Life after travelling
Our life has changed a lot this year, work, school, extra curricular activities for the boys, a boat and swags. But we are still adventurers/explorers. We love getting out exploring this wonderful part of the country.
But it just doesn’t feel like a place for us to put down roots. Matt and I often talk about it. Is it our nomadic lifestyle that we have lived for so long that is stopping us? Or is it just not quite the place for us?
This kinda puts an uncertainty in our mind. What if there is no place that we want to put our roots down?
Our old stomping ground (Echuca) we still refer to as “home” as our family and some of our great friends are there. It’s where the boys were born. It’s where we got married. It’s where our journey began. I’m not sure that’s where our journey is meant to end though. We do still love it there and we get so excited every time we go back “home”. But once again we aren’t sure it’s for us anymore.
Then we contemplate buying another van and that excites me. I love the idea of adventuring again. But the boys … should they know what it’s like to put down roots? Do they really need to? So many defence and police families don’t. They have to move on every couple of years and their kids seem fine. Well adapted. So is it really any different if we do the same? Stay a couple of years in each place then move on.
Then their is the emotional pull to be near our families. Our parents are getting older, the boys are getting older. While they have great memories of the time they have had with their grandparents, are we minimising the amount of memories they could have? Even with their cousins, aunties and uncles. Another couple of years and the boys will be doing their own thing and they won’t have that great connection with cousins like I did with a few of mine.
All these thoughts and feelings run threw my head everyday. Then the weekend comes and I love my Friday night drinks with the mums I’ve become friends with. And I love Saturday and sundays exploring with my little family.
We have made so many friends here that are so similar to us. They love exploring, fishing, boating and having a great time.
The community here is amazing too. Everyone is super friendly.We are loving our time here in the Pilbara.
Is there a place like this for us on the East Coast? Or is it the remoteness that has made this place like it is?
Am I ever going to stop having these feelings? Am I ever going to make these type of friends again?
Why are we so apprehensive about making the next change/leap? I find it so funny that we are toing and froing on this decision, the next journey. We just leaped when we decided to leave on the trip. Within a month we had the house on the market and had made plans. This time we can’t decide where to next, there is so many places we want to live. Whether to rent or buy. Whether we go country or city living. Whether we go cold weather or warm weather.
I kinda wish some one would say you should go here. There is a job for Matt and good school for boys and it’s a great community.
Some days I wish we hadn’t sold our house so we had somewhere to go. But even then I have doubts going back. Would we even fit in there now. We feel so different to the people that we were when were there.
Any advice or if you want to offer us a job. Anything at this stage would be great appreciated😊
What’s “normal”?
As we look for a rental and talk about “normal” life. Our hearts are longing to continue our travelling journal. It just feels weird and almost wrong to think that we will be in one spot for along time.Our heart strings are being pulled in all different directions and none of them feel right, except the one that is pulling towards travelling.
We just feel as though we aren’t finished yet. There is just so much to still see in our beautiful country.
Is this normal? I know lots of travelling families feel like this. Does the feeling go away? Or do you just suppress, ignore the feeling and hope it goes away? How do we go back to a “normal” life?
We love the freedom that comes with living in a van. If things don’t work out you just move on to the next place. The freedom to just say stuff it we’ve had enough let’s go somewhere new. Settling down means we can no longer do that. We have to just put up with it and make it work. I just don’t know how we’ll go with doing that.
It makes me second guess everything we have been raised to believe, everything we are taught. What is “normal” life? Who says that is “normal”? Is your “normal” meant to be my “normal”? Why do people judge your “success” in life by the possessions we have? Why don’t people judge your success by your experiences? Or how happy you are?
Who said we need all those things in our life? Doesn’t that just add more stress and pressure to your life therefore less happiness and your time?
Who said that the boys have to fit into the box to have a “normal” life? Does it really matter how smart they and if they are meeting milestones right now? Or is it more important for them to learn at their own pace and learn what they love so they want to keep learning? Isn’t it more important for them to have life skills that they’ll actually use every minute of the day rather than stuff they’ll never get their heads around and never actually use again once they have completed schooling. And in the mean time someone picks on them for being “dumb” and destroys their self confidence and self worth.
