My experience living in an RV while traveling the country with my family
Author: jenn
My 3 kids and hubby are the loves of my life. I have been a sugar addiction & stubborn weight loss coach for over a decade and wake up everyday grateful to have found my calling!
WHEN… you are “slightly” obsessive about organizing and you just bought your 4000 sq ft and 2.3 acre ranch and realize it’s not humanely possible to organize anytime soon!!
Not to mention no furniture has arrived yet so you’re sleeping on a mattress on a rug in your son’s room.🤦♀️🤭
Lessons LEARNED 1 day on the Edden Ranch after living on the road for a whole year:
Patience is a virtue 🙏
I miss being able to see my kids faces no matter where I was in the RV. I took that for granted. 😌
It is exhausting walking around in 4000sq ft of space putting things away 🤦♀️
I could never have lived in an RV if I started out in Flagstaff with 3 bathrooms and so much open space and clean air⛰
I do not miss NY🙌
Magic is everywhere if you stop and look✨
We don’t need as much as we think we do. It’s a lie!!🤭
Money isn’t everything. Family is everything. ❤️
You can go as fast or as slow as you want in life. The race is with ourselves 🙏
There is such a thing as too many cabinets but not too many closets 😆
Life is created BY design. It’s up to us to design it the way we want. We are in control. 💪
I have to break old habits of everything being SOO organized if I’m going to survive a week in this house and not lose it 🥳
Choose sanity over everything else. Nothing is worth losing sanity over especially if you’re a recovering sugar addict. Ahem. Sugar WILL find you. 🤨
Never leave somewhere to escape something. Leave because you want to go. When you leave to run and escape “it”- “it” will always find you because you took “it” with you. 🏃🏽♀️
Woke up after a long night of tossing and turning! I told Joe when the soul is expanding you can feel it- at least I can!
At 9am today we close on a long dream of owning a house in the mountains. We couldn’t be more thrilled.
So many emotions this whole week. Today is all comes together.
Thank YOU for all the many messages and comments and likes about the close on our house in Flagstaff!!
Joe and I and the kids still think we’re dreaming. Luke said to me today “I still can’t believe this is our house. I feel like we’re visiting!!”
Truth be told to move a family across the country the way we did – with a year long RV trip sandwiched in between running a business and homeschooling- can NOT be done alone.
I know we might have made it look easy but truth be told we had the bestest of friends, colleagues and professionals who are the best at their craft help us!!!
Shout out in NY to our realtors Anthony Perrotta and Michael Sadis!! You 2 got us off Long Island! If you’ve got a house to sell they are your power team to call.
Bryanna and Craig Royal blazed the path for us years ago and answered all our crazy questions since they live on the road full time!! Their oh -so- resourceful blog that talks everything RV life is called crazyfamilyadventure.com.
Long View RV in Connecticut is THE premiere RV dealership in New England. They held our RV for months while we figured out how the hell to finance it. Then when we ran into air conditioners that stopped working , washing machines that exploded, no hot showers for 2 weeks, no heat for a week they were there for us any time we called, any day of the week and any time of day! We recommend them hands down as they stand behind their customers and care deeply.
Then there is Joe’s family Tim and Annie Edden who let us store all our “keepsakes” + Joes tools 😀 in their homes while we travel. And the rest of the Paccione + Edden clan who showed up for an A-MAZING launch party and who help get us off Long island!!
Then there is Kelly Broaddus who is an Arizona realtor extraordinarie. Without Kelly we would never have won the bidding war on our house. It went into contract 4 days after Hitting the market. If you live in AZ and want the best house look no further- Kelly is the bomb.
And if it wasn’t for the dedicated work of our dear friend and mortgage specialist for Wells Fargo, Dave Goldklang we might have been delayed closing for another 2 weeks. Dave goes above and beyond for his clients… we would know. This is the 2nd mtge we’ve worked together on! If you need a mtge that gets done right, Dave is your guy.
