Our Year of Adventures on the Road!!!

I am SO sorry to all of you who have asked me to post sooner!! I know it has been MANY MONTHS since my last post, but I am just now finding the time to write a summary of our adventures being a full-time family on the road for a year! The past couple of months we have been busy settling into our new community and ministry. We have visited with lots of family & friends, celebrated birthdays (Alan turned the big 4-0!) and the boys are getting involved with our church, a local homeschool group, soccer, and library programs! One weird thing that happened - in February,  I ended up getting Bell's Palsy (temporary paralysis on the left side of my face). The symptoms lasted for about a month.  I am just relieved it was temporary and did not last longer than that!

Overall,  everything is going really well! The boys are making new friends as well as enjoying quality time with old ones.  Alan is loving his new ministry! We are so blessed to be serving at such an amazing church here in Texas. It is exciting to see God working through His people!

So- finally...here is the review I promised!!! Just to start, here are some fun facts and adventures by the numbers:

* We visited/traveled through 28 states and Ontario, Canada!

* We were on the road full-time in our RV for 13 months.

* We traveled a total of 12,270 miles in our RV and 22, 769 miles in our mini-van exploring the states we camped in. That's a total of 35,039 traveling miles!!!!

* We stayed in 57 different RV campgrounds/state parks.

* We visited an estimated 35-36 different churches.

* The boys participated in 13 different Junior Ranger Programs with the National Park Service.

* We ate ice cream in EVERY state and another country (Canada)!

* We visited with family, reconnected with old friends, and made lots of new ones!

* We enjoyed serving with the National Center for Biblical Parenting doing seminars all along the east coast.

* We saved all kinds of money during our travels when we joined 9+ grocery/convenience store clubs (that we can remember..ha!) and 5 camping memberships!

* The boys took turns buying a postcard from every museum/state capitol/national park we visited:

Our year on the road was full of amazing adventures, museums, parks, campfires, s'mores, miles, history, firsts, laughs, family time, nature, new friends, and memories of a lifetime.  We are forever grateful for this wonderful opportunity God gave us!  When I first started to narrow down the thousands of pictures from our adventures to post a slideshow on the blog, I still ended up with almost 500 photos!!!! I decided that was WAY too long! (I figure even our family would not want to sit around to watch a 35 minute slide show!)  I tried to get it down to around 300 or so, which was really hard for me to do. So...here is the 20 minute slide show :) ...for anyone who wants to see, click the link below to view our year of adventures:

****UPDATE**** We fixed the video so that everyone can see it now (It was password protected before, but now you can view it! Just click the link below:

Haigood Family RV Adventures!

Blessings to you and yours,

Jill and the boys:)

Our Big Announcement!!

When our journey as a full-time family on the road began in November of 2012, we didn't know how long we would travel or exactly where we would end up.  We have prayed for God to show us His will for our family and over the past few months, He has revealed His plans to us.  The past 13 months have been amazing, challenging, fun, crazy, wonderful, exciting, and...well... the list goes on. As a family, we all have learned so much not only about the history and cultures of the United States, but about each other as well.  We have experienced the joys of spending quality time with each other, reuniting with family & friends, meeting new people at our NCBP seminars, churches, and RV park campgrounds.  We have also experienced some challenges as we adjusted to a very small living space, explored and got lost in new surroundings, had feelings of loneliness as we missed family & friends, and had a few funny mishaps on the road.  I would like to say that I never doubted or had a bad attitude along the way, but that would not be completely honest.  There were moments that I really struggled and had my doubts. Then, there were the times I just marveled at how God brought all of His plans together for us to experience this amazing journey together as a family.  We have grown in so many ways...ways that we didn't even realize that we needed to grown in!

So- as many of you may already know, our new adventure is that we have settled down...permanently! Alan has accepted a position as the Children's Pastor at a wonderful church here in Texas.  We have seen God's perfect timing throughout this process, and we are SO thankful! Our new church family has been very welcoming to all of us.  We are so excited for our new ministry opportunity!

We decided to find an apartment to call home for awhile to give us time to settle into our new community and get to know the area before we purchase a "sticks and bricks" home.  We managed to move and get almost everything settled in time for Christmas.  It has been so wonderful!! We also believe that it is time to sell our "home on wheels" as well. So- if you have been following our blog this past year, and we have actually inspired you to do something totally crazy (like sell/donate everything and travel the U.S. in an RV while homeschooling your children)...have we got THE RV for you!!!!!:)  Here is a link to the listing for more info/photos:Houston Craigs List

I am working on another post that will summarize some fun facts of our travels...number of states...miles...parks, etc. But- until then, I leave you with some fun pictures of the boys when we first walked into our new apartment home...

We were all SO excited to actually have room to spread out and do "FLOOR ANGELS"!!!!!

A few of the boys even kissed the ground! HA!

I have to admit...I sure do appreciate a lot of little things a WHOLE lot more now...my OWN washer and dryer in the apartment, a dishwasher, my very own bathroom (Yes- Alan and I share it, but that is OK because...I have my very own bathroom sink!!!!) Ahh...the finer things in life:)

Blessings to you and yours!!

