Family trip Archives - Build Your Own Adventure

Why YouTube??

Our family isn’t exactly one to share tons of information with everyone. It’s safe to say three of the five of us are introverted and the other two have their moments! So why in the world would we want to start a YouTube Channel and share things with folks we don’t even know? I’m not really sure I have a clear answer for you..

I think it started way back when I was a kid. My parents purchased a giant camcorder to record our school functions. I thought it was the coolest thing ever. Any chance I got, I was holding this monstrosity up on my shoulder and trying to film anything I could. I remember watching music videos on MTV and thinking that I could probably make my own. I do remember having a buddy over and trying to make a few. We thought they were great, but I’m pretty sure they were no where close to it.

Then there was the Gateway Desktop we had. I couldn’t tell you anything about Gateway now, but at the time, I thought it was as amazing as a new MacBook Pro is today. This beast had music editing software installed from the factory! My brother-in-law and I became obsessed with mixing music imediately. I’ve always loved music, but this changed the way I saw and heard it for the rest of my life. I could imagine the wave forms in every song I heard on the radio. I could pick out exactly where I would cut it and start another song. We learned to blend the transitions and we would sit there for hours listening to our masterpiece! I still get pumped up thinking about it.

During high school and college, I spent lots of time filming wakeboarding trips with my friends. At some point, I purchased my own desktop and found Window’s Movie Maker. It was the most basic editing software, but that didn’t stop me from editing our wakeboard footage and adding music. This led to posting videos from local tournaments on a forum called End of Rope Gang. It was always a challenge to make my videos better and more exciting to watch. Unfortunately, my desktop and End of Rope are no longer with us, so all of those videos are just a memory.

This brings us to present day. Many things have changed since I was making wakeboard videos! We carry video cameras in our pockets and there’s a magic app called YouTube. If only it were around when I was in school!

As I’m sure you’ve seen or read, we’ve been camping for years. Like many RVers, we enjoy watching full time families travel and see the country. As a family, we have always dreamed of traveling further and more often, but maybe not living full time in a camper. The time came when we got a crazy idea to build our own camper. That idea led to the idea of creating a channel to share our build. Once the channel began growing, it really gave us a way to express ourselves creatively.

Editing videos and sharing our adventure has been almost therapeutic for me. I get lost in the editing process and picking music just like I did back in the day on the old Gateway. It’s a lot of work outside our everyday work life and school events, but it’s absolutely worth it. I enjoy the freedom to post whatever we want and to create at our own pace. It has been a great place for inspiration for myself and my family, and I hope that you find it to be inspirational as well.

Big Red Update: Sliding Barn Door and Paint!

Once our kitchen was mostly ready, it was time to tackle another challenge. Our bathroom desperately needed a real door!! For our first few trips we used a curtain to cover the entrance, making it way too easy for the kids to bust in at any moment. Not an issue for a mom apparently, but for this dad, I was over it after my first bathroom visit!

We knew early on that we needed to come up with a compact option for our door. Ashley also knew early on that she wanted a sliding barn door for the bathroom!?!?

There were quite a few challenges with a barn door. First of all, it uses rollers that are only held down by gravity to keep the door in place. Knowing how much things move when traveling had me questioning if we would find a door smashed through our refrigerator when we got to our next campsite.

The second problem was figuring out how to fill the gap around the doorway but leave enough space to let the door slide freely. This would also keep nosy children from peeking through the gap!

But the problem that stood out the most for me was that I had never built a door! Like every other part of this build, I was going to wing it and hope for the best.

I jumped on Amazon and ordered this barn door kit, a floor guide and a handle. Then I went down to Lowe’s and picked up the lightest and cheapest trim boards that I thought could be strong enough to build a door. Luckily, we had collected a few free pallets for our build, so I decided I would use those to give our door a nice contrast to the white wood trim boards. With my trusty pocket hole kit and a miter saw, I got right to it.

I have to admit that when I started this build, I really didn’t care for woodworking. There’s something about sawdust that reminds me of beach sand. It gets everywhere and it drives me crazy when it gets in my sandals. 😆

Much like the beach, once I got over the sawdust, woodworking is actually pretty awesome. It’s a beautiful thing to take a few straight pieces of wood and create something functional. I guess what I’m saying is that I’m pretty happy with how our barn door turned out!

Like most other processes during our build, I learned something new, and I have so many ideas on how to build a better door if I ever need to. As for filling the gap between the wall and the door, well I just used standard trim around the doorway and spacers on the mount to adjust the slider out enough to keep the two from touching. It works like a charm!

While I was working on the barn door and also what seemed like weeks after, we were painting.. Probably the most boring and annoying process to me, but it had to be done. Ashley really took control of the painting and knocked most of it out while I was working on other parts of the trailer.

As with any paint project, the hard parts were the fine details and trim work. We are so lucky to live beside the best caulk installer there ever was. My dad came in and caulked all the trim and any other areas that needed it. What a difference that made! Overall, the paint really turned the look of our build around. Instead of looking like the inside of a cargo trailer, it was actually starting to look like a real living space.