Maybe communication skills are the most important thing for a kid to learn, solving conflict, learning to respect friends and their values, learning how to handle different situations and different moods. And there is no better classroom for learning this then the gypsy lifestyle. As a parent/homeschooler I am most proud of my boys when I see them talking to all sorts of different people. When I see them including everyone in camp ground/caravan park. When they know no barriers or lack self confidence they see a kid of any age, any sex, any race and they strike up a conversation and they are instant friends. This is a skill that gypsy kids have. You can pick them when travelling. In “normal” society we influence them and they inherit our anxiety’s and don’t take the risk because of rejection. No one likes being rejected. But gypsy kids just want someone to play with so they’ll play with anyone, there is no rejection there is just friendship of some sort.
Got a bit off track, so back to my thoughts.
What is “normal”? Is my “normal” allowed to be different to yours? Is my “normal” wrong or is yours? Is there a right or wrong way to live life? Does any of it really matter, as long as we are all happy and living our best life?
I do worry about EVERYTHING, if we are screwing up our boys by living this way. But I’m sure I’d be worrying all the same if we were living a “normal” life too. So long as they know we love them and we always have their best interest at heart and we will always be here for them. Does the rest really matter?
To settle and join the rat race again or to top up our funds and continue to travel maybe forever? That is our big decision. Our big uncertainty.
The gypsy lifestyle does take you over and changes your way of thinking. I love it. Living our best life. Xo
A quick update
Wow I can’t believe how long it has been since I have written a blog. Sorry so much has happened.Matt has gone back to work the perfect job at the not quite so perfect timing. We decided to just make it work. So we are a travelling fifo family. Which is working pretty well from the home end but I’m pretty sure it sucks big time for Matt working.
The way we are doing it is we travel from one major airport to the next while Matt is on RnR. Then he goes to work while we explore the area. Then he comes back and we go on our next adventure.
We have travelled up the east coast across to Darwin then across to Broome. I’ll will try and catch up on my blogs over the coming weeks.
I also completed my course I was doing which consumed a lot of time.
We have still been homeschooling and boys are improving out of sight.
I think it’s more me that struggles to comprehend where they are at. So I’ve probably held them back a bit but we are doing more and more challenging things and they are getting it which is surprising me so much.
I think they are growing into wonderful little men. Don’t get me wrong they are far from perfect somedays though they amaze me with how amazing their attitudes are. Then the next day they do something crazy like punch each other or give me the worse attitude but hey they are boys and we are all far from perfect. I’m pretty sure their attitude comes from their dad. In fact, Ethan is growing so much into his dad, he has those same cheeky smart arse comments. Sometimes I want to smack him and sometime I can’t help but laugh, he frustrates me exactly the same way Matt does. It is kinda nice though.
Natey has grown into his own person so much more this time travelling. He too has the same smart arse personally but is this kind, nature loving, adventure seeking boy. He finally is making his own friends and is standing up to his brother. He is super kind and caring towards little kids which surprises me everytime.
Sorry for my slackness I will catch up on blogs.
Take care xo
Decision time again
And just like that our time in Darwin is done … well for the moment.
We have been to and fro since Christmas about what we should be doing with our life’s. Our bank account got to the figure that we needed it to so we can travel for about 12 months. So do we stay and cash up more and be able to travel leisurely and settle just in time for Ethan to start high school. Or do we go for broke and be happy with what we have and settle with a year or two for Ethan to catch up on things that he may of missed out on, before going off high school.
We decided to go for broke and see what pans out.
When we set off on this adventure in 2015, we had next to no money and had what we could afford at the time. But the reason we set up was to spend time with our boys, as everyone knows you blink and your kids have grown up. We didn’t want that to happen to us, we wanted to spend time with our boys, quality, quantity time. We also had enough of materialistic things. We were stupid and wanted all those big things, a big house, a big car but at the cost of what? Working 2 jobs each to pay for it, so our kids wouldn’t appreciate it. And then they would complain what they didn’t have something, so you feel guilty that you work all the time and buy more crap to compensate. When we thought about it we didn’t want that stuff. What we wanted was memories with our boys. We had children to love, nurture and spend time with them, making memories. So that was it, decided let’s sell everything and move into a caravan and travel oz.
