy weather by watching episodes of Modern Family....I think we are caught up now of the last 3 years!  We have had some extreme temperatures here: 85 one day, then 2 days later, 26!  We are getting all our cold outfits together for our trip to Europe in January!

Stormy nights!

Bundled up in Fredricksburg, TX (frozen fountain in the background)

My Aunt and Uncle, who live in Mammoth, CA visited us for a couple of days on their way to Georgia to spend the rest of their winter.  They stayed one night at our RV park, then moved closer into Austin.  We walked and walked and walked around Austin with them!  We had a nice relaxing time, and wish that we were following them to the Southeast in January.
Currently, Jason's Uncle and partner are visiting from the LA area.  They visited us in Salem, OR and now here.  I wonder if they will come wherever we go?!!!  We have enjoyed exploring the Capital building in Austin, the river walk in San Antonio (with lights this time!), and sneaking in a little hike.  Tracy's aunt lives in Austin, whom we met, and treated us to a wonderful lunch at the UT Club, with a sneak peek at one of the stadium suites reserved for those that give over 6 figures to the University!  Andre's already saying he wants one (do they ever grow out of that!).  Wouldn't you know, this is our last week here, and we never got to a game :(

Tracy, Ted and the boys in San Antonio, TX

3rd time visiting and we finally see the lights on display in San Antonio, TX

Boys are drooling over the stadium suites.....

Our time here is winding down, with this being my last week at work (24, 25, 26---augh!!!).  We are now looking forward to the next month which is filled with new and fun things.  We are planning on visiting my cousin in Dallas for a couple of days before heading out to Paris and London with Jason's mom and brother.  And, if that wasn't enough, we are going on the road again with our next adventure  in Phoenix, AZ late January!  Our plan was to go to the Southeast (Carolina's), but there were only a couple of jobs available for me (that paid enough $), and most of the RV parks were full for the winter already.  So, we tried the Southwest and got lucky.  We found an RV site first, and then the job came after.  We are all looking forward to getting warm again and enjoy seeing places in the Southwest.
This has been another whirlwind of a year for us (and our families n friends)!  We have been able to do it all through the love and support of those around us who are keeping us going, keeping us sane, and keeping in touch!  We are looking forward to Phoenix, but never know where we'll end up after that.
Stay tuned to find out, meanwhile, enjoy the pictures and have a great holiday season!
Love, The Grosdidier's

Austin, Take One!

There has been a lag since the last post and that is because our time here in Austin has been full of ups and downs.  We had thoughts that this area just isn't going to work for us, and we need to make a new move.  Things have settled down and we are beginning to find the joy in being in a new town and have started branching out from our RV resort.  So this post is about our take on Austin up until this point.  For starters the big downer was my job.  Things did not go as planned from the beginning, and was actually told to "go home", they couldn't use me.  Having spent so much time getting all of my certifications in order, I thought that I had everything that a job could want in a Labor and Delivery nurse.  Apparently, my advanced certification was too much for this hospital, and they wanted only intermediate, but didn't have a class for 2 weeks.  Needless to say, I have my "intermediate" certification, but have had a whirlwind orientation due to the mess-up.  Things have settled down work wise, and I am finding the groove of the hospital, staff and patient population.  Thank goodness!  I would hate to think that a job/hospital would send our whole family packing!  Although, we are pretty mobile, it is still unsettling how quickly things can go south.
And, South we are!  Let's talk about this weather in Austin....."it's never like this".  We have heard this saying just about everyplace we have been! (Hot weather in Salem,OR;cold winters living in Sparks, NV) Does the crazy weather follow us?  Most people we talked to said that it is unusual for it to be humid in Austin.  Even without the threat of rain, it was humid!  And with the humidity, comes the bugs.....oh, those bugs, they're bigger in Texas!  Jason is the lucky one that is the go-to guy for the pesky critters.  He's left with welts and scratchy bites all over his feet, legs and arms.  We are stocking up on the benadryl creme for him! We have experienced some great thunder and lightening storms so far.  One thunderous boom even set off our truck alarm at midnight (I thought it was the neighbors, so I ignored it...whoops!).  We are thankful that we are on high ground and are not having to deal with mud pits or threats of flooding.  But let me tell you, when it (rain) comes down it is deafening (especially in a metal box)....and drenching!
Austin has also made us appreciate our jobs in the past, and how close we were.  Driving to work takes 30-45 min with traffic.  All I think about is my wasted time spent seeing the same thing everday I go to work. Austin is a much bigger city than we thought.  It takes us 1/2 hour to get pretty much anywhere....
OK, OK, OK!  Enough!  We have turned a new page on our Austin chapter book, as seen in the photos below.....