Starting a build is a huge undertaking that can really make you question if you have lost your mind. When you get to certain points of your build that really change the look, it gives you a new level of confidence you need to keep going. It’s all about breaking a giant project down in to smaller pieces. Just remember that each small piece is part of a giant puzzle that has to work together. In other words, be sure the run all the wires before the walls are up..

Check out our barn door video by following this link.

Blog Update!!

It’s been nearly two years since our last post…. I would say it’s time to catch up on this blog!

We are obviously way behind on our cargo trailer build updates and all the other events that have taken place during that time. Our plan going forward is to post a mix of past and present day events. I want to fill you in on what it was like to build each part of our camper conversion and I also want to keep you up to date on what we are working on these days. This revival is going to be a team effort. I hope Ashley and I can offer different perspectives on our projects, travel and maybe thoughts about life in general.

Buckle up and hold on tight, because you have a lot of catching up to do! In the meantime, check out our YouTube page for updates on our projects. Also check out MomFeedsFive.com for Ashley’s awesome recipes and helpful tips on feeding our busy family.

Country Roads Take Me Home

West Virginia has always held a special place in my heart. I never lived there, but it’s where both of my parents were born and raised, and most of my family still lives there. Growing up, we visited frequently, and some of my most vivid childhood memories are from there- catching tadpoles in the creek that ran by my cousin’s house, riding four wheelers with my grandpa and uncle, big Thanksgiving dinners at my grandma’s table.

As I have gotten older and busier raising my own family here in North Carolina, my visits to West Virginia have gotten fewer and farther between. But this week, my darling husband grudgingly dragged the giant camper over 400 miles through the mountains to my dad’s hometown of Point Pleasant, which is in the western part of the state, right on the Ohio River.

Just getting there was an adventure in itself! We started off the trip with a flat tire- luckily, Adam found it before we even left home. We had never really pulled the camper through the mountains, and we were nervous about how the truck would do. No worries there, though- the truck pulled like a champ and made it up those mountains with no problem at all! Thank goodness, because once we got over the fear and worry of towing through the mountains we were able to really enjoy the sheer beauty of the drive. Just looking up at the tall mountain peaks and down into the lush green valleys leaves me in awe every time. I haven’t had the chance to travel much past the southeastern United States, but looking out over those mountains, I feel like it has to be one of the most beautiful sites in the world.

The first few days we spent some long overdue time with family. It was so good to see my uncle, aunt and cousins. My children barely remembered them, which broke my heart a little. But after a few days of some serious fishing, ice cream dates, and water balloon fights, we were all best friends again! We stayed at Krodel Park, which is a city park there in Point Pleasant. The campground was older, with mostly permanent and seasonal residents, but they welcomed us with open arms, and the kids had a blast in the park’s splash pad and on the zipline!

After one last evening of Mothman pizza, adults hanging out on the tailgate of the truck, children running through the park, we said our sad goodbyes, promising it wouldn’t be so long before our next trip. We left Point Pleasant and headed to Princeton, in the southern part of West Virginia, a good halfway point on our journey back to North Carolina. Princeton is an awesome little town, with picturesque mountain views, friendly people, and all kinds of outdoor activities. The area is well known for its ATV trails, and we were wishing hard that we had our own ATV so that we could go riding! But the children are still a little young for that, so we decided to go to a local state park instead.

The gorgeous waterfall at Brush Creek Falls State Park.

Brush Creek Falls State Park was just down the road from our campground. We read online that it was just a short hike to the waterfall, so we decided to give it a shot. A few miles down a winding mountain road, we almost missed the turnoff and the small parking area for the trail. Thank goodness we didn’t though, because it was one of the highlights of our trip! The trail was wide and easy to navigate, nestled between the creek and a mountain ledge in the woods. It was cool and refreshing on that hot summer day. We all enjoyed stretching our legs, and even the kids were amazed by the beauty around us. The waterfall was breathtaking, the kind of view you see on a postcard, and the sounds of the water falling into the rocks just brings peace to your soul. We trekked down a steep ledge because we just had to put our feet in that water! A kind local hiker advised us that the trail continues several miles to where the creek empties out into the Bluestone River. We followed it for a while, but of course the kids got tired, so we reluctantly turned around. Still, it was a perfect escape and a wonderful glimpse of the beauty of the world around us.

Chilling out at the pool at Brushcreek Falls RV Resort.

While in Princeton, we stayed at Brushcreek Falls RV Resort, a privately owned campground just a few miles from the state park. It was a little slice of heaven tucked away on a hillside right by the interstate. They had a fabulous pool, playground, putt-putt, gem mining, and all sorts of fun stuff for the kids. There was a go-cart track on the property, and we were told that they hold races and events there, although nothing was going on that weekend. After all the traveling and visiting of the prior few days, we adults were pretty exhausted, and this was the perfect place for us to rest and relax while the kids blew off some steam.

We left Princeton and headed home, feeling refreshed. It had been a perfect week, a good mix of spending time with family, adventuring, and relaxing. It’s always nice to get home, but the heat and humidity of eastern North Carolina had me wishing for those mountain breezes. I guess it’s time to plan our next adventure!