Jill and the boys:)

"Road School" Days - Fall 2013

In mid-September, we started homeschooling again after a short summer break.  This past year of "roadschooling" ...traveling from Florida to Maine and being able to experience so much U.S. History with our boys...it truly has been an amazing opportunity and blessing!

This year we have one FIFTH grader...wow...time flies!

one fourth grader...

one kindergartner...

(Caleb had fun learning to spell with Cheez-its!)

...and our youngest is in preschool!

For several years we have enjoyed using My Father's World curriculum.  It really has worked well with our four boys.  This year, we are studying Rome to the Reformation. On the first day of school I came out wearing a toga, and well...you can see in the photo below the boys had mixed reactions! Ha!

One rainy afternoon, the older boys made an arch with pudding and cereal boxes!

Some of you might be wondering...what is it like to homeschool four young boys in an RV?  (You can read my previous posts on "roadschooling" by visiting the right side of the blog under the "Labels" section and just click on the "Homeschooling/Field Trips" posts. ) There are some days that homeschooling in an RV can feel cramped and there is not enough room for everyone to use the table or spread out (OK-that is honestly EVERY day!).  So- on the days when we just need to spread out (or when I am about to pull all of my hair out!!)  we take a field trip and visit the local public library.  The only down side of traveling full-time is that we cannot check out books at the library because we are not local residents.  So- when we do visit a public library, we usually spend a few hours there while the boys read books during our visit. 

Most school days, the boys are divided into two groups. The older boys do school at the table while the younger two play in the back room in the RV or do some activity on the couch. Then, part of the time when I am teaching the younger two boys, the older boys go back to their beds to read.

Making clay tablets

Learning shapes and colors

Caleb's Creation Book

We often do some subjects, like science projects, together as a family. This fall, we have been studying the human body and one day we put together a human "cell" made with jello...

The fun part was putting the gummy worm, peas, beans and a grape in the gooey jello to make the different parts of a cell...

The past week we have been studying all about bones.  When I realized this lesson involved going to a butcher to get some raw animal bones, and then cutting them open...well...I decided this would be a GREAT science project for Alan to take over and teach the boys! (I get queasy at the thought of it! Just...eewwww!!!)

Sometimes we all do a craft together, which can be challenging with four different ages!

We have also made raisins from grapes...

This was a learning experience! The book made it sound like it would take just a few days in the sun for grapes to turn into raisins.  Our grapes must have been really big, because it took about 2 weeks for them to shrivel up!!!

Then, there are days when I surprise the boys with something crazy fun...like writing our spelling words in shaving cream!!!

Yes- many of our days homeschooling in an RV can be really challenging, cramped and CRAZY!! But- when I really stop and think about my life, I am truly grateful for this past year on the road as a family. Life has not been perfect, and there have been lots of opportunities for each of us (especially me) to learn & grow in the areas of patience, grace, and gratefulness!  During this season of Thanksgiving, I am thankful for my many blessings...family, friends, good health, a warm bed, electricity, running water, and the list goes on and on...

May you and yours have a very blessed Thanksgiving!

Jill and the boys:)

Leaving CT and On to Vermont...

After we left Maine and I returned from my Texas trip to be back with Alan and the boys, we enjoyed a quick visit with my family in CT before heading up north to Vermont. The boys had been there all week and had so much fun. (I will let Alan post on that soon...he did such a good job last time! It is funny how much I learned about what happens when Mom is away! HA!) 

On the day we left CT, I remembered to get some photos of the boys at the frog pond in my Dad's backyard. I loved catching and watching the frogs here when I was a little girl!

Some frogs were little...

Some frogs were HUGE! Joshua caught one of the really big ones in his net! He was SO proud!

Then, after our goodbyes, we headed out on the road again...

Can I just say that Vermont is absolutely beautiful?!??

Alan gets a good laugh as I tell him "OH WOW! Just look at that!" and then I remember...oh yeah...he is busy driving a motorhome, towing a van, following directions from the GPS and keeping his eyes on the road!!!! He is such a patient husband!:)

We ended up staying only one night at a state park here in southern Vermont.  We just had to get our state sticker for our RV map, right?!  I wish we could have visited here longer though! The area was beautiful, and the the weather was SO nice! We actually got pretty chilly that night as we were cooking dinner and hanging out around the campfire.  It was the middle of August...but it was cold enough for some of us to wear our jackets!

Ramen Noodles...It's what's for dinner!!!

The firewood was damp, so it took awhile for the fire to get going...

Along with the campfire, always comes s'mores of course!

We woke up to another beautiful, sunny day full of blue skies...

I saw this cabin along the road as we were driving and it just seemed to fit the picture when I think of Vermont...log cabins by a lake...surrounded by evergreen trees...

and then I saw this small church too...perfect for a picture!

We did stop by a local store and grabbed some authentic Vermont maple syrup to enjoy with our next pancake breakfast...yummy!

Our next stop was upstate New York...to visit Niagara Falls!

Blessings to you and yours,

Jill and the boys:)