Yum, Sweet Tea and Rum!

Skateboard swing

The time here is flying, we've been here 5 weeks already!  The boys are getting to experience some alone time from one another.  While one flies to LA to visit with Jason's mom, the other goes to Jason's grandmothers house, who lives 4.5 hours away.  Its a nice break for them as well as us.  Homeschooling is still going well, the 1st quarter grades our out and they are doing as well if not a bit better than when they were in city schools.  Go Jason! Andre is learning to shoot a bow and arrow, and getting pretty good.  The boys are also enjoying having a new skate park to ride.

Our explorations have taken us to Marble Falls (bust!), McKinney Falls (bust!), South Congress (yeah!), 6th street bar scene (wow-wish I was younger w/o kids), Stubbs restaurant and music venue (woohoo), San Antonio riverwalk (very cool), our friends Anne&Andres (good times!).  We have explored some hiking areas/trails all of which are very dog friendly (Elwood is especially pleased!).  Food, yes we've explored the food scene.  My red meat meter is going up!  Our favorite BBQ so far has been Rudy's, but we haven't been to the top ones yet.  Jason found his new favorite mexican restaurant and Andre is tasting his way through burgers and rootbeers.  (After looking at pictures, I guess I'm finding the drinks that go along with the food?!)

Stubbs music concert:Michael Franti

A "Dos-a-rita"

San Antonio Riverwalk...a beautiful day

San Antonio, Tower of Americas, 700 feet up!

Beautiful churches in San Antonio

Andre's Halloween costume

Family is coming this week and we will be doing much more exploring and a lot more eating for sure! The weather is supposed to hold out while they are here, so it should be "perfect" fall weather for Texas.  This next chapter should hold many more adventures and happy times!

Journey to TX

WOW!, glad that it's done!
Ok, there's more to the journey than that, but on the backside of the trip, it doesn't seem so bad.....good thing I wrote things down!
Winding down in Salem was bittersweet.  We were able to say goodbye to family, new friends at work and at the RV park, but with the anticipation of new adventures in TX.  A few days before our long journey, Jason says, "Are you gonna drive when there's a straight road?"....Me: "uh,.....no!!!!"  I'm barely getting over ducking my head going under overpasses!  Although I've accomplished that, now I've moved onto cringing when we make tight turns, fearing we will blow-out our back window from the COW hitting it!  Always fearing the worst keeps me on the edge of my seat....so no driving for me, at least not now!  Knowing that we had long days of driving, I felt bad, but I'd feel worse if I got into an accident or made our trip even longer with going really slow.
We wanted to be in TX in 4 days, driving a total of 2200 miles.  We had figured that we would drive 12 hours/day.  Jason, being THE driver, pushed us 14 hour days, driving 760 miles the first day!  We left Oregon under stormy clouds and wound up having beautiful blue skies with puffy white clouds all the way to Utah.  Because of not knowing where we would end up at the end of the day, we didn't make any reservations at RV parks, but decided to stay at Walmart parking lots.  This was a first for us, but it turned out well.
Here's my "journal" of the trip:
DAY 1 - Oregon to Perry, UT.  8:30am-10:45pm, 760 miles, went further than we thought we would.
-Elwood peed on our bedding! (We had put Elwood in our bedroom when we started out, 2 hours later at our rest stop, we let him out.  I guess he freaked out with the bumps and moving of the COW because all of our bedding was wet!--we were really upset about our new pillows!!!)
-Boys are sleeping, eating and reading books (Alex is re-reading 2 of his books...Andre is semi-reading his book-not making much progress, mostly sleeping---maybe a growth spurt??)
-cold night for sleeping (40*, and we took all the blankets because all our stuff is wet and stinky!)

DAY 2 - UT to Lamar, CO. 7am-9:45pm, 745 miles
-beautiful sunrise in UT, fall is turning trees golden yellow.  Seeing red, flat-top mountains.  Asked boys if they know what "flat-tops" are (haircuts, I mean)----they don't know, but Jason and I remember those!

They looked much "redder" in person

Flat-tops!

Sunrise on the highways!--Beautiful!!!

Golden hues....at 65 mph!