We got a bit lost again. Chasing money, for a bit more comfort and to help set us up when we finish. But how much money is enough? So we revalued what was important to us and this trip, our dream, is more important than materialistic stuff. That’s how we decided that now is the time to go. Chase our dream, finish our trip, do what we originally set out to do, create memories with our boys before they no longer want to be with us, go for broke and start our life’s again with a different prospective.
So Baker’s trip of oz is finally going to complete/do a trip. And we can’t wait.
Take care xo
The End of 2017
What a year we have had, started off with us getting ready to set off on our 2nd attempt of a trip around Oz only to find major fault in our van which had us stay put in Vic/Nsw and move into house for awhile. Finally got van sorted and spend quality time with our families and friends before we decided to move to NT in our new van and put an end to FIFO life.
We have met lots of great people and caught up with old friends. Reminding us why we love gypsy lifestyle so much.
We have had lots of highs with a few lows. 2017 has been a great year. But I’m looking forward to seeing what adventures 2018 has install for us.
Happy New Year hope 2018 is a great year. xo
A few milestones
The past few days we have had 2 major milestones. First one 2 years living in 17foot x 6foot space. A home on wheels. When you get sick of the view of one place you just move on. It has also had its challenges, 4 people living in a small area never being able to have alone time, never enough room for anything. But that one is also a positive as we now don’t have materialistic possessions, everything has a purpose not a need except of the boys toys which have become very limited. But because of that I think they have become a bit humble about receiving gifts and things. Christmas and birthdays they don’t complain when they only receive few presents.And the cleaning all though I have to clean things more often at least it only takes an hour.
I now love living in a caravan and not sure how or when I will go back in a house.
Our other milestone, we have now been a FIFO family for a year. And what a year it has been. We made it with lots of highs and some lows. The boys are still alive. I love having time together as a family. Actual quality time not just a weekend. It has been a very empowering experience for us all.
The boys and I appreciate the sacrifice that Matt makes for us so that we can all live a better life and achieve our dreams. A huge sacrifice but we are sure it’s totally worth it.
Can’t wait to see what 2017 brings us. What new challengers and adventures we can have. All as I know is that as long as we have each other we can achieve and conquer anything.
We got this shit 👊🏻
Our boys
One of my favourite things about travelling is how close our boys are. I mean this may of happened anyway but I’m not sure. But living in 17 foot for 20 months means you have no choice but play with each other. No matter what happens at school, in the caravan park these two always have each other. Although Ethan doesn’t like to admit it and most of the time likes being off meeting new people I think he secretly loves the idea, that no matter what his best friend is always by his side. Brothers best friends for life. I hope it never changes.
Don’t get me wrong they fight, they are boys, and tell each other they hate each other. But there are times where they are just happy being with each other, playing, learning and encouraging each other to conquer fears. True friends.
I love it.
Life in Limbo
Have you ever lived in limbo? Where you have no idea where you will be or what you will be doing in a month or 2 months. This has been our life for the past 18 months or more. Some of you are probably thinking that’s the best way to live but we have always had a plan. Even while travelling we have a “unplan plan”. Were we knew roughly where we are going but no idea when. Which is good but we have always had a plan.
Since I became a work widow one thing I have really struggled with is never been able to plan anything. Every swing there is rumours going round that people are getting put off. Then the next swing the rumour is that there is enough work to last 6 more months.
We try not to get caught up in it all as living in a van we can just pack up and go at anytime. Home is wherever we park it.
But then if there is 6-12 months work, god it would be nice to be in a house. To be able to lock the boys in a room when they are being naughty and shitting me. To be able to cook in an oven not bbq. To be able to shower and shit without worrying about the boys being locked in the van. To have room.
