18 Jan 2025
Back at home base, we continue to decompress from the trip. I know there are still a bunch of posts to catch up on from the trip, and I’ll be getting to those. In the mean time, life goes on. Here is a catch up from the beginning of January!
The routine has mostly settled into our daily home school routine along with a number of doctor’s appointments to catch up on various things that were put off while we were on the trip.
Grandma’s car died and was “making a noise.” Turned out the serpentine belt came off.
What was left of the idler pulley.
Ducky was my helper. Here, he is “Fixing Things” as well.
Ducky also likes to help cook. Here, he helps make breakfast while Randal looks on, considering what trouble he can cause while looking cute.
Randal aggressively tries to share his banana with Garrett.
A little family Dungeons & Dragons time with friends!
Jarek got a metal detector for Yule, and is having lots of fun exploring the yard and seeing what ‘treasures’ he can find. So far, it’s mostly been a bunch of construction trash and rusted tools from the builders and previous owners.
Ducky back in the kitchen, stirring the porridge.
The new heat pump unit on the roof.
Back on the trip, our front AC failed – it would not heat/cool. I ordered a replacement unit and finally had a window to do the work when it wasn’t super cold or raining. I got help from a neighbor to hoist it up onto the roof the RV.
Dismounting and disconnecting the old unit.
Getting the new unit in place.
Meanwhile, Meagan and most of the kids went fishing. They didn’t catch anything, but Jarek got some good practice in with his new rod.
The park they went to had a stocked pond for kids to fish at, as well as a playground. Ducky was all about the climber!
All done and op checked!
We are supposed to get a large amount of rain over the next few days, so got it done just in time. Importantly, we get our front AC back so once these few days of ‘winter’ are over in Florida, we can go back to our regularly scheduled summer!
Dometic denied my warranty claim for the failed AC, but said I could take the old unit to a service center to be checked. They want warranty claims to be checked by one of their people, but don’t cover mobile service calls. By the time we paid for the service calls, it would be the cost of a new unit, if not more.
I did a few other odds and ends – replacing security lights on the house and working to replace a failed battery backup unit for the one of our file servers. I have another project in the works to build a new main server since the failed Back up unit caused a problem in my Synology unit on a recent power flicker when a thunderstorm came by. ☹️
I have most of the important data backed up in a couple locations, but it remains to be seen what I will get out of our Synology units with file system issues.
Those parts are on order, and over the next week or two I’ll be doing the server build.
We gave our tenants in the house notice, and we are all looking forward to getting back into the house. I’ve got a couple projects in mind for the house that will keep us busy for a bit. We appreciate our friends and tenants and we’re doing our best to help them get resettled.
It’s been fun in the RV, but we’ve outgrown it, rather literally, and it’s time to get back into a house. We may still do some short trips in it, but I think we need a larger RV for the growing family. We are in need of a tri-axle unit that is configured for more sleeping areas for everyone.
I’ve got the new truck, Huginn, in the shop right now and he should be done getting checked over by the end of the month. He’s getting all new brakes, and some of the components were sized up. I’m going to go visit the shop next week and discuss a transmission cooler modification and see what else they have discovered. I can’t wait!