-Stopped at Little America Travel Center in Wyoming.  .50cent ice cream cones at 10am---yes, please!  Huge travel area, a mini-city.  Very interesting!
-Bobble head discussion (we have bobble-head of Alex's that is sitting on the dashboard.  It's making it interesting to look at something else besides the vastness of flat lands or the highway.  The discussion is about different bobble-heads that we need to get (besides the coconut from Hawaii), such as a road runner or a cow---which leads us to discussing that perhaps in the future we can have a different kind of COW (condo on WATER), living on board a boat----very distant future!)

Bobble head from Hawaii---gotta find a new one for the road!

-In Colorado we tried to take ourselves out of the path of flooding areas, but no such luck.  On one highway, we got half way through and found the road closed, so we had to back track.  It added about 45 minutes to an already long day.  Especially since the roads we were on were HORRIBLE.  We spent this time saying to ourselves, "get us off this road!".  (the seams in the road made it very loud and bumpy, especially since we had a 18,000 lb load behind us that seemed to pull us back while it went over the bumps.  Also, the highway was rutted out, not from the rain, but more from use and just patchwork not repaired).  (the highway that was closed was due to flooding over the low part of the road, we should have looked on-line at CO roads, but didn't---lesson learned!)
-here's the JAAR blog highway ratings: CA,OR, ID, UT, WY, NE--mostly 5 stars. CO, OK and parts of TX-- 1-3 stars (at least they were paved!).
-stayed at Walmart parking lot again.  Thank goodness for our great heater and shower in our COW.

DAY 3 - CO to Bullard, TX.  6am-8:45pm, 600 miles
-Gotta admire natures colors!  Beautiful sunrise sky through CO and OK plains.
-the drive has made it easier to acclimate to the time difference
-boys are starting to practice their "y'alls"
-decided that it's an actual town, if they have a Walmart! (just our observation)
-got a flat tire from BAD construction roads in TX....This made my heart beat faster, which made Jason drive faster!  He changed the tire in less than 15 minutes! (Of course this happened in the middle of rush hour traffic north of Dallas, TX.  Stopped at a red light a man pulled up next to us and said you had a blow-out on our trailer tire.  We didn't feel (or hear) anything!  It took us a little bit to find a place to pull into.  Using our hydraulic stabilizer jacks, Jason lifted the trailer and showed the boys how to change a tire-----a bit sweaty, due to the 100* heat!).  No damage though!
-Surprised Mamma in Bullard, TX. (Jason's grandmother).  (We were making such good time we decided to stop by to visit with Mamma---she had no idea we were coming.  The boys kept banging on her door, but she didn't open up until I called her and said the boys are waiting for her to open the door!  She WAS surprised.  The boys got to sleep on "real" beds and we all took a hot running shower, woohoo!)

sunset on the plains looking west

Nature's colors-sunset on the plains looking east

our morning shadow following us, we don't look too big!

DAY 4 - Bullard TX - Livingston TX, about 2.5 hours
 - in Jacksonville, TX---"Largest bowl of Salsa" billboard-----yum! (gotta check this out next time we are there---it's just south of Bullard, TX)
-in Livingston to get "Texafied" (got mud flaps on the truck (a TX requirement), had some sweet tea and BBQ.  Stayed at our Escapees RV park (where our mail is forwarded to/from).
-met a nice couple who used to live in Oceanside, CA, drive a white F450, and use Escapees in Livingston, TX (this was weird).  (We have met SO many people that used to live in San Diego area!)

DAY 5 - Livingston, TX-Austin, TX, 4.5 hours with a pit stop in Houston.
-decided to push on to Austin after having a long nights sleep.  We went to Houston to look at Smart cars.  (This is the only car that seems to fit in our toy-hauler area that is under our length and weight restrictions....and can be a great commuter car with great MPG).
-took 1 hour to drive across Austin (in traffic) to get to our RV park.  It's a huge park.  We found a local Mexican restaurant that is within walking distance....a new favorite probably. 

So after a LONG journey, it was nice to "open-up" our COW and put things away.  Nothing broke along the (bumpy) highways!  We did buy a Smart car the next day.  I've never been inside a Mercedes-Benz dealer, but they are NICE.  SMART stands for Swatch, Mercedes, art---now you know!
It's a zippy little car, very small looking from the outside, but actually roomy on the inside, especially if you don't look towards the back :) (because there isn't one!).

The boys are ready to drive it!