And our dear friend, financial guru and accountant Dave Cooper takes customer service to a whole new level. If it wasn’t for him we’d still be drowning in paperwork with no clue how to explain our 4 businesses and that we swear we really do live in an RV and run profitable businesses. Lol.
Behind every success story is a team of caring dedicated people who have your back.
I’ve noticed when a person wins the Tour de France they always give credit to their WHOLE team because without them, they could not have won.
Remember when you were 10 and it was the day before your birthday (or Christmas!!!) and you COULD NOT SLEEP??
That’s me. All week.
I literally wake up 4:30am like clock work and stare at the ceiling.
There is a joy in my belly I can not describe.
First 2 days I thought it was nervousness then day 3 I realized it’s actually EXCITEMENT.
When you set your mind on a dream and it comes true I swear the soul decides to do a – think 80 disco dancing at the club- dance.
Well my soul dances at 4:30am right now.
When my house blew up from a gas explosion just 4 months after being married 18 years ago I lost everything including all my wedding gifts.
Back then I didn’t have a lot of disposable income as Joe had just quit his job to start a biz and I was supporting us.
So we bought whatever we could afford and mostly while suffering from PTSD!😥
(Reminder – never buy stuff while suffering from PTSD. You’re not gonna love it as much after you heal. Just sayin!) 🤦♀️
3 kids later and 2 self employed people in 1 house with an insistence that they go to a private montessori school because I just loved the community and well….😌
Let’s just say I wasn’t buying myself any new expensive furniture, fancy dishes or all that fun stuff you get when other people are chipping in to buy you gifts 😁
Insert yesterday’s conversation Joe had with me while hiking!!!
“You know Jenn, we got EVERYTHING we’ve ever wanted!”
Huh Joe- you think?!?!
Let’s recall what we wanted …
✨Last house had 1 bathroom we all shared and no guest rooms. Girls bunked up and there was no basement. We now have a 4000sq ft “compound” with a guest room, office, 3 bathrooms (kids promise to clean their own bathrooms let’s see how that goes!), game room- yes game room and a hot tub on the deck while looking at the mountains. Pinch me.
✨we always wanted to live in a cul-de-sac. Now we do!!
✨we always wanted to leave NY and live in the mountains!! We live 30min from The local ski resort. Pinch me again.
✨ we love small towns!! We now live in one with freight trains that roll by and remind you of the days when you owned Lionel trains!
✨ we didn’t want to leave Huntington NY because we loved the village SO much. Music + food + shops the most amazing people!! I had so many friends as shop owners. We ❤️ the flagstaff village with music + shops + food and people everywhere (well pre-COVID-19!) pinch me once again!
✨we adored the kids Montessori school which was one of the reasons why we stayed as long as we did! Their new charter school we saw this week had a dog in the classroom and the teaches are bright and happy and kind and open minded! Such a positive fresh space to learn from!
✨we can afford to buy ALL new furniture and dishes and beds and organic mattresses to START OVER the way I always dreamed after the old house caught fire. Just WAIT till you see the Restoration Hardware + Crate and Barrel furniture my dear friend and interior designer extraordinaire picked out!! Dreamy.
AND If that wasn’t enough I just received word from my lawyers that the Sugar Freedom Method is officially trademarked with 6 A-MAZING certified coaches out there teaching others the method.
(OPRAH did you hear that? Isnt it time we spoke??)
I said it before and I’ll say it again-
If you don’t ask, no one is going to give it to you.
And if you don’t have faith, you’ll quit long before your dream materializes. Hence we named our 40 ft home on wheels (Leap of) FAITH.
This has been a dream of a lifetime this past year on the road and I have NO INTENTION OF WAKING UP!!
Truth!! ✨Today was a particularly difficult day as we’re 4 days away from moving into our NEW HOUSE.
I’m sure it’s because of all the transition we’re going through as a family.
This Thursday-7/30, our year long RV adventure comes to a “pause” as we officially buy our house in Flagstaff.