To know that for the next 6-12 months we are going to be in the one place and be able to adjust to that.
At the moment it is month by month. And we seem to be ok, half ok, with living in limbo.
Take care
Xo
The joys of caravan living/work widow.
Being a work widow and living in a caravan means I get to do all the fun jobs.We got a new van last year that has a shower/toilet in it. For convenience reason we upgrade to this “flash” model of van and it has a hot water service in it. I love not having to go to the toilet block in the middle of the night. Convenience of the boys having a shower while I cook tea (instead of taking them across to the showers).
The thing that I don’t like about this convenience of our “flash” van is the emptying of the toilet. That’s right for you non caravanning readers. The toilet has to be emptied every 5-7 days depending on how many times we use it, how much toilet paper is needed to wipe away all the poo (or played with while sitting there). So you pull out a “cassette” (plastic tub), wheel it to the dump point, empty it, hoping like hell there is no splashes especially to the face, rinse and take it back and put it back in.
I’ve had a couple of learning curves with this job since being a work widow.
1. Always make sure last person who used it actually “flushed” it, opened trap door to let fluid into cassette. If they haven’t, fluid goes everywhere in holding cupboard, splashes over your hand (and maybe face) and goes all over ground in annexe.
2. Make sure cassette has been put back in properly before using it, especially for number 2’s. Or else number 2’s end up in holding cupboard and trying to pull cassette out without it falling on the floor takes real skill.
It really is a shit job but someone has to do it. All the male grey nomads keep telling me it’s a blue job not a pink job. But I guess our caravan only has purple jobs, so I have to do it til I can the colour scheme.😜
Til next time
Take care
Xo
Work Widowing Sucks
Today my struggles are real. Work widow life sucks!! I couldn’t even have a shower (remembering we live in caravan park so communal showers) without the boys coming over screaming, and destroying my (and everyone else who was showering) peace. The screaming and waking up the whole caravan park started at 7.25am today. I clean the camp kitchens, so I was up cleaning the one furtherest away when 1 child decided it was appropriate to dob on the other one. The other one doesn’t like been left alone so he decided to follow, screaming, at the top of his lungs. Sorry to everyone in the caravan park, we are having one of those days…no weeks. I’ve had a sick child for the week, so no down time for me. Feel like I’ve had a newborn again up every couple of hours to coughing fits. Which lead me to googling in the middle of the night, where the nearest hospital is. Which lead me wondering, are we covered for ambulance while here. Which then lead me to realise I’d have to take the other child with me. Not much sleep happening with all this (and more craziness) going through my head.
No exercise time this week either. For those of you who read my last blog, would understand how important this is for me at the moment. So yep I’m not in a good place. I’m eating shit because that’s what makes me feel better, when I’m down. Which is a vicious circle as now I feel shit because I’m putting on the weight I just worked so hard to lose.
I have no friends in the caravan park, at the moment. Not even my husband. No one to give me cuddle and tell me that I’m gonna make it. The kids are that screwed up. So my sanity is slipping more and more with each moment.
To take back control of my sanity, I decided to take the boys out. Yep, that will do the trick. Park, fish and chips and sometime at the beach. Perfect!!
Park consist of me telling the boys off, having to be referee, then listen to them yell at each other. Time to move on. We’ll go to the beach to see if that helps me and improves their behaviour so we can get fish and chips. Beach, playing in sand ✅, quiet ✅. Yeh sanity is starting to return. Then child falls over in wet sand. Get over it kid it’s only wet sand. Then other child has gone out a bit too deep and is now wet. Who cares. Shit happens. It’s only water…salt water. He starts sooking, the salt is sting his legs. Really. Then he says “I want to go home”. Who would’ve thought that could start a war. “But I want to stay and have fish and chips”, “But my legs are stinging from the salt”. Grrrr!! Right we are going home. And gonna get Maccas on way back.
Yep shit eating because they are sucking the life out of me with their friggin sooking and whinging.
How many more days til hubby is back??? 16 more days!!
Til next time
Xo
Baker's Trip Of Oz 
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