Yesterday we walked around downtown Austin...it was humid and hot!  The boys saw some UT Longhorn cheerleaders in their daisy dukes and cowboy boots.  All I heard was, "Oh, yeah!!!!"  The temp is 90's,with huge thunderclouds.  It did eventually pour, drenching rain!  We were all very cranky from the humidity.  When it did rain, it caused a "river" in our neighbors RV site.  Jason says it rained 2 inches yesterday!  The dog isn't too happy about the weather, or this trip in general.  He is being very difficult about coming back inside the trailer, maybe because of the thunder? (we left music on for him), or traveling has made him cranky too!  Either way, he wanted to stay outside while it was sprinkling on him. 
Tomorrow, I start work and the boys get back to the home-school routine.  As the weather cools off (hopefully soon!), we will get out to explore this area of Texas.  We are looking forward to reconnecting with our friends from Sparks, NV who live close by, and visiting with Jason's grandmother often (about 4 hours away). 

PS- things we learned:
-the new IOS version for iphone is not so great---new features I didn't know about got me frustrated with the map app.---ggrrrrrrr!
-the boys will read books if they don't have their electronics--:)
-we LOVE simple green---it took ALL the bug juice off the truck/trailer without having to scrub!
-Elwood cannot ride in the COW while driving.  There IS enough room in the cab of the truck for him, and he does well traveling. 
-Texas mud is very slippery with flip-flops.

Time and Patience

Sadly, our time here in Salem is fading, but we are all excited about our new adventures to be had in......Austin, TX!  I have accepted a 13 week assignment in Austin at a Women's Hospital, which begins on 9/30 and ends 12/28.  Believe it or not, the only RV park we could find was 30 minutes outside of town at Lake Travis.  Well, we might have been a little-bit picky by wanting a pool, grass and level sites, but we are going to be there for 3 months!  Our new home will be at the La Hacienda RV resort, and the pictures look beautiful.  If we find in a month that something closer to town is more appealing, we might try to move. 
I was getting nervous about finding another position and finding an RV resort for us.  It is hard to wait around until a position is posted for the time frame we need.  Usually travel nurses fly-by the seat of their pants and go off with a minutes notice to a new position. I realize that I don't like that part of travel nursing.  I want a plan put into action as soon as I think about it.  Oh well, thank goodness for a great recruiter who keeps telling me to "be patient". 
I am finding that having something on the horizon helps keep us moving forward and gives us something to talk about, instead of getting on each others nerves.  In our tight quarters we are finding things that we like (having less stuff), we hate (small bedroom), things we couldn't live without (toilets (separate), doors and tv's), and things we don't use, but had to bring (the wii fitness board!---really, who thought that making a 5th wheel shake MORE was a good thing???---oh yeah, me!).  Being in constant contact with our stuff and having it in our face all the time, it might be time to change it up a bit.
This next week will be filled with getting rid of excess weight (food), making sure our things are put away correctly, securing our things (wine!!!), charting our route and prepping for LONG days on the road.  Here's looking forward to safe travels!

The past few weeks....

I'm looking through my calendar to see what all we have done since the last blog post.  Thank goodness that I'm writing everything down, I can't seem to remember what happened yesterday! (well, now thinking about it, I can remember, but last week....ah??)  The main reason for writing it all down is so that in a year or 5 years time, we can look back and see where we have been and what we have accomplished.  Oh,.... the places we have yet to see!!!
The past few weeks have been very fast-paced with family visiting (x2), home-schooling and a trip.  And now, figuring out where we go next and where I'll be working.  Our first family visit was from Uncle Tracy and Ted, who were with us for 5 days.  We took them to our favorite spot for waterfalls, Silver Springs.  Taking a little hike to see more than one waterfall was well worth the trip, especially the last one where we brought a picnic, wine included!

 On our way back home, we stopped by Bauman Farms, for some tasty produce.  Their hanging baskets of flowers are enormous!  I guess with the weather in Oregon, everything grows nicely and hugely.  Although, the weather at this present time was 85-90, HOT!!! Jason was the tour guide the next day taking them to Corvallis, seeing the sights of the college town.  Tracy and Ted took the train to Portland to visit with friends the following day, which left Jason to himself, sans me (sleeping for work that night) and the boys (in day camp all week long).  I bet he enjoyed the quietness!  We rounded out their visit with a picnic at Willamette Winery, taking home a few (or 12!) of their finest Pinot's to enjoy at home.
 The very next day we picked up Suzi/Vicki at the airport in Portland and had a quick lunch before Tracy and Ted's plane left.  Since we were in Portland, we took her to visit Saturday market, enjoying the many craft stalls and thinking about Christmas gifts!  And ice cream, we had to have some ice cream!  During her visit we went to Tillamook Cheese factory, about 1.5 hours away, but worth the time!  We tasted yummy cheeses, lunch specials and (more) ice cream!  There wasn't a tour going on, or them even making anything, but the place was so busy, almost like an amusement park, but it was Sunday, so I guess everyone else had the same idea.  We took our time heading home touring the coast.  After spending a quiet day around town, we headed out to .....you guessed it, Silver Falls!  This place NEVER gets old.  A quick hike, then a picnic lunch was the plan. 