The kids are ecstatic for the game room, hot tub and 2.3 acres to build their tree house and Joe and I are BEYOND excited to see the tallest mountain in AZ outside our bedroom window!
I always tell my clients to FIND THE GOOD IN YOUR DAY because the mind will always want to find what’s not working!!
After I stewed in some mixed feelings and sadness I decided to go for a hike and make a list with Joe of ALL the places we’ve visited this past year!!
Acadia NP Shenandoah NP Everglades NP Guadalupe Mountains NP Carlsbad Caverns NP White Sands NP Saguaro NP Montazuma Castle NM Grand Canyon South Rim Arches NP Rocky Mountain NP Mt. Rushmore NM Badlands NP Jewel Cave NP Devils Tower NM Yellowstone NP Grand Tetons NP Bryce Canyon NP Grand Canyon North Rim
Niagra Falls The Alamo Key West New Orleans Las Vegas Washington DC Philadelphia Sedona Lake Placid Hoover Dam Glen Canyon Dam Lake Powell Lake Mead Canada Monument Valley Cape Cod RV on a ferry across Lake Champlain
Life is too short to let a bad mood bring us down. Truth be told- this too shall pass.
Ok so today I’m am writing, yes Luke is writing! Today is a special day, not too many people get to have this experience but it’s 1 full year on the road.
Last year on June 30th we left New York and got on our adventure, and I’ve gotta tell you there has been so many ups and downs. Like some of you know this about me but I really like to stay home and just play board games and get creative and this trip isn’t really like that.
Now some of the sights we all see and the memories we have had are awesome but there are some times where I just don’t want to leave my house or whatever you call it.
I’m gonna summarize yesterday as best I can but I’m gonna be honest it was really nothing much except for an extremely close golo match, golo is just like a dice golf game it’s really fun and it was intense. I ended up winning though so I can’t complain.
It was rainy and freezing yesterday and I think it snowed in Yellowstone which is 30 minutes from us. Overall so far I can’t stand Wyoming. It’s always rainy, windy, cold and it’s the beginning of July. I want warmer weather. Also it’s mostly farmland except for a couple small towns.
There was a town a couple days ago in Wyoming that had a population of 4. Like never in my life! My mom asked if one of the 4 people passed away do they change the sign to 3.
We all got a laugh out of that.
Fun fact! There are more cows than people in Wyoming.
Just thinking back I just don’t quite understand how it has been an entire year. Like from day 1. And I also am thinking to myself how did I survive in this, my room is the upper half of a closet, that’s where I sleep and where all of my stuff stays.
And recently my sisters made our kitchen table into there bed because they didn’t like theirs. What kind of table doesn’t turn into a bed?? So I’m eating with my leg as a table – it doesn’t quite work but we live with it.
This trip has been full of excitement and disappointment. Like when COVID 19 hit we didn’t go anywhere for 3 months and even now every store we go into we wear a mask which gets extremely annoying after about 45 seconds.
We still have about 3 weeks left in the trip until we move into our new house. My school was supposed to start August 5 but it’s been postponed until at least the 17th which I am so happy about because now I have more time in the new house!
This week we are going to Yellowstone to see some amazing, mountains, animals and geysers. So in the next couple days expect more adventures.
And 1 more fun fact Yellowstone National Park is 2.5 times bigger than Long Island, NY where we used to live.
I just think of it that way – it has a 7 hour loop to drive so it’s going to get exciting, assuming the weather gets nicer.
Yeaterday was June 30, 2020 and it was DAY 365 on the road!!(Well 366 if you count the leap year we had but who’s counting!)
Exactly 1 year ago today we closed our doors in New York and moved into our 40 foot RV – (Leap of) Faith.
I’ve been looking for words all day to capture my feelings.
I can’t find them.
There isn’t one.
There are SO many.