After 8 days of visitors, we thought everything went pretty smoothly.  Everyone had a place to sleep (I didn't hear any complaints), the main showers at the RV park worked nicely, and everyone got to pick their own blackberries!  Even Elwood got in on eating the blackberries and convincing Ted that it was time for another walk!
After all the excitement of family, we needed to hunker down and get our schedule straightened out for home-schooling.  Jason got organized (and I stayed out of his way).  The boys schooling started 1 1/2 weeks ago, and everyone is still alive!  Jason had done a great job organizing everything and figuring out what a lesson plan is.  The boys are realizing the dad is no push-over and an "F", is an "F" in the books.  The boys haven't learned yet what the teacher likes, apples or chocolate chip cookies.  Actually, they know chocolate chip cookies, but have yet to make any for him yet! (hint, hint).
We recently took a trip to the Emerald City, Seattle.  We had been wanting to go to Vancouver, BC, but it was a bit too far, and our schedule couldn't accommodate it.  Seattle, it was.  Renting a (small) car was the way to go, especially for trying to manuver down one way streets and for street parking.  We laughed when we thought about our huge F450 dually going down some roads, we would have had to go on top of the cars or at least taken off their side mirrors!  Our first day was spent exploring the sites of Pikes Place (super busy on a Sunday, beautiful flowers, yummy food and the original Starbucks),

Pioneer Square (saw what the underground city was all about), the waterfront (ferry depot and ferris wheel, with lots of good smelling seafood), City Center (Space Needle, museums, and park)

and the Queen Anne district (quaint eateries and cute homes).  Our hotel was a couple of blocks from the space needle, so we always knew which direction to head if we ever got lost---with one way streets, that was a lot!  The next day we took a Seattle Duck Tour via amphibious vehicles from the war.  They first gave us a tour of the city, then by water. 

On board the Duck

It was fun to tour this way, but now that we've done it (for the sake of the boys), we don't have to do it again.  The one thing that I wanted to do on this trip that I thought the boys would enjoy was to drive our car onto the ferry, so we did.  We went to Bremerton, an hour ride away,  which had old Navy boats, but mostly we went, then turned around and came back. 

Map of the Puget Sound and surrounding islands and waterways

Blurry, but this is where we are heading.  

Seattle from our ferry

The quiet Puget Sound

Alex would like to thank his mom and dad for this award

One of the fountains at Fountain Park in Bremerton

The fountains explode with water

The views of the Puget Sound from the boat were great.  The boys had a good time running on the boat and scheming up disasters with the cars.  It was then off to see the Troll in the Fremont district, the Ballard Locks and the sights of Seattle from Kerry Park. 

Fremont Troll squishing a 1963 VW bug in its hand

This is the fish ladder next to the Ballard Locks

views from Kerry Park

We never did go up the space needle, but got the same if not better views from all the places around town.  The boys thought it, the Space Needle, was bigger.
On our way home, we stopped at the Mt. St. Helen's visitors center.  I don't know if we were cranky or cheap, but we did not pay the $5/person entrance fee to view the exhibit (about 40 feet long) and see a 10 minute movie.  We paid for Alex to go,... and got all the info from him, then went home and watched Dante's Peak and got the Hollywood version of volcano explosions.  It seems ridiculous when 85% of the people who visited the center, turned and walked out when they saw the fee.  Good 'ol government...and I pay taxes too!
So here we are today.  Currently we are counting down the days here in Salem, as my assignment is done 9/21.  We are looking at Austin, TX as our next adventure stop. I'm still waiting to see what Austin has available for work and if we can find an RV park that has space, and can accommodate our large size.  We have one more course of visitors coming in 1 1/2 weeks, but nothing else on the horizon.  Salem has been a great central location for all of our outings, but we still haven't seen all that's out there in Oregon.  We might just have to make a pit stop back through here down the road to finish our site-seeing.

Our bribes for doing well in school this week!