What I will say about our 1 year “free falling” into the next best version of ourselves is that I’ve learned a lot about life that I couldn’t learn in school or if we decided to stay put in NY!
Here’s what I learned in no particular order:
The net appears when you have faith.
Life is very short
This is a beautiful country I live in
People are inheritantly good + kind
South Dakota supports Trump
I’ve had more success than I could EVER have imagined and not talking about all the money I have in the bank. That’s replaceable. Success is what I’m doing with my life every way.
Bravery and courage come from DOING.
I was actually rich in NY. I just didn’t know it.
Living in 40 ft of space with 5 people will teach you more about yourself than 30 years in therapy
You can do ANYTHING if you set your mind to it you just have to BELIEVE
Joe Edden is a modern day super man/ MacGyver. That man can leap tall buildings with a wrench in one hand and some dice in the left hand so he can play GOLO with the kids while fixing something else that just broke!!!
Magic IS everywhere. You just have to be open to seeing it.
Miracles exist.
Taking cold showers for 12 days won’t kill you. It’s a great rejuvenator
You can spend just as much money living in an RV as you do in a house if you’re not watching
Organic Food can be found is pretty much every state and in every store! Unless you’re in South Dakota then good luck
I buy more than enough food for our rig to last us at least 2 weeks but I always think we’re running low. #italianissues
I miss my family, friends, cousins and aunts and uncles on the east coast but other than that I’m glad we left
We haven’t grilled outdoors once in a year. Heck we don’t even have a grill. It was never about the time. I don’t like doing it
I’m a full blown home body and so are my kids. We go out but sometimes we could stay home and not even leave the rig and be ok with it! Joe not so much.
You can do anything you want in life with support. Anything. The only limitations we have are those we have in our minds. I’ve exploded my biz with the help of some amazing women and started a Sugar Freedom Method Movement while travelling, under tremendous stress, moving constantly with no real exercise or schedule and don’t get me started on the limited internet!! I just wanted it badly enough and I had the focus and support!
Life is happening now. Like now now. When it rains and we’re stuck inside life is happening. When we didn’t find our next home yet and I was stuck in Flagstaff because of Covid that was still my life. And when we started moving again to see more of the country before school starts that’s still my life.
Our life is happening now and I no longer take anything I have for granted.
We’re not exactly living in a van but we’re going through ALL the same stuff living in an RV.
One of the largest online health and lifestyle companies, mindbodygreen, asked us to write an article about life in the road with Covid and it got published today. When we first started our they also asked us to write about life on the road and that link is embedded in the article as well.
The plans for today were to go to the stone yard to pick our granite for our kitchen counter remodel, then go to the flooring company in town for carpet styles and then pick up some groceries.
It turns out the shopping for granite and carpet has dropped off the list for most homeowners during this pandemic and both stores were closed today. It said they were open online but, hindsight being 20/20, I should have called to confirm. We did get groceries quickly and the grocery store is looking much better these days. Most of the items in the store were back in stock.
We are exited about our new home in Flagstaff and we will get to everything related to that soon enough. The kids are having fun picking out beds, dressers, pillows and adding things to their wishlist. Jenn and I made a lot of promises when we moved out of our home in NY and we are doing our best to meet them on those things. We got the house right and they all have their own room that they love. That was a big one. Adding furniture seems easy in comparison.
Fridays are the hardest days to get the kids to do their schoolwork. Caitlin asked straight out if she could just skip everything today? It’s Friday and I get it but, the answer is NO. We got the schoolwork done and then an afternoon of hoverboarding, hiking and frisbee ensued. Good times!
Today was zoom meeting day. I spoke with my sister around mid-day followed by my NY business networking group followed by a zoom call with many of Jenn’s family members. It was great catching up with so many people in one day. Seeing so many familiar faces was a great highlight to my week. Jenn and the kids enjoyed it as well.
The kids actually act better on days when we have calls. You can’t say that social distancing doesn’t affect people’s mood. It just has to.
Luke's Journey Across The USA 